Latest news with #MakingAmericaHealthyAgain
03-07-2025
- Health
RFK Jr. wants everyone to use wearables. What are the benefits, risks?
Last week, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced the agency was launching a campaign to encourage all Americans to use wearables to track health metrics. Wearables come in the form of watches, bands, rings, patches and clothes that can be used for a variety of reasons including monitoring glucose levels, measuring activity levels, track heart health and observe sleeping patterns. "It's a way … people can take control over their own heath. They can take responsibility," Kennedy said during a hearing of the House Subcommittee on Health. "They can see, as you know, what food is doing to their glucose levels, their heart rates and a number of other metrics as they eat it. and they can begin to make good judgments about their diet, about their physical activity, about the way that they live their lives." He went on, "We think that wearables are a key to the MAHA agenda -- Making America Healthy Again. My vision is that every American is wearing a wearable within four years." Digital medicine experts told ABC News that wearables do have benefits and can be used to motivate someone to increase physical activity, which could reduce the risk of poor health outcomes. However, they said not everybody needs to have a wearable and there are some potential risks including data breaches. Nabil Alshurafa, an associate professor in the department of preventive medicine and the department of electrical and computer engineering at Northwestern University in Illinois, said wearables were born out of the quantified self movement. This is a movement that endorses using technology to track and analyze personal data for learning and improvement. "Just the way when we're driving a vehicle, we see whether we're low on gas, and then we pass by the gas station and repump," Alshurafa told ABC News. "So, the idea was sort of can I see when I'm active? Not active? Can I see when I have poor health habits and then adjust accordingly. Did I have good quality asleep last night? If not, let me try to improve that." He said there are benefits to wearables, mostly in the form of motivation to change behaviors. A July 2022 study found wearables can empower patients and help with diagnosing conditions, changing behaviors and self-monitoring. Additionally, a July 2019 study from the University of Florida in Gainesville found wearable devices can motivate and accelerate physical activity, although it did not find consistent improvement in health outcomes. Dr. David McManus, chair and professor of medicine at UMass Chan Medical School and a digital medicine expert, said an example would be if someone wants to walk 10,000 steps a day and they wear an activity monitor that tells them they only walked 5,000 steps on a particular day. This might motivate that person to walk further to achieve their goal. In turn, evidence shows people who are more physically active have fewer rates of heart attacks and are less likely to develop high blood pressure or obesity. "The benefit would be if a person actually used that information to change their behavior," he told ABC News. "That would be the clearest use case of a person using a wearable to learn. … I won't say there's convincing concrete evidence that a wearable will prevent heart attacks -- I would be uncomfortable saying that -- but I do think it's reasonable on the basis of preliminary studies and observational studies, there is some potential benefit for certain types of people from wearing devices to get people motivated to change." Alshurafa said clinicians can also receive more granular data about behaviors such as how much energy patients are expending and how many calories they are burning. It's unclear if Kennedy's connections have played a role in his endorsements of wearables. U.S. surgeon general nominee Casey Means co-founded Levels, an app that allows people to track their food, along with biometric data like sleep and glucose monitoring, to see how their diet is impacting their health. Additionally, her brother, Calley Means -- an adviser to Kennedy -- has a company that could benefit from more wearables in the world. His company, TruMed, allows people to use funds from Health Savings Accounts towards health products, such as fitness tracker watches. There are also drawbacks. McManus said there is not a high level of evidence that shows wearables have benefits over the long term. "One thing I've learned as a physician and researcher is it's really hard to get people to change their habits," he said. "So it's not so much that the sensors don't work, and it's not so much that they're inaccurate -- because there is plenty of data that shows that wearable devices can present really good, high-quality data -- but the missing link in the chain of wearables to good health is getting people to actually get off their couch and go be more active when they have a wearable them that they've been on the couch." There are also privacy concerns because of the substantial amounts of data that wearables generate, as well as the potential for misuse. McManus said if a database gets hacked, the data could be compromised and potentially used by a bad actor to steal additional personal information. "The more data that's generated, the greater the risk," he said. Authors of a JAMA Viewpoint article in 2019 said another risk is that data could be used against policyholders with higher premiums or to deny insurance. Because wearables collect health information such as weight, calorie intake and blood pressure, insurance companies could use the data to increase costs, the authors said. Alshurafa said not everyone needs to wear a wearable and it depends on the patient's condition and what they hope to achieve. "We feel once their health improves, we then wean them off it," he said. "So, this notion that someone has to wear a wearable constantly -- well, I mean once the problem is solved, then hopefully there's no need for it."
