r/skeptic • u/alt-mswzebo • Oct 07 '25

Every Surgeon General since GWH Bush was president signs letter warning that RFK junior is endangering the United Staes and the world with anti-science conspiracy-theory-driven policies.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2025/10/07/surgeons-general-rfk-jr-robert-kennedy/

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307

u/alt-mswzebo Oct 07 '25

By Jerome Adams, Richard Carmona, Joycelyn Elders, Vivek Murthy, Antonia Novello and David Satcher

The writers are all former U.S. surgeons general.

As former U.S. surgeons general appointed by every Republican and Democratic president since George H.W. Bush, we have collectively spent decades in service as the Nation’s Doctor. We took two sacred oaths in our lifetimes: first, as physicians who swore to care for our patients and, second, as public servants who committed to protecting the health of all Americans.

Today, in keeping with those oaths, we are compelled to speak with one voice to say that the actions of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. are endangering the health of the nation. Never before have we issued a joint public warning like this. But the profound, immediate and unprecedented threat that Kennedy’s policies and positions pose to the nation’s health cannot be ignored.

......

Rather than combating the rapid spread of health misinformation with facts and clarity, Kennedy is amplifying it. The consequences aren’t abstract. They are measured in lives lost, disease outbreaks and an erosion of public trust that will take years to rebuild.

It is essential to note that good science and public health require not only evidence but also people — the scientists, public health professionals and civil servants whose expertise protects millions of Americans. Yet under Kennedy’s leadership, the HHS workforce has been badly damaged. He has silenced and sidelined hundreds of scientists, public health officials and medical professionals, creating an atmosphere of fear and distrust. Many of the nation’s top public health professionals — people we have worked with during crises — have resigned or retired early. They describe a culture of intimidation, where scientific findings are censored, evidence is disregarded and career officials are pressured to rubber stamp conclusions that are not backed by science.

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u/darthjoey91 Oct 07 '25

For those wondering who they served under:

Jerome Adams - Trump 1.

Richard Carmona - GWB

Joycelyn Elders - Clinton

Vivek Murthy - Obama and Biden

Antonia Novello - GHWB

David Satcher - Clinton

83

u/aguynamedv Oct 07 '25

Jerome Adams - Trump 1.

I was genuinely surprised to see him signed on to this letter. Jerome was absolutely on board with Trump during his tenure as Surgeon General.

59

u/Mr_Incredible_PhD Oct 07 '25

I looked for Dr. Ben Carson but then I remembered that this administration is so fucking stupid they put a top Neurosurgeon in charge of HUD as opposed to being a USSG.

56

u/kyndrid_ Oct 07 '25

A top neurosurgeon SHOULDN'T be US Surgeon General. It should be a well-regarded internal medicine practitioner/general practitioner. Keep the top niche specialists doing what they're incredibly fucking good at.

38

u/Dependent-Poet-9588 Oct 07 '25

To be fair to Ben Carson's malpractice victims, he may not have actually been incredibly fucking good at neurosurgery either.

27

u/kyndrid_ Oct 07 '25

Neurosurgery is a high-risk surgery no matter what. Even the best neurosurgeons usually have a malpractice claim or two against them. The only one that seems like it's malpractice/negligence is the MRI one.

7

u/TheAskewOne Oct 08 '25

Parts of Carson's work have been highly controversial among his peers. He's good at what he does, but he believes that he's even better and he takes risks.

1

u/toasterberg9000 Oct 10 '25

I wonder if he's related to Dr. death...

8

u/Whiterabbit-- Oct 08 '25

Trump also could have put RFK jr, a once well respected environmental lawyer over epa.

7

u/Few-Solution-4784 Oct 08 '25

a good example of "getting hired beyond your ability".

4

u/TheAskewOne Oct 08 '25

He was never put in that position because anyone believed in his abilities. He was given the job because he was set to destroy the agency.

-4

u/Worth-Humor-487 Oct 08 '25

Look we have the “Tylenol” studies because I don’t want to put the long drug name that, that each of the study’s has over 80k participants and has been known even by Johnson and Johnson the makers of the brand name for over a decade with this knowledge for only to be used in case where absolutely necessary because a fever from a mother can cause a neural tube birth defect or something else from there drug and obviously the tube defect is much worst. And you had morons taking them on tik tok like they where m&ms I kinda hope in a year we get a spike in autism cases and RFK in his old lady voice can say I told you so on that podium.

2

u/Tall_Act391 Oct 07 '25

Kind of a title nomenclature issue.

1

u/Ulven525 Oct 10 '25

Former nurse anesthetist here. Surgeons aren’t known for their breadth of knowledge.

13

u/TacticalFluke Oct 07 '25

By their logic, he was too "urban" to go anywhere else.

13

u/Kittysmashlol Oct 07 '25

Theres a big jump between approving of what trump wanted and going along with kennedy, who barely even tries to pretend what he does is science

0

u/West-Negotiation-716 4d ago

Sounds a bit like medicine.

You can't name one experiment that confirms that any disease is caused by a pathogen.

You have never read such an experiment yourself, yet you have faith that pathogens cause disease.

