Vaccine sceptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr has been sworn in as US health secretary after the US Senate voted to confirm his appointment.
Just one Republican, Mitch McConnell, broke ranks to oppose Kennedy’s nomination. McConnell, who survived polio as a child, said he would not condone “the re-litigation of proven cures”.
“I’m a survivor of childhood polio. In my lifetime, I’ve watched vaccines save millions of lives from devastating diseases across America and around the world,” McConnell said in a statement.
The Democrats unanimously opposed the appointment of Kennedy, who holds some extreme views on health, including on vaccines. He is one of Donald Trump’s most controversial picks for cabinet.
Kennedy will now oversee key health agencies in the US, including the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, with around 80,000 employees and a trillion-dollar budget.
Kennedy has long sown doubts about vaccines, a mission that escalated during the COVID-19 pandemic when he used social media to erode public trust in vaccines. He has also spread debunked theories including that vaccines cause autism.
“He has made it his life’s work to sow doubt and discourage parents from getting their kids life-saving vaccines,” Democratic senator Ron Wyden said during Kennedy’s Senate hearing.
“It has been lucrative for him and put him on the verge of immense power.”
During the Senate hearing, politicians raised concerns that Kennedy would benefit financially from changing vaccine guidelines.
Last year, Kennedy made over made over $US850,000 after he referred clients to a law firm that has sued the makers of Gardasil, a human papillomavirus vaccine that protects against cervical cancer. Kennedy has previously said if was confirmed as health secretary, he would sign over his financial stake to his son.
Just weeks ago, Robert F. Kennedy Jr’s cousin Caroline Kennedy, the former ambassador to Australia, wrote a searing letter to US Senators, urging them not to acccept her cousin’s nomination for health secretary. Caroline is the daughter of former Democratic US president John F Kennedy.
She labelled Kennedy as a “predator” and said he now preys on the desperation of parents of sick children.
“I have known Bobby my whole life; we grew up together. It’s no surprise that he keeps birds of prey as pets because he himself is a predator,” Caroline Kennedy wrote.
“His basement, his garage, his dorm room were the centres of the action where drugs were available, and he enjoyed showing off how he put baby chickens and mice in the blender to feed his hawks. It was often a perverse scene of despair and violence.”
She went on to say that Kennedy Jr has vaccinated his own children, but continues to discourage others from vaccinating theirs.