In his first network TV interview since becoming Health and Human Services secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. spoke with CBS News chief medical correspondent Dr. Jon LaPook about a range of topics, including measles, food additives and weight loss drugs.
Here are some highlights from their conversation:
Measles and “heartbreaking” Texas visit
After previously downplaying the growing number of cases and making several false and misleading claims about the safety of the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine, Kennedy has recently acknowledged the vaccine’s efficacy.
In the CBS News interview, Kennedy publicly encouraged people to get the measles vaccine, marking the first time he has done so since becoming HHS secretary.
“The federal government’s position, my position, is that people should get the measles vaccine,” he said, but added, “The government should not be mandating those.”
He also talked about his recent trip to West Texas, where two children have died from the highly contagious infection in a growing outbreak that’s sickened more than 500 people in that state alone. He called the visit, which included meeting with the children’s parents and attending a funeral service, “very heartbreaking.”
“In some ways, it was very nice to be able to actually meet them in person and spend a whole day with them and share their lives with them and get to know their community, which was very welcoming and loving towards me, and to attend these very, very moving services for these girls,” he said. He described the people in that Mennonite community as resilient, God-fearing, resourceful and kind.
Almost all of those infected in the Texas outbreak were either unvaccinated or have unknown vaccination status, according to health officials. Both of the children who died were unvaccinated.
Food additives
Kennedy said he met with major food processors and producers after being sworn in and received “no real pushback” on removing certain ingredients like artificial food dyes — which Kennedy called “the most egregious” — from American’s foods.
“They’re clearly associated with a variety a grim inventory of diseases, including cancers and behavioral disease and neurological disease like ADHD, and it’s very, very well-documented and they’re making, in many cases, the same products in this country have those dyes, and then they use vegetable dyes in Canada, Mexico and Europe,” Kennedy said.
Certain artificial dyes used in the U.S. are banned or subject to warning labels in other countries. Recently, West Virginia moved to ban seven artificial food dyes in the state. California banned Red Dye No. 3 and some other food additives in 2023.
Earlier this year, under the Biden administration, the FDA announced its decision to revoke the authorization for Red No. 3 in foods, after evidence showed a link between high levels of it and cancer in laboratory animals. Companies are working to update their products to comply with the FDA’s decision by a deadline of Jan. 15, 2027.
Kennedy said the food companies he met with told them it would take time to remove the additives.
“It was just about timing. They said it’s going to take us a while,” he said. “For example, the CEO of Pepsi, which owns Doritos, said … ‘The consumers like them to be very red, and we have not yet found a vegetable dye that we can match, but we’re going to do it.’ And I said they all have to be out within two years.”
Kennedy said he’s going to get rid of what he called “the biggest villain”: the standard known as GRAS, or Generally Recognized As Safe, which allows some food ingredients to bypass the approvals process.
“The FDA became captured by the food industry, and they enlarged the GRAS standard to apply to everything, and that’s why we have 10,000 ingredients in our food and the Europeans only have 400 in theirs. Because in Europe, before you add something, a chemical, to a food, you gotta prove that it’s safe. In our country, it is rubber-stamped.”
Obesity and coverage for GLP-1 drugs
GLP-1 agonists, which Kennedy called “extraordinary drugs,” are available by prescription to anybody who’s diagnosed as diabetic or pre-diabetic — but when pushed on whether they’d be covered by Medicare and Medicaid for those with obesity, Kennedy said officials are “looking at a regulatory framework.”
“Ideally over the long term, we’d like to see those drugs available for people after they try other interventions,” Kennedy said. Those interventions, he said, include the use of glucose monitors and health regimens like a change in diet and exercise.
LaPook pointed out regimens like diet and exercise “have been tried for half a century.” Kennedy argued that now there are better ways to monitor it, which may be used as proof for future Medicare or Medicaid coverage.
“They can show that they’ve done these interventions, and if they don’t work, then you would be entitled to the drug,” he shared of the framework they’re currently debating. “I think everybody would like to make those drugs available to everybody under Medicaid, Medicare. But the impact on our medical costs would increase dramatically.”
Previously, the Biden administration proposed that Medicare would start covering the medications for people with obesity, not just people who had diabetes or some other medical condition. Last week, the Trump administration decided not to move forward with that plan.
Health program cuts
Since his appointment in February, Kennedy has facilitated sweeping cuts affecting a wide range of health programs and thousands of employees.
When asked by LaPook if he personally approved the more than $11 billion in cuts to local and state public health programs — funding that helps states address infectious disease, mental health, addiction and childhood vaccination — Kennedy said, “No, I’m not familiar with those cuts.” The cuts have been temporarily blocked by a federal judge.
“The cuts were mainly DEI cuts, which the president ordered,” Kennedy said, but the $11 billion in public health funding was not DEI-related.
Around 10,000 HHS employees are being laid off in a restructuring move by Kennedy and Elon Musk’s DOGE. Kennedy acknowledged that some of the DOGE cuts will need to be reinstated.
Kennedy said he was not familiar with an example LaPook mentioned of funding being cut for a study on adolescent diabetes.
“There’s a number of studies that were cut that came to our attention and that did not deserve to be cut, and we reinstated them. Our purpose is not to reduce any level of scientific research that’s important,” the secretary said.
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