Epoch Times
25-06-2025
- Health
- Epoch Times
CDC Director Nominee Pledges to Refocus Agency, Support MAHA Agenda
President Donald Trump's new nominee to lead the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention told senators on June 25 that she would refocus the agency to tackle infectious diseases but still look to support the Make America Healthy Again, or MAHA, agenda promoted by Trump and Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 'As CDC refocuses its efforts specifically on communicable diseases ... we'll be laser-focused on that area, but we will continue, and I will continue, to make sure that we're supporting the secretary's vision of overall Making America Healthy Again,' Susan Monarez, the nominee to lead the CDC, said during her confirmation hearing in Washington.
Yahoo
05-06-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
We've finally slowed the surge in overdose deaths. The Trump admin may undo all of it
On May 14, 2025, the Division of Overdose Prevention at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that the number of overdose deaths in 2024 had dropped 27%. This was an extraordinary, even historic announcement, given overdoses had risen relentlessly for more than 33 years, resulting in the deaths of more than a million Americans, with another 1 million projected to die before this decade is over. Now, for more than a year, overdose deaths have decreased every single month, most dramatically for deaths caused by illicit fentanyl — considered the toughest problem, given the opioid's high potency, simplicity of manufacture, and ease of smuggling. That very same day, the new Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., in testimony before Congress, made no reference to overdoses, the number one killer of Americans 18 to 44 years of age, nor to the recent success. A week later, in his agency's 72-page 'Making America Healthy Again' manifesto, the word 'opioid' was never mentioned. Instead, he went on to propose that CDC should be disassembled, along with the other principal agencies responsible for addressing the overdose crisis. Those proposals, as part of the administration's 2026 fiscal year budget, passed the House and await action by the Senate. For nearly thirty years I was a CDC scientist. I have been outspokenly critical of how CDC and those other agencies have handled the opioid crisis, but the solution is not to take a wrecking ball to the institutions that protect us, particularly when we seem to be making progress. What will be the consequences? A health secretary who systematically ignores mention of the major killer of adult Americans is clearly not interested in research on what could account for a decrease in deaths. But among recent national initiatives, the push to increase availability of the opioid overdose antidote, naloxone (brand name Narcan), has clearly played a role. Between 2021 and 2023, the number of naloxone doses dispensed from retail pharmacies doubled, and millions of additional doses were distributed by harm reduction organizations. Then in March 2023, the Food and Drug Administration approved over-the-counter distribution of a nasal spray version. By the end of the year, 20 million doses had been dispensed. The decline in overdose death rates started the month after the nasal spray became widely available. Temporal sequence is not causation, but in a public health crisis, a plausible step is mass distribution of an antidote easily administered by lay persons. Few interventions in medicine are more cost-effective than saving a life in ten seconds for $25. Shortly after being put in charge of the U.S. health care system in February 2025, Kennedy, called for immediate decreased funding for naloxone. And he didn't stop there. Slated for abolition is the National Institute for Drug Abuse, the research group at the National Institutes of Health that helped develop the nasal version of naloxone. NIDA is currently researching opioid analgesics with lower addiction risk and developing wastewater detection systems to provide early warning of new illicit drugs. What is left of NIDA will be absorbed, with other decimated institutes, into a single entity focused on 'behavioral health.'Also on the chopping block is the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, which provides the major funding for state and local naloxone distribution and drug treatment programs. CDC's Division of Overdose Prevention, which is responsible for monitoring the drug epidemic, is marked for demolition too, despite having just reported the unprecedented reduction in overdose deaths. Adding to the threat of a renewed overdose explosion, the CDC issued the stark warning of a seven-fold rise in overdoses from illicit carfentanil, an opioid 100 times more potent than fentanyl — so potent that the drug is used to sedate elephants and minuscule amounts can easily kill a person. Remnants of SAMHSA and the CDC's Division of Overdose Prevention will be folded into the new 'Agency for Healthy America." Even if we assume that every