Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was in a hurry to clarify his opinions on vaccines, abortion and public health priorities in the first of the two hearings of the US Senate as he tries to plead in favor of the Presidency Donald Trump Secretary of Health.
Kennedy seeks to lead the Ministry of Health and Social Services, the $ 1.7 billion agency that finances medical research, public health awareness, food security and drugs, surveillance of the hospital , the financing of community health care clinics as well as Medicare and Medicaid.
Republicans of the Senate Finance Committee have expressed hope that Kennedy could help reduce chronic diseases and health care costs. Democrats have repeatedly used quotes and transcriptions of his books and public appearances to determine it on several questions, in particular vaccines and abortion.
Senator Ron Wyden, a Democrat, argued that “universal health care abortion, Mr. Kennedy has so often changed his opinions that he is almost impossible to know where he is.”
Some points to remember from Wednesday’s audience:
The senators wanted to know: where is Kennedy on vaccines now?
Kennedy insisted that he was not opposed to the vaccines despite a long history of qualifying them dangerous – and the Democrats do not buy him.
“Frankly, you scare people,” said Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island.
“I’m not anti-vaccine,” Kennedy told the committee. He also said: “I support the measles vaccine. I support the polio vaccine. I will do nothing as secretary of the HHS who makes the task difficult or discourages people from taking one of these vaccines. »»
But before he was nominated, Kennedy sought to discredit the vaccines. He said that “coated photos are a crime against humanity,” Fox News told that he always believed in the demystified idea that vaccines can cause autism and urged people in 2021 to “resist To CDC guidelines on the moment when children are expected to get vaccines.
And during the hearing, Kennedy said that “most experts agree” that 6-year-old children should not get COVVI-19 vaccines because they are not in danger. This is not true for experts who have established a vaccination policy: Food and Drug Administration authorized COVID-19 photos for children as young as 6 months and centers for disease control and prevention recommend to children to To vaccinate.
“Most experts are suitable that covid vaccines are safe and effective for children,” said Dr. James Campbell of the American Academy of Pediatrics after hearing Kennedy’s remark.
Senator Maggie Hassan, a Democrat in New Hampshire, toasted Kennedy about the modification of his position.
“There is no reason why one of us believed that you have reversed the anti-vaccine opinions that you have promoted for 25 years,” she said.
Kennedy was in a hurry on his changing opinions on abortion
The appointment of Kennedy was criticized both defenders of abortion and anti-abortion forces because his position seemed to have changed.
During the hearing, several Democrats pushed Kennedy to change his point of view to better use Trump.
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“I have never seen a great politician turning on this question as quickly as you did when Trump asked you to be secretary of the HHS,” said Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont.
Senator Michael Bennet, a Democrat in Colorado, questioned Kennedy’s changing opinions on abortion by citing his previous statements that abortion should be left to pregnant women, not to the government.
Hassan said she was confused: “You have clearly declared in the past that bodily autonomy is one of your fundamental values. The question is: do you defend yourself this value or not?
Kennedy relied several times on the sentence: “I always believed that abortion is a tragedy” – including during the interrogation of the republican senator James Lankford of Oklahoma, which opposes the ‘abortion.
Kennedy also said he agreed with Trump that states should decide to access abortion.
The Republicans have expressed hope that Kennedy could repair a health care system in difficulty
In his opening remarks, the Senator of Idaho, Mike Crapo, the president of the finance committee, congratulated “Kennedy’s commitment to fight against chronic conditions” and declared that the prevention of diseases “will reduce lives, will reduce costs and built a healthier and stronger country ”.
Senator Ron Johnson of the Wisconsin, who was expressed to criticize the requirements of vaccines during the Pandemic of COVID-19, led to a conversation he had with Kennedy when the former Democrat was planning to join Trump. The senator called this an answer to his prayers.
“We have to cure and unify this divided nation,” said Johnson. “Can we not meet as a nation and do this?”
Kennedy said he did not intend to reform Medicaid
Kennedy has struggled to answer questions about the popular Medicare and Medicaid programs, or to provide details on how he would work to reduce health care costs.
He had no response to the Republican senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, who asked the candidate to share plans for the Medicaid reform, a program financed by taxpayers of several billion dollars which covers health care for around 80 million people, including children. The Republicans said they might need to make deep cups in Medicaid to finance Trump’s proposals.
After Cassidy pressed it several times, Kennedy finally replied: “I have no large proposal to dismantle the program.”
Kennedy then said how the agency’s largest programs work, causing senators corrections throughout the audience. Medicaid, he wrongly said, is entirely paid by the federal government. It is not; Federal states and taxpayers finance it.
Later, he spoke of “high premiums of Medicaid and high franchises”, although the practically free program has neither. He seemed confused as to the questions about the hundreds of community health clinics that the agency finances in the cities of the country or on the role it plays in a federal law which obliges the emergency rooms to stabilize anyone present in his establishment.
The controversial bypass with Cassidy, who heads the health, education, labor and retirement committee that Kennedy sit before Thursday, made the confirmation vote of the uncertain republican. Kennedy can only afford to lose three Republican votes if all democratic senators oppose him.
Kennedy said that “more research” required on abortion drugs, other therapies
Again Wednesday, Kennedy suggested that he just wanted to do more research on vaccines, drugs and other products that have already been vigorously studied by the government and independent scientists.
Kennedy said Trump asked him to study the security of mifepristone, the abortion pill that was used more than 6 million times in the United States to terminate pregnancies.
The FDA approved the drug in 2000 after a four -year exam and repeatedly reaffirmed its safety after examining dozens of studies on tens of thousands of women.
“Here are the security studies that tell us that mifepristone is safe and effective,” said Hassan, brandishing a bunch of what she said is 40 of them.
Kennedy has again called for additional research when questioned about his unleated affirmations that an increase in school fire could be linked to a higher prescription of antidepressants.
Kennedy said his remarks had been distorted and that he suggested that antidepressants could play a role among other factors, such as social media.
“I don’t think anyone can answer this question right now,” said Kennedy.
Antidepressants and other prescription drugs are subject to multiple clinical trials that assess their safety and efficiency before being approved. In addition, the FDA has several systems to monitor emerging side effects with drugs after their market and regularly updates updates and alerts to respond to risks.
On Alzheimer’s disease, Kennedy has also resulted in the state of science and research.
A sticky dirt called amyloid plays a role in Alzheimer’s disease, but Kennedy wrongly said that the National Institutes of Health ignore any other potential culprit.
“The NIH has closed its studies on any other hypothesis,” said Kennedy.
But the budget of $ 3.8 billion in NIH for Alzheimer’s disease and similar dementia includes the search for a range of other factors that can underline the way Alzheimer’s disease develops.
The senators used Kennedy’s own words against him
By reading the transcriptions of the podcast and his own writings, Bennet questioned Kennedy about his previous declaration according to which COVVI-19 was designed to target whites and blacks while sparing the Jews Ashkenazi and the Chinese.
Kennedy denied having said that he was “deliberately targeted”.
Bennet also interviewed Kennedy about an assertion that Lyme disease is “probably a militarily biow-coating weapon”.
“I probably said that,” replied Kennedy.
Kennedy also denied having compared research on the CDC of COVVI-19 vaccines to the “Nazi death camps”, which prompted the Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock of Georgia to read these remarks of a transcription.
The author of the Associated Press Amanda Seitz contributed to this report. Additional Reuters and Global News files