Alex Miller

Associate Editor

Loyola University Chicago School of Law, JD 2026

President Trump’s return to the White House has sparked a lot of controversy as he takes extensive executive action and appoints contentious figures to his cabinet. At the top of the list of most controversial is arguably the newly confirmed Secretary of Human Health and Services, Robert Kennedy Jr., because of his skepticism towards vaccines and pharmaceutical drugs like Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs), used to treat various mental disorders. Despite criticisms, Kennedy gained a large following during his 2024 presidential campaign, where he founded the Make America Healthy Again movement and advocated for public health policies that make American food healthier and end the chronic disease epidemic in this country. Aligned with these initiatives, President Trump has taken extensive action in the first sixty days of his second term to reform public health policy. Among these changes is the newly created Make America Healthy Again Commission, which is chaired by Secretary Kennedy and consists of other cabinet and high-ranking executive officials. The Commission is initially tasked with addressing the childhood chronic disease crisis, specifically targeting nutrition, prescription drug misuse, and government transparency related to ethics and public trust.

Nutritional reform

First, President Trump tasked the Commission to identify and report the best practices for promoting proper nutrition and promoting healthier lifestyles for children. In the past, Secretary Kennedy has criticized the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for “failing to protect children” from dangerous food additives and its general ineffectiveness at ensuring that children have access to nutritious foods. Specifically, Kennedy has advocated against “ultra-high processed foods,” referring to foods that contain high amounts of added sugar, fats, seed oils, pesticides, or other chemical additives. Through the Commission, Secretary Kennedy will likely implement new guidance for governmental agencies to more closely regulate the food processing industry and educate the American public on the risks of these foods, which are linked to chronic health diseases like obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and cancer. As part of this guidance, Kennedy has expressed his desire to dismantle the FDA and restructure it to better carry out his goals to end the chronic disease epidemic.

Also on the Commission is the Secretary of Agriculture, Brooke Rollins, who is expected to work closely with Secretary Kennedy and with American farmers to ensure that American food is healthy, abundant, and affordable. Secretary Rollins has expressed her desire to end the childhood chronic disease epidemic by reducing the availability of ultra-processed foods in school food programs funded by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and eliminating unhealthy foods, including foods with high amounts of added sugar, from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). As the USDA oversees the Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) to administer SNAP, it should promulgate new regulations that prohibit unhealthy foods from being served in school lunch programs and from being purchased through SNAP. These changes are necessary to implement to counter the rising rates of childhood obesity and chronic illness. In 2022, about 40% of American children had at least one health condition and more than 40% were overweight or obese, so reducing children’s access to unhealthy foods will reduce childhood obesity. Although healthier foods are traditionally harder to access and are more expensive, the USDA can, and should, combat these obstacles by subsidizing healthy and natural food products grown by American farmers, rather than subsidizing American sugar and unhealthy products with added sugar.

Concerns of over-prescribing medications for children

Additionally, President Trump tasked the Commission to assess the prevalence and threat of overusing medication and the prescription of SSRIs, antipsychotics, mood stabilizers, stimulants, and weight-loss drugs. Secretary Kennedy has received extensive backlash for his remarks over SSRIs after linking antidepressants to school shootings. Despite fears that Secretary Kennedy will ban antidepressants and other life-saving drugs that treat mental disorders, Kennedy has been a long-time advocate for medical freedom, stating he simply wishes to provide fully informed consent about the risks surrounding these medications. Likely, the Commission will focus on the appropriateness of prescribing these drugs to children. For example, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) treatment has been highly criticized over the last decade with growing skepticism that children are being misdiagnosed with ADHD and then improperly prescribed stimulants like Adderall. The Commission should assess the accuracy of these concerns and provide guidance to federal agencies, like the FDA, to implement changes that increase transparency of the effects of these drugs on children.

Conclusion

As chair of the Commission, Secretary Kennedy has obstacles to overcome as he currently faces a measles outbreak in Texas. Kennedy has previously criticized the MMR (measles-mumps-rubella) vaccine as unsafe and linked to autism, but now is weakly suggesting maybe people should receive the shot. Kennedy must encourage MMR vaccines among children, especially with reports that an unvaccinated child has died due to the outbreak. How he handles this public safety concern will set the tone for the next four years over whether he will be successful in advancing public health and restoring public trust in governmental institutions. There is a fine distinction between advancing a “Make America Healthy Again” agenda and governmental overstep that will worsen public trust, especially when it comes to threatening affordable access to life-saving mental health care and access to food.

Earlier this month, Kennedy encouraged general safe practices to safeguard children against measles without directly calling for parents to vaccinate their children. To restore trust in public health institutions and agencies, Kennedy must be an advocate for all things that can save the most lives, and that includes the MMR vaccine, which has existed for decades and has much stronger data supporting its safety and efficacy, compared to controversial vaccines like the COVID shot. If the Commission is successful on reforming public health in this country and ending the childhood chronic disease epidemic, then the Trump administration and Secretary Kennedy would be incrementally closer to fulfilling their promise to make America healthy again.