Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was wrong about many things. Matters in public health Vaccines do not cause autism. Raw milk is more dangerous than pasteurized milk. And cell phones have not been shown to cause brain cancer. But the basic idea behind his attempt to “Make America Healthy Again” is correct: America is not healthy. And our current system still hasn’t fixed the problem.
Joe Biden took office promising to “defeat” the coronavirus pandemic, cure cancer and provide more people with health care. Perhaps no one in the world has talked more passionately about funding cancer research than Biden, whose son Beau died of brain cancer in 2015, and in 2022 announced the initiative. to reduce cancer deaths in the United States by half over the next 25 years. Biden’s FDA Commissioner Robert Califf has been firm in his argument that the agency must play a role in reversing it. A “catastrophic decline” in American life expectancy and warned again and again about A 2019 study found that only 12 percent of Americans are considered healthy based on their waist circumference. Blood sugar, blood pressure and cholesterol
Of course, a Biden White House won’t end cancer or obesity in four years. But many of the policies have done little to touch America’s broader health problems, despite Califf’s dramatic rhetoric about the nation’s food problems. But FDA’s efforts to improve the situation largely involve providing Americans with more information about healthy foods.
The public health bureaucracy the Trump administration will inherit is more focused and skilled at curing America’s health problems than preventing them. Such defects Even though billions of dollars are spent every year on these agencies, But it damaged the public health establishment’s credibility enough that Kennedy appointed Donald Trump’s Secretary of Health and Human Services, Marty Makary, Trump’s pick to lead the FDA. It has also increased in prominence from speculation that it is “Medical beliefs” in the United States and elsewhere And with Trump’s choice to lead the CDC, former Rep. Dave Weldon has criticized the agency’s vaccine policies. and once tried to block vaccine safety research. Because of what he claims is a conflict of interest. A group of men who have made a living distrusting our existing health care agencies may soon be empowered to try to destroy them.
If we speak honestly The Biden administration has less time to deal with America’s profound health problems. Because it was forced to deal with at least a few disasters. Much of Biden’s term has been spent guiding the country out of the pandemic. Overall, his administration has met most of its COVID goals. Biden White House provides free COVID testing to Americans. and mounted a vaccination campaign that resulted in more than three-quarters of the country being vaccinated. Still, the pandemic has come under pressure from the CDC, with claims that efforts to fight the virus have been too slow and too aggressive. During Biden’s tenure as chairman of the agency Promised to “share science and data faster” and “translate science into practical policy” but has struggled to respond to the ongoing spread of bird flu. Public health experts criticize the CDC for not releasing enough information about the spread of the virus. This includes a human case in Missouri earlier this year. And farmers are unwilling to follow the agency’s recommendations for preventing the transmission of the virus from sick cows to humans.
Some of those disasters are self-inflicted. The FDA is entrusted with making sure our food and drugs are safe. And problems are generally detected quickly after they occur. But for months, the FDA failed to act on whistleblower complaints. It alerted regulators about poor conditions in infant formula factories. This ultimately caused a nationwide shortage of powdered milk. and two infant deaths. Should the FDA decide which tobacco products can be sold? But it has failed to regulate the illicit market for e-cigarettes and nicotine bags like Zyn, and every administration talks about being led by it.”Science and Truth” The White House appears to have bowed to political pressure and abandoned plans to ban menthol cigarettes at the end of a long rulemaking process. The past four years have revealed that key parts of the agency’s remit – especially oversight of tobacco and the food system – have been neglected by agency leaders. In 2022, an independent review of the food court was launched. and FDA Tobacco found that both lacked clarity in mission and goals.
at the same time The administration also failed to achieve its lofty ambitions. Biden has quietly abandoned some of his bolder ideas, such as a campaign promise to create a public option insurance plan. Office of Advanced Research Projects for Health It is a new government agency that funds high-risk, high-reward research. And it is essential to Biden’s cancer goals. Still in the early stages And Republicans in Congress are already eager to cut the budget. And some promises, like Biden’s ambitious goal of helping change America’s diet. It has been seen as just a frivolous pursuit of knowledge.
The administration has branded the 2022 Hunger and Nutrition Conference as the largest and most important nutrition policy conference since the Nixon administration. school and led to the creation of the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (or WIC), which provides food to approximately 6 million Americans each month. The Biden administration summit ended with a pledge to end hunger and improve America’s diet by 2030, but steps were taken to achieve those goals, such as developing a plan to add warning labels to unhealthy foods. that proceed simply And all the agency has done so far on that project is research on potential label designs. The FDA has also committed to reducing sodium in foods. But the targets set for the food industry are entirely voluntary.
These efforts are painstaking and bureaucratic. The agency’s warning about warning label design comes amid threats from the food industry to sue any labels. That is actually considered unfair in the American legal system. Regulators have trouble forcing companies to do many things without being viewed as unconstitutional. But the Biden administration’s efforts appear laughably inadequate. Considering the extent of America’s health problems
RFK Jr. promises a break from the status quo. This is not to say that if he is confirmed as health secretary. He has a better plan. Most of his ideas included nothing more than declarations that he would take immediate action once Trump was sworn in as president. The reality is that many endeavors can take months or even years to complete. And some may not be possible at all. For example, he has signaled that he will clear house at the FDA food court, despite rules that prevent government officials from being fired against their will. He also pledged to ban certain chemicals in food. which he argued contributed to America’s declining life expectancy. But for every chemical banned by the FDA, it must go through a lengthy regulatory process. This may be challenged by food companies in court. Kennedy’s idea to significantly change the system of fees drugmakers pay to the FDA to review their products could plunge the agency into a budget crisis.
If Kennedy is confirmed to lead HHS, he will have to quickly confront the reality that governing is a slow and tedious process. It doesn’t give importance to big, bold ideas. Even if a callous leader like Trump is the perpetrator. At the beginning of the first term Trump has declared war on drug companies. which he claimed Trump’s then-Health Secretary Alex Azar “got away with murder” because of the high price tag. It took the next four years to make major changes. This includes requiring drug manufacturers to post prices in TV ads. Importing medicine from Canada Tie American drug prices to those of other countries. and cancel the refund where middlemen negotiate for insurance companies But each idea got bogged down in bureaucracy and litigation. Early Efforts Trump’s efforts to control COVID by blocking international air travel have done little to keep the virus out of America. This is despite his claims at the time that the policy “saved us” from a wider outbreak.
Biden benefits from Operation Warp Speed’s rapid push to create a vaccine. But it was his team of technocrats who finally distributed the vaccine. And finally they lowered the price of the medicine. In a much simpler way than Trump has proposed. But democratic technosystems also fail to address our most pressing and visible health problems. Trump’s picks have little experience in navigating the Rube Goldberg conundrum that is American bureaucracy. They certainly aren’t afraid to try new things. But we’re finding out how far it can take them.
