Tag: Food and Drug Administration

Donald Trump and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. (RFK Jr.)

Every accusation was a confession of what they wanted to do if they were to attain power

On Friday, President Donald Trump signed an executive order that would shift power over grantmaking away from career scientists to political appointees. Lysenkoism 2.0 has been made official policy, and science in the US is in deep trouble.

/ August 11, 2025
Robin toppled. (Vinay Prasad.)

EBM “Boy Wonder” Vinay Prasad is toppled

Evidence-based medicine "Boy Wonder" Dr. Vinay Prasad was fired as CBER Director after less than three months on the job. What can the kerfuffle surrounding his ouster tell us about the FDA and doctors who enabled Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.?

/ August 4, 2025
Vinay Prasad, MD, MPH

COVID-19 contrarian Dr. Vinay Prasad meets real world responsibility

Dr. Vinay Prasad parlayed his COVID-19 contrarianism into a high-ranking position in the FDA. Now he's facing real world responsibility, and knives are out for him. Can he survive?

/ July 28, 2025
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Tucker Carlson

After ACIP: Where Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will likely go from here in his quest to eliminate vaccines

HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was on The Tucker Carlson Show last week. It got me to thinking: What's next in RFK Jr.'s crusade against vaccines after he turned ACIP into an antivax committee?

/ July 7, 2025
Mehmet Oz, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Marty Makary, Jay Bhattacharya, Vinay Prasad

Marty Makary and Vinay Prasad embrace a “more fluid concept of evidence” at the FDA

Last Thursday during a roundtable on stem cell therapies, new FDA Commissioner Marty Makary referred to EBM levels of evidence as an artificial and dogmatic construct. Apparently Dr. David Katz's "more fluid concept of evidence" now reigns at the FDA—selectively.

/ June 9, 2025
James Lyons-Weiler

Attacking vaccines through the misunderstanding of medical ethics

Since becoming HHS Secretary, RFK Jr. has been deceptively weaponizing principles of evidence-based medicine against vaccines. Will weaponizing research ethics be next? It might if the ideas of one of his advisors, James Lyons-Weiler, are any indication.

/ May 19, 2025
EBM hierarchy

HHS is weaponizing evidence-based medicine to falsely portray vaccines as unsafe

Last week, HHS announced that all "new vaccines will undergo safety testing in placebo-controlled trials." Sounds good? Not so fast. This is really a deceptive weaponization of evidence-based medicine to undermine confidence in vaccines and eliminate at least some of them.

/ May 5, 2025
Extinction-level event. Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

How bad is it? RFK Jr.’s extinction-level threat to science-based federal health policy and public health is here

Five months ago, I called RFK Jr. an "extinction-level" threat to US biomedical science and public health. That extinction is under way.

/ April 14, 2025
National Institutes of Health (NIH).

RFK Jr. vs. the NIH: Say goodbye to the greatest engine of biomedical research ever created

President-Elect Donald Trump has nominated antivaccine activist and anti-pharma conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. to be Secretary of Health and Human Services. I've written about the damage he will do, if confirmed, to the CDC and FDA, but what about NIH, the greatest engine of biomedical research ever?

/ November 18, 2024
Trump at Madison Square Garden

Donald Trump won. Now what for science-based federal health policy?

Last week, Donald Trump defeated Kamala Harris and will return to the White House in January. What does this mean for science-based federal health policy? Hint: Nothing good. Just like the rest of the government, the worst people are likely to be in charge of health and science policy.

/ November 11, 2024