ST. PAUL, Minn., Dec. 17 (UPI) -- 2025 will go down as among the most tumultuous years ever at U.S. health agencies, as President Donald Trump and his controversial Health and Human Services secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., sought to reshape the government's healthcare establishment to reflect conservative values.
In instituting their "Make America Healthy Again" agenda, they carried out mass layoffs at key agencies such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration, challenged long-established science by promoting beliefs many experts consider fringe or conspiratorial, placed new emphasis on "parental rights" in vaccine policy and sought to save billions of dollars in taxpayers' funds.
"We must remake the government to maximize efficiency and productivity in order to fulfill the president's promise to Make America Healthy Again," Kennedy said in his May budget statement to Congress.
"[The Department of Health and Human Services] has made progress towards these goals, promoting the health of Americans while instituting significant workforce reductions and identifying over $13 billion anticipated in contract savings -- and there is more to come."
