Physicians slam RFK Jr for sharing 'wacky, flat-earth'-style disinformation about the health of kids

US health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has been slammed by physicians over his claim that he can tell children have “mitochondrial issues” by just looking at them.

In his role as Health and Human Services Secretary, RFK Jr., who has a history of health misinformation, has been criticised for his dangerous comments about scientific innovations such as vaccines.

RFK Jr. recently applied new restrictions to life-saving Covid vaccines and has been accused of fearmongering about autism, which has no single known cause, and which Donald Trump labelled an “epidemic”.

“We’re finding interventions, certain interventions now that are clearly almost certainly causing autism,” RFJ Jr. told president Trump at a cabinet meeting on Tuesday (26 August). “And we’re going to be able to address those in September.”

But, his latest piece of misinformation came during a signing ceremony for the so-called “Make America and Make Texas Healthy Again” initiative on Wednesday, where he claimed that he can tell that children are unwell by looking at them.

“I know what a healthy child is supposed to look like. I’m looking at kids as I walk through the airports today...and I see these kids that are just overburdened with mitochondrial challenges, with inflammation – you can tell from their faces, from their body movements and from their lack of social connection – and I know that is not how our children are supposed to look,” RFK Jr. claimed.

Physicians, with actual scientific knowledge about such matters, have slammed RFK Jr.’s comments, saying “this is not normal” of a health secretary.

“I'm sorry but what? Our Health Secretary says that he sees kids at airports and can tell by their faces that they have mitochondrial challenges.

“This is wacky, flat-earth, voodoo stuff people. This is not normal,” one physician wrote.

Another scientist said: “Scientist here. Mitochondria do not present challenges to faces, movements, or social connections."

Even among those who are not in the medical field, his comments were deemed “high quackery”.

“The man who just blocked you from being able to get a COVID vaccine says that children who don't look him in the eyes have ‘mitochondrial challenges.’

“This is high quackery,” wrote one person.

Someone else said: “You’re not a doctor. You didn’t even take a science course in college. Otherwise you’d probably understand that we don’t base our national public health policies on anecdotal observations made by lunatics about children at the airport.”

On Thursday, the director of The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Dr Demetre Daskalakis, resigned from his position.

In his letter, he explained that RFK Jr.’s views “challenge my ability to continue in my current role at the agency and in the service of the health of the American people”.

“We are seven months into the new administration, and no CDC subject matter expert from my Center has ever briefed the Secretary. I am not sure who the Secretary is listening to, but it is quite certainly not to us.

“Unvetted and conflicted outside organizations seem to be the sources HHS use over the gold standard science of CDC and other reputable sources,” he wrote.

Indy100 has reached out to Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for comment.

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