Adobe Stock (Left), Robert F. Kennedy Jr. by Gage Skidmore / Flickr (Top), Robert Redfield by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention / Wikimedia Commons (Bottom)
CV NEWS FEED // Robert Redfield, who was the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) under the Trump administration, has endorsed Trump’s plan to put Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in charge of a Commission on Childhood Chronic Disease, despite Kennedy’s past criticisms of Redfield and the CDC.
In a video clip posted to the X account “End Tribalism,” Kennedy said Redfield’s recent statement was “breathtaking” since Kennedy has publicly criticized Redfield for years, including in the book “The Real Anthony Fauci.”
“This afternoon he came over and had lunch with me,” Kennedy said. “It was the first time I’ve ever met him, and the first thing he said to me is, ‘You got everything right.’”
In a September 24 op-ed written for NewsWeek, Redfield wrote that “the failing health of our kids, the needless suffering and death, can be ended by a Kennedy Commission on Childhood Chronic Disease.”
Redfield also wrote that “Kennedy is right,” and that the CDC, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) all “suffer from agency capture.”
“A large portion of the FDA‘s budget is provided by pharmaceutical companies,” Redfield wrote:
NIH is cozy with biomedical and pharmaceutical companies and its scientists are allowed to collect royalties on drugs NIH licenses to pharma. And as the former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), I know the agency can be influenced by special interest groups.
Redfield wrote that the U.S. Department of Agriculture “is a captive of industry, too,” as it prioritizes the interests of large corporations over small farmers and public health. “To cure our children, we must reevaluate our food choices and the underlying practices of the agricultural sector.” Redfield continued. “We must prioritize wholesome and nutritious food.”
Kennedy focused on public health during his presidential campaign and continued to speak on public health when he endorsed Donald Trump, according to NewsWeek.
During his speech endorsing Trump, Kennedy stated that American healthcare was “the most important issue” the country faces, according to NewsWeek.
“We spend more on health care than any country on Earth, twice what they pay in Europe, and yet we have the worst health outcomes of any nation in the world,” Kennedy said. “Nobody has a chronic disease burden like we have.”
Kennedy has specifically raised alarms over childhood chronic illnesses, obesity, and high rates of autism. He expressed concern that the American diet is causing chronic illness in a video recently posted on his X account.
In the video, Kennedy specified that the food dye yellow #5, or tartrazine, present in many snacks and drinks, and even vitamins and medicine, was originally a byproduct of coal, which was used to pave roads until a British chemist realized that it could be used as a clothing dye. Now tartrazine is created from petroleum.
Food producers started using tartrazine to sell discolored, low quality foods before they knew that it could cause developmental delays, asthma, tumors, intestinal injuries, and ADHD, among other negative health impacts. Kennedy stated that other countries besides the United States heavily restrict tartrazine, and foods containing it contain warning labels.
It should be noted that Kennedy was a lifelong pro-abortion Democrat until he left the Party this year. Since then, he has softened his stance on abortion, but remains pro-choice.
