We live in an age when SecWar “Whisky Pete” Hegseth can end mandatory flu vaccinations for our troops and claim it’s about freedom. After all, it’s not like strong, virile American warriors can ever be sidelined by sickness … oh. Wait. So it’s not surprising the tobacco industry, which screeched about freedom for decades as a defense against regulation, is pushing tobacco as a mind-hack. And influencers aligned with RFK are claiming nicotine is healthy; Jillian Michaels, for example, says “Nicotine, unto itself, is not toxic. It’s beneficial,”
I don’t know if these people are crackpots, trying to gain attention by swimming against what we know about tobacco or taking some kickbacks (and it could be all of them) but this is grade-a bullshit. Nicotine is extremely toxic, and it’s incredibly addictive (details at the link). Unfortunately I suspect lots of people primed to believe medical knowledge is garbage will swallow this snake oil, particularly as there are many products that allow them to indulge without smoking. The UK, by contrast, has just passed a bill that says nobody under 17 now can ever smoke cigarettes legally. In the US, by contrast, we have a former tobacco lobbyist getting a senior-level gig at the CDC.
The rejection of medical knowledge reflects the MAGA movement’s general hatred of science for telling them what they don’t want to hear: “GOP political orthodoxy includes positions that are at odds with the scientific consensus on multiple issues, ranging from the validity of the theory of evolution, to the reality of climate change, to the efficacy and safety of vaccines. In each case the scientific consensus is solidly grounded in evidence. But even before the rise of MAGA the U.S. right was increasingly hostile to evidence-based policymaking — especially, of course, where the evidence is unfavorable to fossil fuel interests or quack medicine, both financial mainstays of right-wing politics.”
Plus there’s the desperate desire to grab clicks by offering more bullshit than the competition: “In an interview posted Tuesday with podcaster Benny Johnson, former Rep. Matt Gaetz insisted there’s a secret program that is actively working to breed alien-human hybrids designed to help officials communicate with people on other worlds.” Then again, perhaps I’m being unfair — Gaetz may well be stupid enough to believe what he’s saying.
And of course there’s the general paranoia about non-existent health risks, like claiming local governments should ban farms-to-solar-power projects because of dangerous radiation. In contrast, of course, to the environmentally friendly oil and gas industries … whom I’d lay pay are promoting this kind of balderdash.
Now other links:
RFK Jr. once claimed that every black drug is put on drugs such as Adderall, therefore they need to be taken from their families. Confronted with this claim by Rep. Terri Sewell, he lied.
Anti-vax Moms in California are suing the state for a religious exemption to school vaccine requirements.
Contrary to Kennedy no, fluoridating water does not destroy our brains. But his administration is doing its best to let disease destroy us.
“Most states allow parents of adult children with disabilities, family members of children with disabilities, and family members of the elderly to be paid for providing attendant care.” Kennedy, child of wealth, thinks this should be an unpaid labor of love. Fits with his general bias against disability
“Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s health agency has altered the guiding document for an influential vaccine panel by enhancing its role in considering safety risks and expanding qualifications for membership to include knowledge of “recovery from serious vaccine injuries.”
The head of the Veterans Affairs Department has repeatedly said that the agency needs to hire more doctors, nurses and other providers “taking care of people on the front line,” even as President Trump seeks to shrink the federal government. But the V.A. has eliminated thousands of medical positions that were left vacant after a wave of resignations and retirements last year, according to a New York Times analysis of internal agency records that have not previously been reported.”
The CDC has found that “the covid-19 vaccine cut the likelihood of emergency department visits and hospitalizations for healthy adults last winter by about half,” Under Kennedy, they’re not going to publish the report. Oh, and “Pfizer has ended its large Phase III Trial of an updated COVID19 vaccine. They were not able to enroll enough people to meet their goal. A major problem is the FDA’s wholly unreasonable demand that people with chronic conditions, who benefit most from the vaccine, not be allowed to participate.”
“The legal battle between the administration and the research community started last February, when the National Institutes of Health abruptly announced it would cap payments for research overhead at 15%. Three lawsuits opposing the caps were immediately filed by state attorneys general and organizations representing private and public universities, hospitals, and academic medical centers. ” In a rare victory for medical/science sanity, the administration has given up the fight. On the other hand, “A lawyer for the Trump administration told a judge on Wednesday that Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has such broad authority over vaccine policy that he could even scrap recommendations for measles shots in favor of people deliberately exposing themselves to the virus.”
And on another hand, “The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has temporarily paused testing for rabies and pox viruses, the family of viruses that includes smallpox and mpox, according to an update to the agency’s website on Monday.” It no longer has enough staff with expertise.
Conversion therapy is traumatic and harmful. Banning seems within standard state oversight of medical practice. But because it hurts gays and the right wing likes to hurt gays, SCOTUS has decided bans violate free speech. Unlike restrictions on what doctors can say about abortion …
The Toddler has boasted about cutting drug prices by 1,000 percent. RFK Jr. lies that the Toddler isn’t wrong, he just calculates a special way. As noted at the link, the Toddler is still wrong.
I’ll leave with this snarky assessment from Shakezula following Kennedy’s demand Starbucks prove coffee with sugar in it (not as much as he claims) is safe: “Junior is not a details person. Or a knowledge person. Or a let experts figure this out while I stay in my lane person. He’s a my opinions are always right person and those people are shit at creating policy because everything has to be filtered through their ego. Even when the basis for the opinion is perfectly fine: There’s too much sugar in the average American’s diet, the journey through his brain makes it shitty … He is also an extremely privileged person of the most out-of-touch variety, who recently told people they should eat liver or cheaper cuts of steak if they can’t afford the type of massive steak that is pictured first on his newly released, visually chaotic, dietary guide.
The correct answer was to reel off other protein sources, including foods that aren’t animal based. But that would require details and considering other people’s points of view. He doesn’t want to do that. He wants to ride his food is medicine hobby horse, which involves telling people that if they eat the way he tells them to they won’t get sick. It does not involve helping people purchase the food he says they need to eat. I can’t find any sign he objected to Republican cuts to SNAP benefits. But it’s the ultimate version of the patient as consumer of health care model.”
