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Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Wants to Ban Drug Ads on TV. It Wouldn’t Be Easy.
Since the late 1990s, drug companies have spent tens of billions of dollars on television ads, drumming up demand for their products with cheerful jingles and scenes of dancing patients. Now, some people up for top jobs in the incoming Trump administration are attacking such ads, setting up a clash with a powerful industry that has long had the courts on its side.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President-elect Donald J. Trump’s choice for health secretary, is a longtime critic of pharmaceutical advertising on TV, arguing that it leads broadcasters to more favorable coverage of the industry and does not improve Americans’ health. He has repeatedly and enthusiastically called for a ban on such ads. Elon Musk, who is spearheading a government cost-cutting effort, last month wrote on X, his social-media site, “No advertising for pharma.”
RFK Jr.’s Nomination Gathers Steam After Senate Meetings
GOP senators seem to be embracing the potential for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, despite his controversial views on vaccines and pro-abortion record. Kennedy was initially thought to have a difficult path to confirmation, but after meeting with some two dozen senators this week, many seemed ready to look past his political baggage and focus on areas of shared interest.
Kennedy’s confirmation is not a sure bet, but he has faced far less skepticism than some of Trump’s other divisive picks, particularly Pete Hegseth, his pick to lead the Pentagon, and former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard’s (D-Hawaii), tapped to lead a key intelligence office.
RFK Jr. Pick Raises Hopes for Vaccine Injury Program Overhaul
The choice of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to lead the nation’s top health agency is breathing life into an effort to reform a decades-old government program for paying people injured by vaccines. Thousands of people are waiting to see whether the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services will pay their claims for injuries or death allegedly from vaccines. Handled through a program shielding drugmakers from lawsuits, claimants can wait for years for word on whether they’ll be paid.
Lawmakers have pushed for changes to the Reagan-era process without success. Reformers say the Biden administration has been unhelpful, and that vaccine skepticism and reluctance to touch COVID-19 measures — handled through another government program — have stymied change.
Kennedy’s longstanding criticism of vaccines and the pharmaceutical industry is giving some hope for renewed momentum. Others worry his vaccine skepticism could erode support for modernizing the injury program and fuel skepticism that reformers say cuts against their mission.
CNN Reveals ‘Troubling’ Poll: American Trust In Vaccines Is Plummeting
American trust in medical institutions and vaccine technology has been plunging the past several years, and though the media treats this as a “troubling” and dangerous development for our society the shift might represent a positive change. The activities of Big Pharma have gone largely unchecked and unchallenged for many decades. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has a revolving door policy, allowing pharmaceutical executives to exit their companies and work at the agency with impunity, then leave again and return to their former jobs. It’s not hard to understand how this creates a serious conflict of interest at the (FDA).
This problem of corruption was never more clear than it was during the covid pandemic. Since that event, the U.S. population has been losing faith in the ability of the government to scrutinize pharmaceutical products and protect people from potentially disastrous experimental medications and vaccines. When the love affair between government and Big Pharma was put on blatant display, the American people rightly began to question everything. Recently, CNN unveiled a poll which proves that U.S. faith in vaccines is in steep decline.
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‘We Just Dismiss People Like RFK Jr.’: Infectious Disease Expert on How — And How Not — To Rebuild Trust
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the nominee to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, has been in a marathon of meetings to shore up his confirmation votes come the new year. As his “Make America Healthy Again” movement gets closer to a seat of power in the federal government, onlookers are wondering how Kennedy’s sweeping critiques of food, pharma and health care will translate into actual policy.
Some general areas of agreement — ripe for policymaking — have emerged, including on limiting corporate influence in government and improving the food supply so healthy foods are accessible for more Americans. There also seems to be bipartisan agreement that federal health officials should respond to the public’s suspiciousness with transparency and clear communication. That, in turn, may rebuild trust that has degraded over time and especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Review of Us Vaccine Injury Reimbursement Program Shows Less Than 3% of Claims Eligible for Compensation
A report yesterday from the U.S. Government Accountability Office on federal response to medical countermeasure injury compensation claims — primarily about COVID-19 and flu vaccines — reveals that, during the first few years of the COVID-19 pandemic, claims spiked to 27 times the typical number received, and less than 3% of the claims were eligible for compensation.
About half of the claims were related to COVID-19 vaccination. The vast majority of money paid for claims, however — more than $6 million — was for harms tied to the H1N1 flu vaccine.
The Health and Human Services Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program review showed that the program received a surge of 13,333 injury claims, and 92 (2.6%) of the completed claims were eligible for compensation.
Mpox Is Spreading in Congo’s Capital, Threatening Global Efforts to Contain the Virus
Mireille Efonge got sick a few months ago, with a fever and painful blisters on her groin. She became too weak to move, so neighbors carried her to a health center with walls of plastic sheeting in Pakadjuma, a crowded, poor community in Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo.
There, a nurse called an ambulance to take her to a hospital. Soon lesions broke out on her head and the rest of her body, each one a hard nub of throbbing pain. Finally she was given a diagnosis: mpox. “I’d never heard of it,” Ms. Efonge said. This was back in August, when the mpox virus — closely related to smallpox — was still almost unknown in Kinshasa, a city of 17 million people.
Some researchers now recall that time almost wistfully, because it might still have been possible back then to fence in the mpox virus, to fend off disaster. That window has probably closed, they say. The detection of a new, fast-spreading strain of the virus in a remote mining town in eastern Congo led the World Health Organization to declare mpox a global public health emergency in August. Since then, its spread has only accelerated.
FDA Approves Generic Version of Novo Nordisk’s Glp-1 Diabetes Drug Victoza
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on Monday approved Hikma Pharmaceuticals’ generic version of Novo Nordisk’s diabetes drug Victoza, which is currently in shortage in the country. The agency said it prioritizes review of generic versions of the drugs that are in short supply. Victoza, or liraglutide, has been on the FDA’s shortage list since 2023.
“Generic drugs provide additional treatment options which are generally more affordable for patients,” said Iilun Murphy, FDA’s director of the Office of Generic Drugs. Hikma’s generic drug first received tentative approval in June. The company did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment on the drug’s pricing. Earlier this year, Teva Pharmaceuticals had launched an authorized generic version of Victoza in the U.S.
Lithium Shows Promise in Treating Autism-Related Symptoms in Mouse Study
A discovery has highlighted lithium — a drug long used to treat bipolar disorder and depression — as a potential therapy for autism spectrum disorder (ASD). This research, conducted by a team at the Center for Synaptic Brain Dysfunctions within the Institute for Basic Science led by Director Kim Eunjoon, reveals that lithium can restore brain function and alleviate behavioral symptoms in animal models of ASD caused by mutations in the Dyrk1a gene.
ASD is a neurodevelopmental disorder affecting 2.8% of the global population, characterized by social deficits, repetitive behaviors, intellectual challenges, and anxiety. Because ASD imposes a heavy burden not only on the patients themselves but on their families and society as a whole, new therapeutic methods must be developed to treat the core symptoms of ASD. Despite its prevalence, there are no definitive treatments or preventive measures.
GLP-1 Zepbound Is Approved as First Drug for Sleep Apnea
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved the first prescription medication specifically for treating obstructive sleep apnea (OSA): the weight-loss drug Zepbound.
In a news release published Dec. 20, the FDA stated that Zepbound, part of the GLP-1 receptor agonist medicines that include Ozempic, was cleared to treat moderate to severe OSA in individuals with obesity. According to drugmaker Eli Lilly, the treatment is intended for use alongside a reduced-calorie diet and increased physical activity.
