On Feb. 13, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., commonly known as RFK, was confirmed as the head of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), despite lacking healthcare-related credentials that the vast majority of occupants in this position possess.
In the few short weeks since RFK has become the head of HHS, past problematic comments by RFK have resurfaced, as well as concerning new policies he wishes to implement.
It is worth noting RFK has had, according to CNN, a worm that entered his brain and “ate a portion of it and then died.” Due to the worm in his brain, Kennedy unfortunately suffered from brain fog and issues with short-term word retrieval. These cognitive-related health issues have caused many to question his ability to adequately head HHS.
RFK Jr. details medical abnormality that he says was a parasitic worm in his brain | CNN Politics
For example, he has baselessly claimed that antidepressant use in adolescents is the cause of school shootings in a 2023 interview with Bill Maher, a comedian and political commentator. The vast majority of readers of this article know at least one adolescent who has used or currently uses antidepressants and has seen firsthand that antidepressants do not encourage the perpetration of heinous acts of mass violence by otherwise non-violent adolescents. The data supports this common-sense realization.
According to a 2019 study conducted by the NIH, “most school shooters were not previously treated with psychotropic medications - and even when they were, no direct or causal association was found.”
Kennedy has made statements about race that are not only scientifically unfounded, but harmful to Black Americans and Americans of other racial or ethnic minority groups.
In a 2021 interview with Dr. Judy Mikovitz and Rev. Robert McCoy, he stated “we should not be giving Black people the same vaccine schedule that’s given to whites, because their immune system is better than ours.”
This claim that Black people have a better immune system than white people is not only incorrect, but harmful. Unfortunately, a large number of Americans, specifically white Americans, hold medically racist beliefs similar to those RFK holds.
According to a 2016 survey conducted by Princeton University, half of medical students and medical residents, a group in which white people are overrepresented, held at least one problematic and incorrect view about Black patients, with 21% of first-year medical students erroneously believing that Black people have stronger immune systems than white people, and 20% of medical students and medical residents believing that Black people’s nerve endings are less sensitive than those of white people and can thus feel less pain.
Placing the issue of scientific accuracy aside, this belief that RFK perpetrates causes real harm to Americans. According to Harvard University's Global Health Institute, this harmful belief has led to doctors, particularly white doctors, viewing Black patients’ pain as insignificant and has also led to lower rates of pain management and treatment in Black patients.
One of the most concerning potential policies promoted by Kennedy is his policy that aims to combat the addiction crisis in the United States. According to the New York Times, Kennedy has suggested that people suffering from addiction to illegal drugs should be required to go to camps referred to as “healing farms.”
He has stated that, at the healing farms, people struggling with addiction would “learn to get re-parented,” and “American kids can reconnect to America’s soil, where they can learn the discipline of hard work that rebuilds self-esteem and where they can master new skills.”
It is unclear what the “reparenting” and “discipline of hard work” refers to, and it is unclear if often life-saving medications for those suffering from addiction, such as Methadone, would be allowed at the camps. He also plans to make the farms available to people who want to cease taking antidepressant medications such as Prozac, which, as discussed earlier in this article, are safe, lifesaving and do not cause school shootings. Ironically, he posits that the farms should be paid for by a federal legalization and subsequent taxation of marijuana.
RFK’s recent confirmation is a major cause for concern, and I urge the reader to always keep peer-reviewed scientific studies in mind when forming their own opinions around vaccines, antidepressants, addiction or any other scientific topic. In addition, I urge the reader to educate themselves about the history of medical racism and how it impacts medical care today and to identify and combat their own biases.
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