RFK Jr. vs. Big Pharma Goliath: What Can Be Done to Rein in Drug Makers, Big Food and the FDA
© AP Photo / Patrick Semansky
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Donald Trump has tapped Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for HHS chief - the top advisor to the president on health-related matters, and chief administrator overseeing the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health, Medicare and Medicaid. Here's what he can actually do to make real change.
Fixing even a fraction of the problems contributing to America's health crisis could prove daunting, with the nation facing an obesity epidemic (over 70% of American adults are obese or overweight), an addiction scourge (15% use illicit drugs, 20% suffer from alcohol dependency), a prescription drug crisis (66% use at least one prescription medication), contaminated drinking water (a concern for nearly half of the population), skyrocketing autism (which affects one in 36 children, compared to about one per 1,000 in the 1980s), and other serious health-related issues.
Kennedy has recognized the gargantuan scope of the challenge, saying in a recent interview that the US health care system as it’s presently set up means there’s “nothing more profitable” than keeping Americans sick “for life,” with chronic disease a big business he estimates to be worth some $4.3 trln (i.e. about five times the size of the US’s 2024 defense budget).
Kennedy has yet to lay out the details of his agenda as potential Trump Health and Human Services Secretary, including for make good on promises to rein in Big Pharma, but has dropped important hints in recent interviews and speeches about:
negotiating with drug companies on medication costs,
barring major pharmaceuticals from being able to spend billions of dollars on television advertising, which he has characterized as a disguised form of lobbying and insurance against media criticism,
ending vaccine mandates, at least for federal agencies and the military, and lobbying to do so at the state level, while preserving Americans’ rights to make an informed choice,
reforming vaccine research standards. Kennedy has been outspoken in his criticism of former chief presidential medical advisor Anthony Fauci and others at the NIH over US-funded gain of function research thought to have ultimately caused the Covid crisis.
As Secretary of Health and Human Services, Kennedy would also be responsible for America's food safety regulations, an area of government he has said repeatedly has been captured by big corporations. On this front, Kennedy could:
encourage municipalities to get rid of fluoride in tap water, citing fluoride's long-suspected impact IQ levels in children,
push to ban or at least restrict artificial food coloring, additives and chemicals,
restrict processed foods in school lunches, and roll back subsidies for corn and soy,
end perceive FDA overregulation on “stem cells, raw milk, hyperbaric therapies, chelating compounds, ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, vitamins, clean foods, sunshine, exercise, nutraceuticals and anything else that advances human health and can’t be patented by Pharma,” as he suggested in a recent X post.
RFK Jr. also wants federally-funded medical schools to focus more on nutrition, and to create a national fitness standard like the one promoted by his uncle – President John F. Kennedy.
Kennedy has promised to take on conflicts of interest between regulators and the entities they’re meant to be regulating – citing money given to the FDA by Big Pharma, and corporate links to health and dietary advisories.
The HSS Secretary job requires Senate approval, meaning Kennedy’s selection could become a daunting uphill battle come January, especially if Big Pharma and Big Food use their lobbying muscle to pull strings to block his appointment.
Battle lines are already being drawn, with GOP senators promising to give him a shot, calling his selection “a bad day for Big Pharma,” and his candidacy a "brilliant" move by Donald Trump. Senate Democrats have rushed to dub Kennedy a “fringe conspiracy theorist” spouting “outlandish views on basic scientific facts,” over his much-publicized vaccine hesitancy, and argued that his selection “would be nothing short of a disaster.”
Senior officials from agencies Kennedy would be tasked with overseeing also called him out, with Clinton-era HHS chief Donna Shalala saying he’s “totally unqualified” and “dangerous” to America and the world.
Former Obama HHS chief Kathleen Sebilius, meanwhile, has expressed hopes that Kennedy would get bogged down in the agency's bureaucracy. "He has no organizational management experience, and HHS is one of the largest domestic organizations," she said, highlighting the agency's 83,000 employee workforce and massive $1.7 trillion budget.
Kennedy has expressed readiness to work with the HHS and its subordinate agencies, but warned naysayers in top jobs, including at the FDA, that he will not tolerate efforts to block his initiatives. “If you work for the FDA and are part of this corrupt system, I have two messages for you: 1. Preserve your records, and 2. Pack your bags,” he wrote in a tweet last month.