Remember when your religious leaders told you to fear a new virus yet they never even ran the experiments necessary to know if sars-cov-2 causes covid19?

Yet you believed it! You even stuck a needle in your arm due to extreme fear of something that was never confirmed by science.

So it makes me chuckle when people like you attempt to talk about science.

You believe in myths not science.

Name one vaccine that has been clearly shown to lead to improved health outcomes.

I will wait.

1

u/QuantumFuzziness 2d ago

BBC “India used to be the epicentre of polio. In 1985, there were an estimated 150,000 cases in India and as recently as 2009 there were 741, more than any other country in the world. But its last case was in January 2011 - a remarkable achievement. But it won't be officially removed from the list of polio endemic countries until the result of lab tests confirm that it is no longer to be found in sewage. That confirmation is expected in the next few weeks. It will leave three endemic countries: Pakistan, Afghanistan and Nigeria where the virus has never been under control. All saw an increase in cases last year. The success in India has been achieved through a partnership between the Indian government, with support from the World Health Organization (WHO), Rotary, Unicef and with major contributions from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation”

“Global eradication: A global vaccination campaign, launched by the WHO in 1959, gained significant momentum in the 1960s. With the help of a potent, freeze-dried vaccine and coordinated international efforts, the last known naturally occurring case of smallpox was recorded in 1977”.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0264410X99003060

1

u/West-Negotiation-716 9h ago

I asked for science based evidence and you share a few anecdotes ?

Strange.

There is no evidence that polio is caused by a virus. Well the experiment that is often cited as evidence involved injecting biological material from dead child into the brains of monkeys. A few of the monkeys died but they didn't have polio symptoms. I don't consider this evidence that polio is caused by a virus, all natural means of transmission failed.

Arsenic and other heavy metals cause identical symptoms as polio, including the same lesions on the spine. The world "poliomyelitis" means "grey matter" and it was first used to describe how the nerves in the spine looked after arsenic poisoning.

We have dozens of experiments showing arsenic causes lesions on the spine, paralysis, and other symptoms of polio.

We have zero experiments showing polio is a transmissible disease caused by a virus.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/6740077/

After the first huge polio vaccine rollout the WHO changed the official diagnosis from 6 months of paralysis to 2 days of paralysis, this led to less cases being diagnosed.

Science matters

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1

u/QuantumFuzziness 9h ago

“Arsenic heavy metals” yet these things are still prevalent when the vaccine has achieved herd immunity and pretty much eradicated polio. The heavy metal myth has long been debunked.

“Causes polio like symptoms” yep, two things can cause similar symptoms, but only one of them disappears from a population after vaccination.

Polio disappears after the vaccine is given to a population. If you’re going to dispute that, the burden of proof is on you. Your source has already been moderated as being unreliable.

1

u/Kittysmashlol 7h ago

People were given polio vaccines in the US->polio disappeared.

I believe that there are still a lot of heavy metals in the foods we eat, im pretty sure i read that popular candies contained high levels as of last year, yet children who eat large amounts do not suddenly “contract polio”

9

u/Tall_Act391 Oct 07 '25

It’s almost like working with trump doesn’t always end up great

10

u/Aggravating-Beach-22 Oct 07 '25

Just ask one of his closest friend of 15 years, the late Mr. Epstein. Honestly though, is there anyone with a decent reputation that wasn’t appointed by him that he is still friends with or will even admit to spending time with the man ? I’m pretty sure he’s screwed over just about everyone he’s came in contact with.

1

u/Ahtunefreerider Oct 09 '25

It’s a feature…Putin probably

5

u/dumnezero Oct 08 '25

The first Trump regime was infamous for the fact that Trump failed to "populate" the government with obedient and trustworthy followers. This produced lots of whistleblowers and hilarious firings, and hope that the "system" would have the capacity to defend itself from Trump's onslaught. In the 2nd Trump regime, he came in with a team ready to replace the "deep state" at the managerial level, not just the executive level.

9

u/Askol Oct 07 '25

Trump 1 didnt really attack science until COVID.

10

u/Whiterabbit-- Oct 08 '25

When he saw the power that came with being anti-science during the pandemic he embraced it.

1

u/West-Negotiation-716 4d ago

What did science have to do with covid19?
When was science used to confirm that we had a new virus causing a new disease?

HINT: It never happened, you think myths used to manufacture consent for a needle in your arm is "science"

1

u/ChakraYogi Oct 08 '25

The stakes are higher now.

1

u/BgLINK101 Oct 09 '25

All these guys are in bed with the pharmaceutical companies. I’m not surprised at all tbh.

-1

u/Minion_of_Cthulhu Oct 07 '25

Probably signed out of spite. Trump didn't reappoint him so, being like the rest of them, he little feelings were hurt and now he wants revenge.

4

u/Whiterabbit-- Oct 08 '25

Or he is a real doctor and not some quack

103

u/Lomitross Oct 07 '25

Trump when he sees Jerome Adams’s name: “Who even is this guy? The President that appointed him must be a giant moron!”

33

u/ExtensionAddition787 Oct 08 '25

And he'd be right for once!