cent of the budgets of the three cancelled drug control groups is eliminated, the total reduction in the federal budget would be one-tenth of one percent, or considerably less than the cost of one aircraft carrier. According to the new director of the Office of Management and Budget, Russell Vought, these transformations should be done in a way to assure that the federal workforce will 'be traumatically affected,' and 'viewed as the villains.' What should the few remaining traumatically affected villains do about the drug crisis? Kennedy, who attributes his heroin recovery to 12-step abstinence, made that clear in his 2024 documentary: 'We're going to build hundreds of healing farms' — places where people with addiction 'learn the discipline of hard work' and 'get re-parented,' all the while bringing 'a new industry to these forgotten corners of America.' Antidotes, treatment, prevention? These are at best irrelevant — more likely, a moral hazard. The first thing you learn in public health is that all victories are temporary. Back in 2000, the CDC group where I worked demonstrated that ongoing transmission of measles — the most infectious pathogen known to humankind — had been eliminated from the U.S., thanks to nationwide hard work to raise immunization levels. A quarter-century later, because of lowered immunization levels consequent to a torrent of vaccine misinformation by Kennedy and others, there have been more than 1,000 measles cases in 30 states over the first five months of this year. The question is now before Congress: If the agencies battling the drug epidemic are disabled, will a renewed explosion of deaths result? The last time the current president was in office, overdose rates rose more than 44% over the course of his tenure — the largest overdose increase in American history, with more than 300,000 lives lost. This time, we may never know if history is repeating itself since the systems that monitor overdose deaths are themselves subject to elimination. However, families of future overdose victims may still wonder if 2025 was the year we helped make Americans die again.
Yahoo
30-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Opinion - For members of Congress, MAHA isn't just great policy — it's also smart politics
Believe it: The coalition behind 'Making America Healthy Again' will play an outsized role in deciding the 2026 Congressional midterm elections in more than 500 days from now in November 2026. That's because the issues that go into MAHA close the gender gap and maintain the voter margins with young voters. But MAHA has been years in the making, going back long before President Trump won his second term and even prior to the political accession of current Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. My organization is now prioritizing the voters in the top 50 battleground U.S. House seats and 10 U.S. Senate seats, including the open seats in New Hampshire, Michigan, and Minnesota. The voters in all of the prioritized battleground Congressional races fully support the common-sense, nonpartisan health policies about making our nation healthy again. We will be bringing them and their constituent voices to meet in person with their U.S. senators and Representatives in Washington starting next month. U.S. senators who oppose their constituents' heartfelt, passionate support for these policies will lose in 2026. This includes making epinephrine an over-the-counter drug (something FDA Commissioner Martin Makary voiced support for in his March confirmation hearing) the elimination of taxpayer-funded sodas from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, expansion of regenerative farming, and elimination of glyphosate herbicides and other poisons in the food supply. Conversely, senators and representatives, regardless of party, who support their constituents and the policies we work for will earn the support of their constituents on election day. Our coalition is truly bipartisan, based on an Executive Order issued by a Republican president and implemented by a scion of the Democratic Party. This has helped my organization scale to become the fastest-growing nationwide public health advocacy coalition, which is ready to be activated in a micro-targeted deployment to battleground U.S. House and Senate races in the midterm elections. Perhaps most importantly, leaders in Congress from both parties support our goals. