In a social media video released, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) slammed Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the American healthcare system.
00:02Dangerously, President Trump and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert Kennedy
00:08are wreaking havoc on our already broken and dysfunctional health care system.
00:14I love the slogan. It's a great slogan.
00:17Make America healthy again. Fantastic.
00:21Unfortunately, the Trump administration is doing just the opposite.
00:27You don't make America healthy by throwing 15 million people off the health care they have,
00:32which is what Trump's big, beautiful bill does.
00:36You don't make America healthy by, as a result of these Medicaid cuts,
00:40shutting down or creating a decline in services for hundreds of nursing homes,
00:45community health centers, and hospitals throughout the country.
00:49But it gets even worse than that.
00:52Secretary Kennedy has just fired the head of the CDC, Dr. Susan Monterey, who has been on the job for just a few weeks.
01:02Her crime? Well, she refused to be a rubber stamp for Kennedy's anti-vaccine conspiracy theories.
01:10That is her crime. That's why she was fired.
01:14In other words, she believes what virtually the entire medical and scientific community believe.
01:21And that is that vaccines are an enormously important public health tool,
01:27which protect the health and welfare of our children and all Americans.
01:33It is a bit absurd to have to say this in the year 2025.
01:40But let me say it. Vaccines are safe and effective.
01:46Let me say it again. Vaccines are safe and effective.
01:52That, of course, is not just my view.
01:54Far more importantly, it is the overwhelming consensus of the medical and scientific communities.
02:01The American Academy of Pediatrics, the largest professional association of pediatricians in our country,
02:09representing over 67,000 doctors who treat our kids every day.
02:16They call immunizations, quote,
02:18one of the greatest public health achievements, preventing tens of thousands of deaths and millions of cases of disease.
02:27End quote. That's the pediatricians.
02:30The American Medical Association, the largest professional association of physicians and medical students in our country,
02:38representing over 270,000 doctors, along with 79 leading medical societies,
02:46recently said that vaccines for flu, RSV, and COVID-19 are, quote,
02:53the best tools to protect the public against these illnesses and their potentially serious complications. End quote.
03:02The World Health Organization, an agency comprised of some of the most prominent medical experts around the globe,
03:09representing 194 countries, found that over the past 50 years, vaccines have saved 154 million lives and reduced the infant mortality rate by 40%.
03:24Unfortunately, Mr. Kennedy, the head of U.S. government public health agencies,
03:34doesn't agree with the leading doctors and scientists in our country and around the world.
03:41He believes that, quote,
03:44he believes that, quote,
03:45autism does come from vaccines, end quote,
03:49despite more than a dozen rigorous scientific studies involving hundreds of thousands of children that have found no, quote,
03:58no causal association, end quote,
04:01to link vaccines to autism.
04:04He has called the COVID-19 vaccine, quote,
04:08the deadliest vaccines ever made, end quote,
04:11despite findings from the WHO that these vaccines saved 20 million lives throughout the world during the pandemic.
04:20He has claimed that the polio vaccines killed more people than polio ever did, despite the fact that the scientific community has found that the polio vaccine have saved 1.5 million lives
04:35and prevented over 20 million people from becoming paralyzed since 1988.
04:41He has absurdly claimed that, quote,
04:46there is no vaccine that is safe and effective, end quote.
04:52That is the head of the Health and Human Services Agency.
04:57So, what does this mean for the health of the American people?
05:04Short term, it will mean, unless we change this situation,
05:09that for millions of Americans, it will be harder to get life-saving vaccines.
05:15Already, the Trump administration has effectively taken away COVID vaccines from healthy adults and kids,
05:22unless they fight their way to our broken healthcare system.
05:26It will also mean higher out-of-pocket costs if people are able to get the vaccine at all.
05:34And the long-term implications are even more dangerous.
05:38As the former chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee,
05:43I will never forget holding a hearing two years ago with the major government officials responsible for protecting us from a new pandemic,
05:53including the head of the CDC.
05:57Without exception, every one of these agency heads said that while they could not predict the exact date,
06:06there will be a future pandemic, and we must be much better prepared for it than we are today.
06:15Unfortunately, despite that reality, Secretary Kennedy's actions are making a dangerous situation even worse,
06:25by defunding the research that could help us prepare for the next pandemic.
06:30In August, he canceled nearly $500 million in research for the kinds of vaccines that helped us stop the COVID pandemic.
06:41Secretary Kennedy is endangering the health of the American people, now and into the future.
06:49Secretary Kennedy must resign.
06:53In his place, President Trump must listen to our doctors and scientists and nominate a Secretary of Health and Human Services
07:02and a CDC director who will protect the health and well-being of the American people,
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