SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
us department of health and human services
'A Slap in the Face to Moms and Dads': GOP Blocks Attempt to Stop Trump From Raising Childcare Costs
"If Trump had simply done nothing... some of these families would have ended up saving as much as $15,000 a year," said Sen. Patty Murray.
Jul 31, 2026
In what Democratic Sen. Patty Murray described as a “slap in the face to moms and dads,” Republicans have blocked her proposed resolution to restore a rule that could have saved low-income parents thousands of dollars per year on childcare before the Trump administration axed it.
Under a rule that went into effect earlier this month, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) rescinded a Biden-era rule that capped families’ copayments at 7% of their household income for the Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF), which helps about 994,000 low-income families pay for childcare so parents can work, attend school, or participate in job training.
The program is administered at the state level, and under the abandoned rule that was enacted in 2024, all states were required to begin phasing in the 7% cap, which is considered a federal affordability benchmark.
Under the Trump policy change, states will not be required to cap parents' copayments as long as they continue to use a sliding scale based on income level and don't present a "barrier” to receiving assistance, though it's not specified what that means.
As of March 2026, 19 states had not lowered their maximum copayment to 7%.
An April analysis by the Center for American Progress found that, by eliminating the federal cap, families in 10 states that have not enacted it would lose between $450 and more than $15,000 in potential annual savings, depending on how high their state sets the threshold.
In Ohio, which caps copayments at 27% of household income, families could lose up to $15,482 in annual savings under the maximum copayment. In Vermont, which caps copayments at 14.9% of household income, families could lose up to $11,712.
(Graphic from the Center for American Progress)
Murray (D-Wash), the former chair of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP), introduced a resolution last month under the Congressional Review Act, which would have nullified the administration's elimination of the 7% cap.
It also would have restored other Biden-era requirements that were reversed under the same rule, including requirements that states pay childcare providers based on enrollment rather than attendance, pay them in advance, and use grants and contracts to fund childcare for infants, children with disabilities, and those in underserved communities.
In a speech on the Senate floor before the resolution came to a procedural vote on Thursday, she told her colleagues bluntly, “You are either voting to lower childcare costs or to increase them.”
She challenged the senators who planned to vote against the resolution to “go home and tell the parents in your state you voted to raise their childcare bill,” adding that “you cannot call yourself pro-family while voting to make it more expensive to raise one.”
In a party-line vote on Friday, the bill was blocked from advancing by a margin of 52-47, with every Republican voting against it except for Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who is absent after being hospitalized in June.
After the vote failed, Murray described it as an example of Republicans taking money away from American families struggling to afford the basics of life while pushing for lavish spending on war and tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy.
“How about instead of a $1.5 trillion war budget, we make sure every working family in America can afford childcare?” Murray said. “If Trump had simply done nothing, and left the 7% cap in place, some of these families would have ended up saving as much as $15,000 a year for their family.”
According to a Century Foundation analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics data, childcare costs increased by 5% from August 2024 to August 2025 and now average more than $13,000 per child per year across age groups.
Trump has been surprisingly open about the fact that, under his control, and in direct contrast with his campaign promises, the federal government is prioritizing spending on his war in Iran instead of providing government subsidies for Americans’ basic needs, including daycare.
"We’re fighting wars. We can’t take care of daycare," he said during a speech in April. "You gotta let a state take care of daycare, and they should pay for it too. It’s not possible for us to take care of daycare, Medicaid, Medicare, all these individual things.”
“Trump says we can’t afford childcare. But he is wrong,” said Murray, who has co-introduced legislation to expand federal childcare subsidies and cover nearly all costs for low-income families. “The truth is we can’t afford to ignore childcare.”
Keep ReadingShow Less
Planned Parenthood Sues Trump Admin Over Title X Funding for 'Vital Care'
The organization has "provided affordable sexual and reproductive healthcare, including birth control, STI testing and treatment, cancer screenings, and wellness exams to millions of people through Title X."
Jul 29, 2026
Planned Parenthood Federation of America on Wednesday sued over the Trump administration's attempt to abuse a federal program "for an overtly political and ideological agenda that is at odds with Title X's statutory purpose of funding comprehensive family planning care for those who cannot afford it."
"Title X of the Public Health Service Act is the only domestic federal program devoted solely to family planning for uninsured, underinsured, and low-income people," notes the complaint, filed in federal court in Washington, DC by lawyers at PPFA, Democracy Forward, and Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr.
