A former GOP administration doctor has criticized Donald Trump's administration for RFK Jr's stance on one crucial health issue.
The Secretary of Health and Human Services has, like many of his colleagues, aired his skepticism about vaccines in recent weeks. Jonathan Reiner, the former cardiologist to Vice President Dick Cheney, has consistently called out RFK Jr. for his rhetoric and advice to the American people. The Secretary of Health, earlier this week, claimed US citizens should avoid eating bagged food, which Reiner took issue with.
It appears official bodies are taking issue with RFK Jr's comments, too, with a US vaccine advisory committee meeting scrapped. No new dates for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention meeting, which had been scheduled for later this month, have yet been announced.
Reiner responded to this worrying development with a statement on X, writing, "The White House appears to be reining in HHS. Recent polling shows that there’s low public confidence in the recent changes to the US vaccination policy, and the CDC.
"In response, the acting CDC director was just removed, new leaders were installed at HHS, and the FDA just reversed course on reviewing Moderna’s flu vaccine, likely after pressure from the White House. The admin seems to now understand that the assault on vaccines politically is a losing strategy, and this is not the time for ACIP to create more havoc."
Reiner's comments come just two days after he ripped into RFK Jr for the Health Sec's claim that Americans are the unhealthiest people in the world. Speaking to Theo Von, the Secretary of Health said, "When my uncle [John F. Kennedy] was president of this country, I was 10, he spent nothing on chronic illness. Zero.
"Today we spend $4.3trillion a year, and it's about 40 cents out of every tax dollar that is paid by you, to the federal government, that is going towards treatment for chronic disease. It's unsustainable, and it's getting worse every year.
"Individuals have a responsibility - when I was a kid, one in five children were obese. Today it's- overweight is 40%, and adults are even higher. People do not get obese because they're invalids or lazy, or they don't want to do exercise. They got that way because they are being mass poisoned."
Reiner replied, "Americans are not the sickest people in the world. There’s a lot we can do to improve the health of our population, including eating better (and vaccinating our kids) but to call Americans the sickest people in the world, is just bulls---."
