Drama Shadows Recent MAHA Wins

The past couple of weeks has seen a lot of drama within the Make America Healthy Again movement. Much of the commotion surrounds President Donald Trump’s new Surgeon General nominee, Dr. Casey Means along with her brother, Calley, a special adviser to HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

A few members of the wider MAHA coalition have cited concerns over their involvement in biotech companies, while others condemn their lack of emphasis on vaccines. Predictably, the far-left media is having a field day, running stories better suited to the E! network than serious media outlets.

Amidst all the distractions, however, major MAHA wins are flying under the radar.

FDA Wins

Not only did the FDA mandate that three of the most controversial food dyes be removed from processed food, but the agency will also be conducting a post market review of all added food chemicals. In a recent press release, the FDA announced measures to “increase transparency and ensure the safety of chemicals in food.” According to the press release, the FDA will roll out a modernized, evidence-based prioritization scheme for reviewing existing chemicals, initiate a final, systematic post-market review process, and expedite its review of chemicals currently under review.

Barely any legacy media outlet covered these stories, much less applauded them. In a contentious hearing before the House last week, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. had to toot his own horn to Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., who was blasting Kennedy for his consolidation efforts at HHS. “Congressman DeLauro, you say that you’ve worked for 20 years on getting food dye out. Give me credit! I got it out in a hundred days!”

He repeated his now popular charge, “There’s no such thing as Republican children or Democratic children. There’s just kids and we should all be concerned with them.”

In response to the changes at the FDA, many companies are fast-tracking efforts to comply with new standards. Recently, Tyson Foods announced it will be eliminating petroleum-based dyes by the end of the month.

In addition, last week Kennedy ordered the FDA to conduct a complete review of the popular abortion pill, mifepristone. According to insurance data, one in ten women experienced a serious adverse event within 45 days of taking the pill, including sepsis, infection, and hemorrhaging. According to the report, “the real-world rate of serious adverse events following mifepristone abortions is at least 22 times as high as the summary figure of “less than 0.5 percent” in clinical trials reported on the drug label.

Vaccine Recommendation Changes

The FDA plans to introduce a new review system for future vaccines that would require placebo testing, a huge victory for MAHA supporters.

FDA Commissioner Dr. Marty Makary signaled his support for the move. “We want to see vaccines that are available for high-risk individuals,” Makary said. “And at the same time, we want some good science. We want some good clinical data.”

The agency is focusing on the good data it already has. Years of failed COVID policy preceded years of underreported mRNA side effects and needless injections. Finally, health officials are doing something about it. On May 20, Makary, along with Dr. Vinay Prasad, announced that federal agencies will no longer recommend COVID shots for children and teenagers.

Furthermore, officials have limited recommendations for ongoing shots to high risk and older individuals. It’s a small step, but it represents a historic reversal of the CDC vaccine schedule for kids, which, with only one exception, always grows and never shrinks.  

For many years, Trump touted his first-term health campaign, Operation Warp Speed, as a huge success. As a result, many speculated that the president would stymie efforts by Kennedy and others to re-assess the COVID vaccines. But every relevant public statement by the president supports Kennedy’s efforts, even if it means rethinking past policies in light of new evidence.

Earlier this year, Kennedy also suggested HHS would review the entire childhood vaccine schedule, though, at the moment, this remains a promissory note.

End of Gain-of-Function Research

Another MAHA success came on May 5, when Trump signed an executive order to ban federally funded gain-of-function research on biological agents and pathogens in foreign “countries of concern.”  Kennedy called the move “a milestone and historic development.”

Though the executive order was quite narrow, it’s clear that leading health officials recognize the problems with this research wherever it is conducted. “There’s no laboratory that does this right, there’s no laboratory that’s immune from leaks,” the HHS secretary commented during the signing.

National Institute of Health Director Jay Bhattacharya stated, “The conduct of this research does not protect us against pandemics as some people might say. Any nation that engages in this research endangers their own population as well as the world as we saw during the COVID pandemic.”

“Gain-of-function is an area of science where scientists really play God,” Kennedy told “The Record With Greta Van Susteren.” “They’re taking pathogenic viruses and they’re making them more transmissible, they’re making them more virulent, and they’re making them more deadly.”

Some in the MAHA movement have complained that these policies are too modest—and that may be true. But each represents a reversal of policies that, until recently, elite influencers treated as settled. Among fans of MAHA, the more charitable interpretation is that Kennedy, Makary, and Bhattacharya are wisely choosing an incremental approach. It’s easy to forget that they have held their positions for only a few months.

Like much of President Trump’s agenda, it’s been hard to keep pace with these major health policy reforms. However, if the MAHA coalition can stay focused and disciplined, we have every reason for hope that the Trump-Kennedy vision of making American healthier will succeed.

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