President-elect Donald Trump said in the weeks leading up to the election that he would allow vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to “go wild on health.”
While Kennedy’s role in Trump’s new administration remains unclear, the environmental lawyer’s many controversial statements are rallying state lawmakers to pay close attention to Connecticut’s public health messaging, which they said must lean into years of rigorous science.
“There is an imminent threat to the health and well-being of our citizens from what is being said,” said Dr. Saud Anwar, state senator and chair of the Public Health Committee.
In recent weeks, Kennedy has issued statements attacking the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). He said on social media the agency was waging a “war on public health.”
FDA’s war on public health is about to end. This includes its aggressive suppression of psychedelics, peptides, stem cells, raw milk, hyperbaric therapies, chelating compounds, ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, vitamins, clean foods, sunshine, exercise, nutraceuticals and anything…
— Robert F. Kennedy Jr (@RobertKennedyJr) October 25, 2024
Kennedy has also said that upon Trump taking office he would push for a recommendation against adding fluoride in local water systems.
“We don't need fluoride in our water, and it's a very bad way to deliver it because it's delivered … through the blood system,” Kennedy told NPR.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has called community water fluoridation “one of the 10 greatest public health achievements of the 20th century,” and bases its fluoride recommendations on years of peer-reviewed research.
“RFK is tweeting about getting rid of fluoride in water, that's disastrous,” said Cristin McCarthy Vahey, a Democratic state representative.
Fluoridation became a law in Connecticut on May 18, 1965, and as of April 2015, the Health and Human Services’ optimal fluoride level is at 0.7 mg/L.
Children are at risk for tooth decay if their water supply has limited or no fluoride in it, according to Johns Hopkins Medicine.
Countering misinformation on vaccines and public health
Kennedy heads the Trump-aligned Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) movement that promotes ideas health experts – including Anwar, a pulmonologist – say fly in the face of science.
“For a person who has been very clear about where his policies are, this is going to be a public health crisis if those policies are implemented,” Anwar said. “The public health protections that are in every state are now going to be endangered.”
One area of concern? Vaccines, which have been a repeated target of Kennedy, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.
In 2021, Kennedy claimed that the COVID-19 vaccine was the “deadliest vaccine ever made.”
But the benefits of vaccines – including COVID-19 vaccinations – outweigh their risks, according to the CDC. Global immunization efforts have saved at least 154 million lives over the past 50 years, according to the World Health Organization.
State lawmakers say they are also concerned that funding for public health could dry up under the incoming Trump administration. Connecticut recently secured $148 million from the CDC for public health.
“What kind of funding cuts are we going to see that prevent us from continuing to get the message out about what is science?” Vahey asked.
Anwar said he is in talks with public health experts in the state to promote what he said is “science, data [and] evidence.”
But public health messaging also needs to go beyond that, he said.
“But we also look … at how we are communicating that information, how we're building trust, how we're building relationships,” Anwar said. “And how we have trusted messengers in the community who can make sure that our citizens are receiving information in a way that they can believe.”