After the US Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Population Affairs in April announced changes to how it chooses Title X grantees for the 2027-32 cycle, the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association and the Family Health Council of Central Pennsylvania sued last month, backed by the ACLU.
The office then updated the policy earlier this month. However, as Wednesday's complaint explains, the updated version still says that "in evaluating and awarding Title X grants," the office "will consider the extent to which applicants 'advance' and 'align with' a series of political priorities."
PPFA's attorneys argued that the administration's approach is unlawful and puts the group's members "at a competitive disadvantage," which could ultimately impact people seeking care, from contraception to testing for sexually transmitted infections (STIs).
Democracy Forward president and CEO Skye Perryman—whose organization has repeatedly sued over Trump policies—said in a statement that "people should be able to receive the healthcare that is right for them, their lives, and their values, and that requires support for providing critically needed family planning services for people who cannot afford it."
Accusing the administration of "once again putting politics over people," she said that "the unlawful, ideologically driven changes to Title X threaten devastating consequences for lower income Americans nationwide who rely on the program for essential healthcare, including birth control, cancer screenings, and STI testing."
"Title X was created so a person's income would never determine whether they could access the medically appropriate family planning care that is right for them," Perryman emphasized. "We will aggressively pursue legal action on behalf of our clients until the administration stops undermining that promise and follows the law."
Highlighting the potential impact of the administration's policy for people throughout the United States, PPFA pointed out that from October 2024 through September 2025, its health centers provided over 1.3 million Title X visits across 33 states.
"Planned Parenthood health centers have provided affordable sexual and reproductive healthcare, including birth control, STI testing and treatment, cancer screenings, and wellness exams to millions of people through Title X," said PPFA president and CEO Alexis McGill Johnson. "We are suing the Trump administration because, yet again, it is trying to make it harder for people to get the vital care they need at Planned Parenthood."
The new lawsuit comes after Planned Parenthood and other reproductive health clinics regained access to Medicaid funding earlier this month, following the expiration of a provision in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which President Donald Trump signed last July.
The passage of that provision was a victory for forced pregnancy advocates, who have long targeted Planned Parenthood for providing abortion care. An analysis from the organization found that the "defunding" effort led to the closure of nearly 30 health centers, all of which were located in "contraceptive deserts" and two-thirds of which were in areas defined as rural, medically underserved, or experiencing health professional shortages.
The group also called the Medicaid provision a "backdoor abortion ban," noting that 64% of Planned Parenthood health center closures were in states where such care is legal, and the shuttered facilities had previously served over 10,000 abortion patients annually.
"By deliberately targeting Planned Parenthood, President Trump and his allies in Congress worsened a public health crisis, making it harder for people to get the essential and lifesaving care they needed at their trusted provider," McGill Johnson said in early July.
"Still, anti-abortion lawmakers are trying to make 'defund' permanent because Planned Parenthood health centers provide abortion care where it's legal," she stressed. "They are willing to sacrifice the lives and health of people across the country if it gets them closer to their goal of banning abortion everywhere and shutting down Planned Parenthood."
"We're in a fight for survival—not just for Planned Parenthood health centers, but for everyone to get high-quality, affordable healthcare from their trusted provider," she added. "And know this: Planned Parenthood will never stop fighting to ensure everyone can get the care they need."
Keep ReadingShow Less
‘The Reality Is Ugly’: Trump Reportedly Pushing RFK Jr. to Ramp Up Assault on Vaccines
"If Trump gets his way and waters down the child vaccine schedule over the debunked autism myth, more American kids will suffer and die of preventable disease."
Jul 28, 2026
With the US already experiencing public health crises involving measles and explosive diarrhea, President Donald Trump reportedly believes it's time to further undermine Americans' faith in the safety of vaccines.
The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday that Trump in May asked US Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. why he wasn't doing more to research disproven claims linking childhood vaccination with increased incidence of autism.
Trump specifically said he'd like to see Kennedy cut the number of shots the CDC recommends for children on the idea that doing so would make "autism rates drop, even if any such effect could take years."
Kennedy, despite being best known as an anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist before being appointed as the nation's top health official, was reportedly "taken aback" by Trump's demands, as White House political advisers had asked him to tone down his rhetoric about vaccinations.
During a White House meeting roughly a month later, the Journal reported, Trump complained that Kennedy "wasn't doing enough" to reduce the number of childhood vaccinations.
