RFK Jr., one-time environmentalist, kills NIH climate change programs

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was named by Time magazine as a “hero of the planet” for his pioneering work to clean up America ’s waterways.

On his second day as secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services , he ended HHS funding for climate change and health programs at the National Institutes of Health .

Ken Callahan , a senior adviser for policy and implementation in the Immediate Office of the Secretary for HHS , sent an email to Dr. Matthew Memoli .

My job is to make Americans healthy again.” But these are not separate matters. According to the scientific and public health communities, there is a strong connection between these two issues that Kennedy has professed to care about. Yet in his initial hours as HHS secretary, he moved to kill NIH programs that strive to protect the health of Americans from the various threats of a warming globe. In doing so, this former “hero of the planet” failed to live up to both his past passion and his much-ballyhooed mission of the moment..