Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Confirmed as Trump’s Health Secretary: Shots

Despite millions of dollars spent by groups against his nomination, the Senate voted to install Robert F. Kennedy Jr. at the helm of the Department of Health and Human Services.

Kennedy was facing opposition from the Left in his decades of commenting on conspiracy theories of vaccines and from the right of his previous support for abortion rights. For several weeks, it was uncertain whether he had enough senators who supported him to get through. Yesterday, Democratic Senators were talking on the floor past midnight in protest. But on Thursday morning he had the votes to be confirmed. Voting was 52 to 48. Mitch McConnell, the former Republican majority leader and a polio survivor, joined Democrats to vote against Kennedy.

There are many questions about what happens next to Medicare, vaccines and medical research. Here is a guide to five key questions to see as Kennedy takes control of the huge health agency in the coming weeks:

1. Congress could cut Medicaid and (perhaps) Medicare

Kennedy hasn’t talked much about the future of Medicaid or Medicare, and in his hearings the basic questions fumbled about how they were created. But he is now supervising both popular programs that together secure about 140 million Americans.

As soon as the 119th congress was sworn in, the Republicans began to talk about ways to cut down on spending in Medicaid. It is a public health program for low -income persons who are partly paid by the federal government and partly by states. Historically, it has been very popular with the public – one KFF Survey From last year, 71% of Americans found that the program should mostly continue as it is.

In the midst of interviews about cuts, President Trump declared that his team would “love and appreciate” Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, and that any cuts would be related to waste or abuse and would not affect the recipients.

But cuts far beyond waste and abuse may come anyway to free up funds for Trump’s priorities such as tax cuts and border security. Conservative groups and Republican lawmakers have long claimed that Medicaid has grown too large – during the pandemic, registration grew to 80 million people. The proposal from the House Republicans would try to find $ 880 billion in cuts to Medicaid. States are likely to reduce benefits and limit eligibility. Medicare could also be in for cuts of some kind.

Dr. Mehmet Oz, the heart surgeon, the TV personality and the former candidate for the Senate in Pennsylvania, are Trump’s choice to lead the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, which is part of HHS. A date of OZ’s confirmation hearing has not yet been determined.

2. Future of vaccine policy after confusing signals in hearings

When the senators voted to confirm Kennedy, an outbreak of measles in Texas continued. Seam Marfa Public Radio reportedNine is hospitalized in an outbreak of at least 24 measles in Gaines County, which has one of the lowest vaccination rates in the country. All cases are in people who were unvaccinated, most are children.

Kennedy is one of the country’s most prominent vaccine opponents. During confirmation hearings, he repeatedly claimed he was not an anti-vaccine or against the vaccine plan, and he said he supported certain vaccines, including polio. However, he would not accept that the connection between autism and vaccines had been thoroughly debunked.

Kennedy won confirmation of strength of his promises to Senator Bill Cassidy, R-La., A Doctor and President of Senate Health Committee. These promises included that he would not interfere with the current vaccine policy and that Cassidy would oversee some of his decisions on HHS.

The former chairman of the committee, late. Patty Murray, D-Wa., Said at a press conference this week that these promises were not credible. “Republicans choose to pretend as if it is in any way credible that RFK Jr. will not use his new power to do exactly what he has been trying to do for decades: undermining vaccines,” she said.

There is much that Kennedy could do on vaccines with regard to the appointment of advisers, direct NIH research and change public health messages about the importance of vaccines. Public Health and Medical Advocates will look closely to see what Kennedy is doing at this arena.

3. Will the HHS get the DODE treatment?

DOGE, the Elon Musk-led effort to unilaterally dismantle agencies through furloughs, layoffs and stop work orders, could well come to HHS.

Right now, HHS has a budget of almost $ 2 trillion and a staff of 90,000 people. A huge part of this budget is Medicare and Medicaid, the public health programs for seniors and people with low income respectively. DOGE employees have been at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services for the past several weeks, CMS officials told NPR.

Other health agencies that are part of HHS include Food and Drug Administration, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and National Institutes of Health.

Project 2025, the plan from the Heritage Foundation, which has so far adapted to Dog’s actions, suggests dramatic changes to HHS, including division of CDC into two agencies and eliminating forces. Kennedy has not talked much about his plans for the agencies, except to say that he would fire 600 NIH researchers and instruct the agency to redirect resources from infectious disease and to investigate the basic causes of chronic diseases.

4. Science information and research in disorder

Already without Congress or DOGE, the actions of the Trump administration have caused tectonic changes in science in America.

Several executive orders for “ideology” caused federal health agencies to delete scores of databases and web pages that included forbidden expressions such as “gender”, though apparently not – -related sites on tuberculosis and natural disasters also became dark. A federal judge has since instructed the agencies to restore these pages, but their sudden disappearance of resources – including those used by doctors routinely when treating patients – have alerted many in public health and medicine. It is especially unclear how research involving groups that cannot be mentioned, as transient people, can now continue.

Biomedical research – long a source of bipartisan support and national pride – has not been spared either. NIH’s subsidies for research institutions have already been targeted at dramatic cuts, another step that is currently paused by a federal judge. Several Republican Senators, including Cassidy, Susan Collins of Maine and Katie Britt of Alabama, have talked about how harmful this blanket policy could be for universities with major research institutions. Collins wrote in a statement That Kennedy promised her that he would “examine” the policy again when confirmed.

5. How can “MAHA” translate into politics

Kennedy spoke in his confirmation hearings about how he understood the health agencies from a unique point of view – as a science expansion that had spent decades filing for many of them. He claims that the agencies have lost their way and it is reflected in the fact that Americans have poorly expected life expectancy and many chronic illnesses.

He has not yet posted how he can use politics and his power that oversees the agencies to “put America’s health back on track.” He spoke a lot during the consultations about food programs outside HHS ‘jurisdiction, which suggested that he might try to collaborate with the Department of Agriculture to collaborate on programs such as SNAP.

There are powerful industries that can push back against some of his goals like Big Food and Big Pharma, which NPR has reported. And some researchers in public health question how realistically such a revision will be in a Republican-controlled, regulatory-friendly federal government.