Multiple high-quality medical studies have found no link between vaccines and autism.
Brad Woodhouse, president of Protect Our Care, expressed horror at the president leading the charge against childhood vaccinations, which are estimated by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to prevent 4 million deaths per year worldwide.
"The reality is ugly," said Woodhouse. "If Trump gets his way and waters down the child vaccine schedule over the debunked autism myth, more American kids will suffer and die of preventable disease. We’re already in the middle of a record-breaking measles crisis thanks to vaccine lies amplified loudly by this administration, yet Trump is determined to do more damage."
Gavin Yamey, director of the Center for Policy Impact in Global Health at Duke University, declared himself "livid" at Trump's latest efforts to undermine confidence in vaccines.
"Ahead of the midterms, RFK Jr. and Trump... are ALL IN on their dangerous anti-vaxx activism and conspiracy theories," Yamey wrote in a social media post. "There is a wealth of high quality evidence that vaccines do not cause autism."
Claremont McKenna College political scientist Jack Pitney noted that Trump's false belief in a link between vaccines and autism stretches back years.
"For decades, Trump has pushed the lie that vaccines cause autism," Pitney wrote. "Now he reportedly wants RFK Jr. to push it even harder. The result? More US measles cases in the past 18 months than in the previous 20 years combined."
Keep ReadingShow Less
'Republicans Created This Crisis on Purpose': Federal Data Shows ACA Enrollment Plunging
"This coverage collapse was a choice that Congress made. As a result, millions more will end up uninsured, living sicker, dying younger, and being one emergency away from financial ruin."
Jun 29, 2026
The Trump administration quietly released data last week showing a sharp decline in the number of Americans enrolled in health insurance on the Affordable Care Act exchanges, a widely predicted outcome caused by congressional Republicans' refusal to extend subsidies that helped people buy coverage.
The new data, published Friday on the Department of Health and Human Services' website, shows that 19.2 million people were enrolled in ACA marketplace plans as of February—a decline of more than 5 million since the start of President Donald Trump's second term.
Last year, Republicans repeatedly blocked Democratic efforts to enact a temporary extension of the enhanced ACA tax credits, whose expiration at the start of 2026 led insurers to jack up premiums, pricing many out of coverage entirely. In focus groups, some Americans facing premium spikes said they would be forced to cut back on groceries or ration their medications to afford coverage.
“This dramatic decrease of millions of Americans losing health insurance is the result of deliberate decisions by the president and congressional leaders—it is what we feared but expected, given the end of the enhanced tax credit and other policies that make it harder to get on and stay on coverage," said Anthony Wright, executive director of the advocacy group Families USA. "As a result, millions more will end up uninsured, living sicker, dying younger, and being one emergency away from financial ruin."
Wright dismissed the Trump administration's attempt to explain away the coverage losses by claiming the numbers show a decline in "phantom" enrollment and fraud, calling that narrative "an insult to every person who became uninsured or underinsured."
"These results are real for the millions who faced premiums doubling, paying hundreds of thousands of dollars for coverage. The resulting price spikes and coverage losses are real for all who buy coverage as individuals, including gig workers, small business owners, young adults, seniors not quite of Medicare age, and many others," said Wright. "The consequences are now undeniable: millions dropped from the rolls, and yet another year of double-digit premium increases."
The lapse of enhanced ACA subsidies—which were established in 2021 during the Biden administration—alongside the roughly $900 billion in Medicaid cuts included in the Republican budget package that Trump signed into law last summer amounts to what analysts, advocates, and Democratic lawmakers say is the largest assault on federal healthcare programs in US history.
"We weren’t being hysterical. We knew this would happen," said Rep. Sara Jacobs (D-Calif.) in response to the new enrollment figures. "When Republicans passed the Big Ugly Bill and cut funding for healthcare, they literally signed away millions of Americans’ ability to afford health insurance. And now it’s happening."
According to the Congressional Budget Office, around 16 million people across the US could lose health coverage by 2034 due to the Trump-GOP law, and millions of children have lost coverage since last year.
“Trump and Republicans are engineering the most devastating assault on healthcare in history, and today’s numbers prove it," Leslie Dach, chair of the advocacy group Protect Our Care, said on Friday. "They ripped away the tax credits that helped millions afford coverage, gutted funding to help people enroll, and sabotaged the ACA at every turn. They knew exactly what would happen, they chose to do it anyway, and it’s going to get worse."
