This text initially appeared on vigilantfox.com and was republished with permission.
RFK Jr. simply walked into Congress and set the place on fireplace.
They weren’t prepared for this.
Rep. Dingell thought she had Kennedy cornered on drug costs—then he dismantled her argument in a single fell swoop.
However the true firestorm got here when he known as out the one Democrat Rep. who took extra Massive Pharma cash than anybody else on the committee.
Earlier than you may repair a damaged system, it’s important to acknowledge simply how damaged it truly is.
That was the message from HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as he opened his testimony earlier than Congress with a sobering analysis of America’s healthcare disaster.
“America stays the SICKEST developed nation,” he mentioned. “And but we spend $4.5 trillion yearly on healthcare, 2 to three instances extra per capita than comparable nations.”
Kennedy didn’t simply level to waste; he warned that your entire system is turning into unsustainable. Healthcare prices are rising sooner than the financial system, whereas well being outcomes hold sliding. People are paying greater than ever, and getting sicker in return.
“If we don’t stanch this development, we’ll ransom our kids to chapter, servitude, and disastrous well being penalties.”
Extra money isn’t the reply, Kennedy argued. It’s about how we spend it. “We received’t clear up this drawback by throwing more cash at it,” he added. “We should spend smarter.”
Which means reducing the paperwork, fixing misaligned incentives, and ensuring {dollars} really go towards bettering well being, not simply managing illness.
That’s when Kennedy unveiled his historic 7-part finances proposal, a sweeping reform plan designed to flip the healthcare system on its head.
1. Deal with psychological well being and dependancy head-on: “These points now rival persistent ailments of their affect… HHS will aggressively fight the opioid disaster, particularly the unfold of artificial medicine like fentanyl.”
2. Prioritize vitamin and wholesome life: “The president’s finances requests $94 billion in discretionary funds to help these priorities, together with the Administration for a Wholesome America.”
3. Clear up the U.S. meals system: “We are going to equip FDA to take away dangerous chemical substances from meals and packaging and shut the GRAS (‘typically acknowledged as secure’) loophole.”
4. Refocus NIH and CDC analysis priorities: “We’ll finish gain-of-function experiments and eradicate funding for analysis primarily based on radical gender ideology. On the CDC, we’re returning to core missions—monitoring ailments, investigating outbreaks, and reducing waste.”
5. Eradicate DEI funding and battle actual poverty: “We are going to transfer past lip service to communities of shade and take significant motion to deal with their wants.”
6. Modernize cybersecurity and well being IT: “The AI revolution has arrived… We’re utilizing it to handle healthcare information securely and pace up drug approvals.”
7. Rebuild public belief: “Belief that eroded by years of business seize, waste, and misplaced priorities.”
“We are going to launch a brand new period of transparency in public service, creating an trustworthy, science-driven HHS that solutions to the president, to Congress, and the American folks.”
Kennedy’s plan drew speedy pushback. Not everybody on the committee welcomed his proposals, and a few raised considerations about how they could have an effect on present company workers.
Rep. Diana DeGette centered on a letter signed by NIH scientists who questioned Kennedy’s management. She pressed him to commit that no disciplinary motion can be taken in opposition to them. “It needs to be a simple reply as a result of it’s unlawful,” she mentioned.
Kennedy responded that his aim was to revive scientific independence. HHS, he mentioned, would “commit that we’re completely depoliticizing science at NIH for the primary time.”
He additionally pointed to what he known as Biden-era politicization of science, saying, “The Biden administration….Ms. Chairwoman, the Biden administration politicized the science and I simply gave you three of 1000’s of examples of how they did that.”
When requested immediately concerning the letter, Kennedy mentioned it was the primary he’d heard of it.
Then Rep. Frank Pallone jumped in, clearly agitated by Kennedy’s place on vaccines. He accused the secretary of shutting the general public out of vaccine coverage selections.
“You’ve made various main selections about vaccines,” he mentioned. “There’s been no public remark course of. No accountability.”
He adopted with a pointed outburst: “What are you afraid of?! Are you simply afraid of receiving public feedback on proposals?!”
Kennedy responded calmly. “Now we have a public course of for regulating vaccines. It’s known as the ACIP committee—and it’s a public committee.”
Pallone pushed again, elevating his voice. “You fired the committee! You fired the ACIP!”
“I fired individuals who had conflicts with the pharmaceutical business,” he mentioned confidently.
Then he added, “That committee has been a template for medical malpractice for 30 years.”
