Category: Public Health

Trump is antivax.

“Best practices”: The buzzword that the Trump administration will use to eliminate as many vaccines as RFK Jr. can

The CDC Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices met last week, eliminating the universal recommendation for the birth dose of the hepatitis B vaccine. There was, however, a more insidious threat to vaccines in a White House press release after the meeting cloaked under the buzzword "best practices."

/ December 8, 2025
An assortment of fast food and snacks, including a cheeseburger, hot dog, pepperoni pizza slice, french fries, potato chips, chocolate bar, donuts, cookies, popcorn, onion rings, and a glass of soda with ice.

The War Over Ultraprocessed Foods

Recently the city of San Francisco sued several food giants (Kraft Heinz, Mondelez and Coca-Cola) for deceptively marketing “ultraprocessed foods” and then externalizing the resulting health care costs onto the public. They cite a recent Lancet review which concludes: “The totality of the evidence supports the thesis that displacement of long-established dietary patterns by ultra-processed foods is a key driver of the...

/ December 3, 2025
Vinay Prasad, MD, MPH

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. is definitely coming for your vaccines, part 5: VAERS and a useful idiot at the FDA

In the sadly continuing story of how Health and Human Services Secretary RFK Jr. is working to eliminate vaccines, we look at a useful idiot, Dr. Vinay Prasad, and how he is weaponizing dead children to justify making vaccines harder to approve.

/ December 1, 2025
Graffiti art of a man wearing a judge's wig and crown, holding a scepter and a briefcase, striding confidently. The mural is painted on a wall next to wooden boards and stones.

Read the Comments: “Just Do the Opposite of Whatever This Administration Recommends!”

It's obviously not good that people have lost trust in the FDA, NIH, and CDC. However, since those once vulnerable institutions are now lead by naked emperors, it's good that the American public, at least those that read the news, has uniformly recognized they have no clothes.

/ November 29, 2025
CDC Headquarters

The CDC is lying to you about vaccines and autism

The CDC webpage about vaccines and autism now misrepresents the science and lies to the public about vaccines and autism. It's just part of HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s continuing war on vaccines.

/ November 24, 2025
MAHA has fallen

“MAHA has fallen”? Antivaxxers are getting very impatient with Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Recently, antivaxxers have been expressing their impatience with HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s progress eliminating vaccines. It was inevitable. Has MAHA fallen?

/ November 17, 2025

COVID-19 infection during pregnancy is associated with higher rates of autism and neurodevelopmental diagnoses

A recent study found that infection with SARS-CoV-2 during pregnancy is associated with a higher risk of autism and neurodevelopment disorders. This is yet another reason why vaccination during pregnancy is important.

/ November 3, 2025
Aluminum hydroxide

RFK Jr. is definitely coming for your vaccines, part 4: Aluminum edition (or: Everything old is new again…again)

Last week, news stories reported that HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. had convened an "aluminum working group." Among the "scientists" there are antivax scientists about whom I've been writing for over a decade. Everything old antivax is new again.

/ October 13, 2025
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. lying about vaccines again

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. weaponizes an old antivax trope in his quest to eliminate vaccines

People who keep whistling past the graveyard (of vaccines) to assure themselves that RFK Jr,. won't take away their vaccines are deluding themselves. One seven-minute video he posted last week shows that, weaponizing an old one deceptive antivax trope claiming that vaccines didn't do that much to improve global health.

/ October 6, 2025

The Cholesterol Wars Continue

As a first approximation it seems that the purpose of social media is to misrepresent medical information and to promote wellness gurus who basically have no idea what they are talking about. Part of the problem is that medical science is often complex, and the short attention-span format of social media often favors simple clean narratives. So “wellness influencers” dominate while genuine...

/ October 1, 2025