“Among the three million who have lost coverage are parents skipping cancer screenings, patients rationing insulin, and families who are now one medical emergency away from financial ruin," said Dach. "Republicans created this crisis on purpose, and while Americans pay for it with their health and their lives, billionaires are cashing their tax cut checks."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Trump's New Medicaid Rule 'Designed to Ensure People Lose Healthcare,' Critics Warn
"Today’s announcement marks a grim step in America’s march towards a healthcare system that further restricts access to healthcare and creates barriers rather than delivering affordable healthcare to families."
Jun 02, 2026
The Trump administration on Monday unveiled a rule that is expected to push millions of low-income people off Medicaid by imposing complex bureaucratic barriers in the form of work reporting requirements, which have proven disastrous at the state level.
The rule, released by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), marks a key step toward enacting the Republican budget reconciliation package that President Donald Trump signed into law last summer. That measure included around $900 billion in cuts to Medicaid, with new work requirements projected to account for nearly $330 billion of that total.
The new rule will dictate how states must implement the budget law's Medicaid work mandates and who is exempt from the requirements. States are already spending tens of millions of dollars hiring new staff and upgrading technology in preparation for the mandates taking effect next year.
Broadly, the Trump-GOP law requires adults without disabilities between the ages of 19 and 64 to demonstrate at least 80 hours of work, community service, or other "qualifying activities" per month to keep their Medicaid coverage.
Exemptions to the work reporting requirements include people who are pregnant, caregivers to children under the age of 14, or "medically frail." The CMS rule defines the latter category as those with "physical or behavioral health conditions that significantly impair their ability to consistently work or participate in other community engagement activities."
Advocates warned that the rule will force many sick people off coverage. The rule states that people with HIV/AIDS, end-stage renal disease, and cancer would not necessarily be exempt from the work reporting requirements.
According to The New York Times, "states had expected that people with certain serious diagnoses would qualify for the exception, and they had been developing ways to match applications with existing medical records to identify most such people automatically."
"Nebraska’s Medicaid program, which began enforcing a work requirement last month, developed a list of exempted conditions that is nearly 300 pages long," the Times reported. "The state will now need to adjust."
"When these requirements go into effect at the beginning of next year, it’s going to be a complete train wreck for America."
Anthony Wright, executive director of Families USA, said Monday that "far from protecting the vulnerable, this guidance significantly raises the barrier for demonstrating medical frailty, meaning many patients in the middle of treatment will have the new hassle of proving their condition, over and over, with any mistake or gap being penalized by the loss of their healthcare and coverage."
"Through this rule," said Wright, "CMS is requiring duplicative documentation and prohibiting states from taking full advantage of consumer-friendly tools like self-attestation."
During the first year of the work reporting requirements, which are set to take effect nationwide in January 2027, people will be allowed to attest in Medicaid applications that they meet one of the exemptions, according to administration officials.
"Beginning in 2028, states will be expected to verify the exemptions," NBC News reported. "The temporary flexibility, the officials said, is intended to give states time to build systems that can verify exemptions using claims data and other records."
The advocacy group Protect Our Care warned that the new rule "creates a labyrinth of paperwork, reporting mandates, and rigid eligibility rules designed to ensure people lose healthcare, even when they should qualify to keep it."
“Instead of lowering costs or making care more accessible, Republicans are weaponizing government bureaucracy against the American people," said Brad Woodhouse, the president of Protect Our Care. "They are betting that if they make the process confusing and exhausting enough, millions of people will fall through the cracks and lose the care they depend on to survive. Hospitals will suffer, providers will be pushed further to the brink, and families across the country will pay the price while Republicans once again put wealthy donors and corporate greed ahead of the health and well-being of everyday Americans.”
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has projected that, over the next decade, the Trump-GOP work reporting requirements will push nearly 3 million people off Medicaid.
Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said in a statement that the CMS rule "is the dark heart of the Republican plan to kick millions of working Americans and their children off their health insurance by placing a mountain of paperwork in front of them."
"These barriers are designed to prevent Americans from getting affordable healthcare, while providing a profit bonanza for the corporate consultants who get paid millions to build bureaucratic booby traps," Wyden added. "The Republican plan for healthcare is to kick people when they are down, making sick people sicker and hard times even harder. When these requirements go into effect at the beginning of next year, it’s going to be a complete train wreck for America, and not just for the Americans caught in the bureaucratic maze Republicans have created: Every community will be left with worse healthcare."