Pallone struggled to reply. “I… I… look, I, I… I can’t…”
The change left the distinction between them unmistakably clear.
Kennedy turned the highlight again on Rep. Frank Pallone, triggering a tense change that drew a pointy response from Democrats on the committee.
“If I can take a minute to answer one thing that Congressman Pallone mentioned…” Kennedy started, referencing a dialog they’d 15 years earlier. On the time, Kennedy recalled, Pallone had been probably the most outspoken advocates in Congress for households impacted by vaccine harm.
“You have been very adamant about it,” Kennedy mentioned. “You have been the main member of Congress on that concern.”
Then got here the second that shifted the tone of the listening to. Kennedy acknowledged that since that point, Pallone had accepted $2 million in marketing campaign contributions from pharmaceutical firms—“greater than another member of this committee.”
He didn’t degree a private accusation, however made the implication clear. “And your enthusiasm for supporting the previous ACIP committee, which was utterly rife and pervasive with pharmaceutical conflicts, appears to be an end result of these contributions.”
Democrats rapidly moved to interrupt. Committee Chairman Buddy Carter known as for order and urged Kennedy to retract the remark. Kennedy complied, saying merely, “They’re retracted.”
However the second lingered. The stress within the room signaled that the affect had already been made.
Because the listening to resumed, Rep. Debbie Dingell shifted the main target to prescription drug costs and pressed Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on his coverage stance. She framed her query as a protection of current Democratic initiatives, highlighting the Inflation Discount Act and the creation of the Medicare Drug Value Negotiation Program.
“Do you help the drug worth negotiation program,” she requested, “and decide to utilizing the instruments and authorities offered to you below the regulation, to drive down prescription drug prices for the American?”
Kennedy didn’t take the bait. As a substitute, he outlined a broader technique formed by President Trump’s directive to problem longstanding pricing norms. The aim, he defined, was to not tinker across the edges—however to remodel the system completely.
“We’re utilizing each device that’s given to us,” he mentioned, “and President Trump has ordered me to do one thing that no different president has, which is to determine across-the-board Most Favored Nations, in order that we’re not paying greater than Europeans are.”
He added that negotiations with pharmaceutical firms have been already underway. “We’re going to have the ability to decrease drug costs throughout this administration—greater than any administration in historical past.”
For Kennedy, the problem wasn’t about partisan loyalty. It was about delivering measurable, lasting outcomes, and he made that distinction clear.
Then got here a subject few in Washington wish to revisit: the greater than 340,000 unaccompanied migrant kids misplaced in the course of the Biden administration.
For a lot of within the room, it was an uncomfortable shift, however the particulars have been not possible to disregard.
Rep. Kat Cammack outlined how HHS did not correctly vet sponsors, whereas regulation enforcement companies have been denied entry to key info. “These children have been despatched to unsafe addresses, even non-existent ones,” she mentioned. “They have been uncovered to trafficking and exploitation.”
Kennedy didn’t deflect. He acknowledged what went fallacious and defined how the system broke down. “They have been emphasizing pace over safety,” he mentioned. “There have been political causes for that. They wished the optics of empty detention facilities.”
He went on to explain how traffickers exploited the chaos, arriving with faux IDs, choosing up a number of kids without delay, and delivering them to parking heaps, strip golf equipment, and transport containers. “One individual received 42 children to 1 deal with,” Kennedy mentioned.
Beneath his management, he advised the committee that it wouldn’t occur once more. HHS now requires DNA testing, ID checks, earnings verification, and full background screening for each sponsor—no exceptions.
It’s a quiet however hanging instance of what accountability appears like when nobody’s watching.
Lastly, Rep. John James introduced the dialog again to the large image. He requested how the federal government may dismantle the perverse incentives that reward treating illness quite than stopping it, the place each main participant income from People staying sick.
“At each degree of the system… it’s only a bundle of perverse incentives,” Kennedy responded, “that principally put each actor within the system—pharmaceutical firms, suppliers, hospitals and insurance coverage firms—in an advantageous place to enhance the variety of sick People.”
The way in which ahead, he defined, is to realign incentives round outcomes. “We wish outcome-based medical care. We wish value-based medical care,” Kennedy mentioned.
He advised the committee that HHS is already working by the Heart for Medical Intervention to pilot new packages that prioritize well being outcomes. The plan is to scale them system-wide.
Kennedy added that he’s in energetic talks with the nation’s main insurers. “They wish to do it too,” he mentioned.
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