When Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. took the helm of the department in February 2025, he pledged to remove special interests from HHS and chart a new path focused on “gold-standard science.”
He made his core policy interests clear in November 2024, even before he was President Donald Trump’s pick for the job, accusing the federal government of suppressing “psychedelics, peptides, stem cells, raw milk, hyperbaric therapies, chelating compounds, ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, vitamins, clean foods, sunshine, exercise, nutraceuticals and anything else that advances human health and can’t be patented by Pharma.”
But many public health experts note that the secretary’s policymaking efforts tend to reflect his personal lifestyle choices rather than settled science. That is leading to worries that his style of leadership is steering the department in a way that could set a dangerous precedent.
As an example, they point to his support for peptides, short chains of amino acids that have become popular as injections that promise a variety of benefits, such as antiaging, gut health and enhanced athletic performance.
Kennedy has pushed the FDA to ease restrictions on them, telling podcaster Joe Rogan that he once found them helpful in treating a back injury.