Keep ReadingShow Less
'These People Are Shameless': RFK Jr.'s Son Launches Healthcare Investment Fund
"The festering swamp of corruption and self-dealing surrounding the Trump White House just got even deeper."
Apr 25, 2026
US Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s son, Finn Kennedy, is reportedly seeking to raise $100 million for a new healthcare industry investment fund that will seek to capitalize on "policy initiatives in government"—including RFK Jr.'s so-called Make America Healthy Again agenda.
The Financial Times reported Friday that Finn Kennedy's fund, Victura Ventures, has already secured roughly $70 million in commitments. The fund is "targeting early-stage growth companies involved in healthcare AI, consumer health, and other health technologies," FT reported, citing an offering document.
"Kennedy’s foray into healthcare investing marks the latest example of the cozy relationship between the Trump administration and close associates who have sought to capitalize on it," the newspaper added. "Sons of President Donald Trump and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick have invested in cryptocurrency businesses as Trump has promoted alternative currencies. Donald Trump Jr. has joined the board of 1789 Capital, a fund founded by pro-Trump donors in 2023. At least four of 1789’s portfolio companies have won contracts from the Trump administration. 1789 has also invested in big government contractors, such as Anduril and Elon Musk’s SpaceX."
Additionally, as Common Dreams reported on Thursday, Eric Trump appeared on Fox Business to brag about a $24 million Pentagon contract secured by Foundation Future Industries, where the president's son serves as chief strategy adviser.
"These people are shameless," journalist Doug Henwood wrote in response to the reporting on Finn Kennedy's new fund.
The advocacy group Protect Our Care said the FT reporting and a Friday story in The New York Times—which detailed how a top Kennedy aide "was advising on changes to the American health system while running a rapidly growing wellness company poised to benefit from Trump administration health policies"—show that "the festering swamp of corruption and self-dealing surrounding the Trump White House just got even deeper."
According to the Times, Kennedy aide Calley Means "held between $25 million and $50 million in stock in the company, Truemed, through November, as he continued to serve as its president."
"For months, Mr. Means has ignored questions from Democrats in Congress about his finances, including the extent of his stake in Truemed, and how they related to federal policy," the Times added.
Kayla Hancock, the director of Protect Our Care’s Public Health Project, said in a statement Friday that "it’s perhaps easy for RFK Jr. to look at Donald Trump and Commerce Secretary Lutnick blatantly abuse the power of the White House to enrich themselves, family members, and big donors, and say, ‘Why not me?’"
"Kennedy claims he’s following ethics rules, but why did he keep the barn door open for his son and close associates to profit off his policy decisions?" asked Hancock. "It follows a corrupt pattern of Trump administration officials exploiting loopholes to steer money into their family and friends’ pockets at the same time they rip away healthcare from millions of Americans and push policies that hike costs on everything from insurance premiums, gas, to groceries.”
Keep ReadingShow Less
3-Year-Old Abused While Waiting Months to Be Released From Detention Under Trump Restrictions, Says Family
“She was so long in there," said the child's father. "I just think that if they would have moved faster, nothing like that would have happened.”
Apr 05, 2026
President Donald Trump's Department of Health and Human Services and its office in charge of providing care for unaccompanied immigrant children have been named in a civil lawsuit alleging that a three-year-old was sexually abused after immigration officials separated her from her mother at the US border, while her father waited for months to be reunited with the child.
The girl crossed the border with her mother last September but was separated from her mother after the woman was charged with making false statements, according to The Associated Press. She was sent to the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR), which operates under HHS and places children in foster or shelter settings.
When Trump took office for his second term in January 2025, the average time a child was under ORR's care was 37 days, but as of February children were remaining in shelter or foster settings for an average of 200 days.
The process through which ORR releases children to the care of their parents or sponsors has grown more arduous under the Trump administration, and in the case of the three-year-old, she waited for five months in foster care while the government repeatedly told her father it couldn't make an appointment for him to be fingerprinted.
Court documents state that during that time, the girl reported being sexually abused by an older child who was living in the same foster setting in Harlingen, Texas. She told a caregiver that she had been abused multiple times and had suffered bleeding as a result.
ORR only told her father that there had been an "accident" in foster care. Officials did not tell him the result of a forensic exam and interview of his child, but the older child accused of the abuse was removed from the foster setting.
