Robert F. Kennedy Jr., head of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, seems to be taking his revenge on the American Academy of Pediatrics for defying him. A report from the Washington Post on Wednesday revealed that HHS has abruptly revoked millions in federal funding from the non-profit organization.
According to documents obtained by the Washington Post, HHS has pulled seven grants to the AAP, including some related to studying autism and sudden infant deaths. The AAP has regularly criticized RFK Jr. this year for making changes to the country’s vaccine policies unbacked by evidence. Just this week, HHS officially endorsed the end of a decades-long recommendation to universally vaccinate children against hepatitis B starting at birth.
“The sudden withdrawal of these funds will directly impact and potentially harm infants, children, youth, and their families in communities across the United States,” Mark Del Monte, AAP’s CEO and executive vice president, said in a statement to the Washington Post.
RFK Jr.’s reprisal
In documents viewed by the Post, HHS provided several reasons for the funding cuts.
For instance, the agency took issue that some of the grants were being used for research projects that contained “identity-based language.” In another case, the funded research purportedly didn’t focus enough on nutrition and chronic disease prevention—areas that Kennedy has claimed his HHS is emphasizing more than ever before.
The AAP isn’t the only group that’s lost funding as of late. In a statement to the Post, a HHS spokesperson said that the AAP grants and others were revoked for no longer aligning “with the Department’s mission or priorities.”
Of course, it’s no secret that the AAP and RFK Jr. aren’t exactly on the best of terms these days. On Wednesday, for instance, the organization and others were in federal court as part of an ongoing lawsuit against Kennedy. The AAP is arguing that RFK’s unilateral decision to remove the covid-19 vaccine from the CDC-recommended immunization schedules for children and pregnant women runs afoul of federal law.
Brain drain
While the decision to freeze out the AAP might be Kennedy’s most egregious yet, he’s caused plenty of harm throughout the year.
The AAP, and many other experts, have also lambasted RFK Jr. for hijacking the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, for instance. Earlier this June, Kennedy fired all 17 members of the previous ACIP and installed his own allies, many of whom—like Kennedy—have a track record of misrepresenting the risks of vaccination. Susan Monarez, the former CDC director, has alleged she was fired in August this year for refusing to accept, without review, the recommendations of the new ACIP; several senior CDC officials resigned in protest following her firing.
Without any adults in the room, Kennedy has continued to run roughshod over the country’s public health system. Over the last few weeks, he’s pushed the CDC to boost the debunked link between vaccines and autism, endorsed conspiracies about Lyme disease, and tried to blame antidepressants for causing mass shootings despite next to little evidence supporting such a link.
The AAP might be the latest health organization to earn the ire of RFK Jr., but it probably won’t be the last.
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