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.), and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) are all acutely aware of the power our coalition has now, and all four are working with us in support of their respective conferences. Why? Because the 50 battleground House seats and 10 U.S. Senate seats will be decided by mere thousands of votes. Our coalition will be a deciding factor in many if not all of these toss-up Congressional election races. What differentiates our organization from any other entity is our unprecedented structure and confluence with the electorate's mindset and policy priorities. We are free of the corporate groups that traditionally mete out retribution upon those who boldly do what is right. And we have secured the immediate branding of a disruptive force that enjoys trust from voters trust on the policies they care most about. Don't take our word for it. Every congressional incumbent in a battleground district or state has met with us, and many are relying upon us and our voters to be re-elected. In more than 30 years of working with Congress and White Houses of both Republican and Democratic political parties, I have never seen so much certainty among congressional leaders that these issues will determine their political fate and build the next congressional majority. With 522 days to go until election day, each senator and representative working with us understands that his or her race is being won, right now, by MAHA issues and MAHA voters. Robert K. Houton is founder of the Make America Healthy Again Coalition, is a former U.S. Senate candidate from Maryland and candidate for chair of the Democratic National Committee. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
The Hill
30-05-2025
- Health
- The Hill
For members of Congress, MAHA isn't just great policy — it's also smart politics
Believe it: The coalition behind 'Making America Healthy Again' will play an outsized role in deciding the 2026 Congressional midterm elections in more than 500 days from now in November 2026. That's because the issues that go into MAHA close the gender gap and maintain the voter margins with young voters. But MAHA has been years in the making, going back long before President Trump won his second term and even prior to the political accession of current Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. My organization is now prioritizing the voters in the top 50 battleground U.S. House seats and 10 U.S. Senate seats, including the open seats in New Hampshire, Michigan, and Minnesota. The voters in all of the prioritized battleground Congressional races fully support the common-sense, nonpartisan health policies about making our nation healthy again. We will be bringing them and their constituent voices to meet in person with their U.S. senators and Representatives in Washington starting next month. U.S. senators who oppose their constituents' heartfelt, passionate support for these policies will lose in 2026. This includes making epinephrine an over-the-counter drug (something FDA Commissioner Martin Makary voiced support for in his March confirmation hearing) the elimination of taxpayer-funded sodas from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, expansion of regenerative farming, and elimination of glyphosate herbicides and other poisons in the food supply. Conversely, senators and representatives, regardless of party, who support their constituents and the policies we work for will earn the support of their constituents on election day. Our coalition is truly bipartisan, based on an Executive Order issued by a Republican president and implemented by a scion of the Democratic Party. This has helped my organization scale to become the fastest-growing nationwide public health advocacy coalition, which is ready to be activated in a micro-targeted deployment to battleground U.S. House and Senate races in the midterm elections. Perhaps most importantly, leaders in Congress from both parties support our goals. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.), and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) are all acutely aware of the power our coalition has now, and all four are working with us in support of their respective conferences. Why? Because the 50 battleground House seats and 10 U.S. Senate seats will be decided by mere thousands of votes. Our coalition will be a deciding factor in many if not all of these toss-up Congressional election races. What differentiates our organization from any other entity is our unprecedented structure and confluence with the electorate's mindset and policy priorities. We are free of the corporate groups that traditionally mete out retribution upon those who boldly do what is right. And we have secured the immediate branding of a disruptive force that enjoys trust from voters trust on the policies they care most about. Don't take our word for it. Every congressional incumbent in a battleground district or state has met with us, and many are relying upon us and our voters to be re-elected. In more than 30 years of working with Congress and White Houses of both Republican and Democratic political parties, I have never seen so much certainty among congressional leaders that these issues will determine their political fate and build the next congressional majority. With 522 days to go until election day, each senator and representative working with us understands that his or her race is being won, right now, by MAHA issues and MAHA voters. Robert K. Houton is founder of the Make America Healthy Again Coalition, is a former U.S. Senate candidate from Maryland and candidate for chair of the Democratic National Committee.