“I asked them, ‘What happened? I want to know. I’m her father. I want to know what’s going on,’ and they just told me that they couldn’t give me more information, that it was under investigation,” said the father, who is a legal permanent US resident and spoke to the AP anonymously to protect his daughter's identity. “She was so long in there... I just think that if they would have moved faster, nothing like that would have happened.”
The Trump administration has claimed its new restrictions for sponsors and family members seeking custody of their children who are in ORR's care have prevented traffickers from illegally bringing children into the US and have kept unaccompanied minors safe.
Family members like the three-year-old's father are required to submit to income verification, home inspections, and DNA testing.
The new procedures were immediately followed by a drastic jump in child detention times, according to the AP.
Legal advocates have filed lawsuits challenging the new restrictions on the grounds that they can cause prolonged detention for children. Lauren Fisher Flores, the legal director of the American Bar Association’s ProBar project and the attorney representing the girl's family, told the AP that the organization has worked on eight habeas corpus petitions on behalf of children who have been detained for an average of 255 days.
In the girl's case, the government finally allowed the father to be fingerprinted after attorneys sent a letter to ORR, but still did not provide a timeline for his daughter's release. His lawyers then filed a habeas petition, prompting the government to release the child to her father.
During the legal challenge, the father learned the details of what ORR had called an "accident" that happened in the foster setting.
“To have your child abused while in the government’s care, to not understand what has happened or how to protect them, to not even be told about the abuse, it is unimaginable,” Fisher Flores told the AP. “Children deserve safety and they belong with their parents.”
Keep ReadingShow Less
'One Year of Failure': The Lancet Warns RFK Jr.'s Assault on Science May 'Take Generations to Repair'
Kennedy has "made a habit of throwing good money after bad" by promoting "junk science and fringe beliefs."
Feb 27, 2026
A scathing editorial published Friday in one of the world's most prestigious medical journals took US Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to task for what it described as "one year of failure."
In its editorial, the Lancet began by listing off several of the broken promises Kennedy made during his first speech after being confirmed to lead the US Health and Human Services Department (HHS), such as his vow to have "open and honest engagement with everyone willing to work towards making the USA healthy again" and usher in "a new era of unbiased science without hidden conflicts of interest, secrecy, or profiteering."
In fact, the Lancet found that it took Kennedy less than two weeks to break a key promise.
"Ten days after his speech about trust and openness," the journal noted, "HHS rescinded a 54-year-old policy of soliciting public comments for new rules and regulations, silencing the voices of many of the stakeholders he pledged to serve."
Things have only gotten worse since then, the editorial continued, as Kennedy has shelved research into mRNA vaccines and "made a habit of throwing good money after bad" by promoting "junk science and fringe beliefs."
The editorial concluded by warning "the destruction that Kennedy has wrought in one year might take generations to repair, and there is little hope for US health and science while he remains at the helm." The journal urged the US Congress to "hold Kennedy accountable for his record, or else accept responsibility for endorsing President Trump's decision to let him 'run wild on health.'"
The Lancet editorial drew a range of reactions from medical experts and academics.
Scott Forbes, an ecologist at the University of Winnipeg, explained the significance of a journal such as the Lancet publishing such an overtly political editorial.
"For context, the Lancet is one of the two most important medical journals on the planet," he wrote in a social media post. "When they put this on their front cover, it is only because there is something seriously wrong. That something is RFK Jr. He is a notorious crank and charlatan. But that's par for the course in the Trump regime."
Forbes' point was echoed by Krutika Kuppalli, associate professor at UT Southwestern Medical Center's Department of Internal Medicine.
"When a leading medical journal uses language like this, it’s not rhetoric," she wrote. "It’s a warning the world should take seriously."
Pediatrician Vincent Iannelli took the Lancet to task for publishing a since-retracted study in 1998 that falsely linked vaccination with the development of autism, which subsequently helped the anti-vaccination movement gain currency.
"Let's not forget that Wakefield's fraudulent paper that was published in the Lancet helped get us on this road," Iannelli said. "RFK Jr. was influenced by mothers who blamed vaccines for their child's autism."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Polio Survivors Fear a Resurgence as Trump Adviser Suggests Scrapping Vaccine Requirement
"We don’t have a healthcare infrastructure to take care of a polio outbreak."
Feb 23, 2026
After the Trump administration official in charge of immunization policy suggested that childhood polio vaccines should be made optional, experts and survivors of the deadly disease are warning that it could make a furious comeback.
Dr. Kirk Milhoan, a pediatric cardiologist who is chair of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, suggested on a podcast last month ending public schools' vaccine requirements for dangerous diseases, including measles and polio, which would be one of the most dramatic shifts in federal health policy in more than half a century.
Where these diseases once infected millions of people each year, Milhoan noted their dramatic decline in recent years, suggesting they no longer pose the threat they once did and that vaccines were therefore less necessary. However, he ignored the fact that the near-total eradication of these illnesses was due to society-wide vaccination in the first place.
In the first half of the 20th century, tens of thousands of people (mostly children) suffered paralysis from polio. The first vaccine was introduced in the USA in 1955. Notice the trend afterwards.(by @ourworldindata)
[image or embed]
— Information is Beautiful (@infobeautiful.bsky.social) January 26, 2026 at 2:55 PM
The US is already at risk of losing its measles eradication status after drops in vaccination rates caused the highest number of cases and deaths in more than three decades last year.
Measles vaccination rates had already been dipping for years amid rising anti-vaccine sentiment. But it was shifted into overdrive after vaccination restrictions were narrowed by Trump's Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who publicly spread doubt about the Measles, Mumps, and Rubella (MMR) vaccine's well-documented safety and efficacy.
At its peak in 1952, nearly 58,000 people became infected with polio. Over a third of them became paralyzed, and more than 3,000 died. A vaccine was introduced for the illness in 1955. Within just two years, the number of cases had dropped by 90%, and the disease was declared eliminated in the US in 1979.
Childhood vaccination rates have dropped across the board over the past five years. Where about 95% of kindergarteners received the measles and polio vaccines in the 2019-20 school year, that number had plummeted to 92.5% in 2024-25.
But because polio is several times less infectious than measles, the current national average coverage still provides substantial protection, though localized outbreaks remain possible in undervaccinated communities.
If childhood vaccination is made optional, however, those who have treated and lived with polio fear it could also come back with a vengeance.
Survivors say US healthcare system not ready for new cases – ‘the only thing to fix polio is the polio vaccine’
[image or embed]
— Guardian US (@us.theguardian.com) February 23, 2026 at 2:13 PM
In an interview with the Guardian published Monday, Grace Rossow, an operating-room communications coordinator, whose leg remains paralyzed from a case of polio as an infant in India, said the vaccine had “absolutely been a victim of its own success."
“People aren’t scared of polio anymore,” she said. “People don’t really see the daily side of living with a vaccine-preventable disease. With polio, you’re never going to fix us, and that’s the problem. The only thing to fix polio is the polio vaccine.”
Polio's status as a thing of the past has not only diminished the public's understanding of why it's important to prevent, but also how to treat it. Rossow said, "We don’t have a healthcare infrastructure to take care of a polio outbreak."
Art Caplan, one of the last remaining survivors of the 1950s outbreak, who has struggled with lifelong weakness in his legs due to the disease, said he's watched as most of the medical professionals who understood how to treat it retired and died. "There’s nobody left. They don’t see it."
Gordon Allan, a surgeon who is the orthopedic residency director and the total joint reconstructive fellowship director at Southern Illinois University School of Medicine, said that in the event of a new polio outbreak, most people in his field would have little idea how to treat those suffering from the illness.
“Orthopedics has really changed a lot now from the people who trained me," he said, noting that even those doctors only had experience treating post-polio symptoms.
“No one practicing has first-hand experience," he said. "Orthopedics was quite different because of polio, and all that stuff just faded away."
The last polio case in the United States was detected in New York in 2022 in an unvaccinated adult who became paralyzed from the illness.
None have been diagnosed since. But as measles has shown, outbreaks can spread very quickly in communities with large unvaccinated populations, which are often insular and religious.
Caplan said he was "furious" at Milhoan's contention that childhood vaccine requirements should be reconsidered just because polio is no longer around.
"If you could gather up the kids I saw die or become really severely disabled from 50 years ago, they would want you arrested," he said. "It’s horrifying, and the height of irresponsibility to leave the door open even a crack."
Keep ReadingShow Less
See More
Most Popular
To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good.
News & Opinion
Trending
Common Dreams, Inc. Founded 1997. Registered 501(c3) Non-Profit
Privacy Policy