Kennedy visits CDC after deadly shooting
DeKalb County Police Officer David Rose was mortally wounded while responding to Friday's shooting.
Most CDC personnel assigned to the campus are teleworking this week, and additional safety and security measures are being put in place ahead of their return, according to HHS.
In a statement posted on X on Saturday, Kennedy said the agency was 'deeply saddened' by the shooting.
'We know how shaken our public health colleagues feel today. No one should face violence while working to protect the health of others,' Kennedy said.
Multiple reports have said the suspect in the shooting was fixated on the COVID-19 vaccine and blamed it for his mental health issues.
Kennedy, who founded an anti-vaccine group before becoming HHS Secretary, has also long disparaged the CDC and public health officials. He once called the agency a 'cesspool of corruption' while running for president. Under his leadership, the Trump administration has laid off nearly 2,000 employees.
CDC and public health officials have been subject to increased anti-vaccine backlash fueled by conspiracy theories, as well as blowback to public health measures implemented in response to the coronavirus pandemic.
The union that represents CDC employees said disinformation about vaccines has put workers' safety at risk and called on HHS to condemn the spread of false information about vaccines and protect employees from future violent threats.
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CNN
an hour ago
- CNN
Anti-vaccine group that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. founded files lawsuit against him over vaccine safety task force
Vaccines Children's health Federal agenciesFacebookTweetLink Follow A nonprofit anti-vaccine group founded by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said it is funding a lawsuit against him, in his capacity as secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services, for failing to establish a task force to promote the development of safer childhood vaccines. 'Our first priority will ALWAYS be children's health. Sec. Kennedy has FAILED 'to establish a task force dedicated to making childhood vaccines safer, as mandated by federal law,' so we WILL be holding him accountable,' Children's Health Defense said Tuesday in a post on X. The tactic is one familiar to both parties. When Kennedy was head of Children's Health Defense, he filed dozens of lawsuits against corporations and government agencies, usually over vaccines. 'It's difficult to know how much of this is performative,' Dr. Peter Hotez, who co-directs the Center for Vaccine Development at Texas Children's Hospital in Houston, said in an email. 'The steady stream of pseudoscience policies and propaganda pushed out of the Humphrey Building in Washington DC are both straight out of playbook from both RFK jr and CHD. As far as I can tell there is no real daylight between the two.' The National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act of 1986 directs the HHS secretary to establish a task force consisting of the director of the National Institutes of Health, the commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration and the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The NIH director is designated as chair. According to an article posted Monday on Children's Health Defense's news site, in the years since the act was passed, no HHS secretary – including Kennedy – has ever reported to Congress on steps taken to make vaccines safer. 'This is part of the 1986 act itself,' Children's Health Defense CEO Mary Holland said in the article. 'That no secretary has done so since the passage of this law is a blow to the rule of law. I hope and trust that the current secretary will fulfill his obligation to Congress's mandate.' The task force was indeed created, but it was short-lived, issuing its final report in 1998. Since then, Kennedy has used the absence of the panel to mischaracterize the government's efforts to ensure the safety of vaccines. He's floated the idea of reviving the panel – or one like it – on vaccine safety for years. Children's Health Defense says attorney Ray Flores, its senior outside counsel, filed the lawsuit. Kennedy filed a similar suit in 2018 after a Freedom of Information Act request failed to produce any of the reports that are supposed to be filed under the Act, including the 1998 report. HHS has not responded to CNN's request for comment about the new lawsuit. Dorit Reiss, a professor of law at UC Law San Francisco, also said the lawsuit 'looks performative.' 'It may give Kennedy cover for convening this task force that he may already want to convene. It may well be collusion,' she said in an email. 'To me, this looks like a way to give political cover to something the Secretary may want to do anyway (and can do without anything). The government has answers to this lawsuit, but may not want to. 'Even if it does not include the people in the [National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act], there are multiple federal committees that routinely look at vaccine safety and how to make vaccines safer. It's something that gets a lot of attention,' Reiss wrote. Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly described who filed the lawsuit against HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The lawsuit was filed by attorney Ray Flores and Children's Health Defense says it's funding the lawsuit.
Buzz Feed
4 hours ago
- Buzz Feed
Why IKEA Turned Away My Son: A Parent's Warning
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I stopped signing the form. I said to the staff member, 'That's discrimination against kids with disabilities.' She didn't respond. I hadn't known about the store's play area before this visit, and I had been happy to see that it wasn't a playground ― just a space with toys like a train set and dart board. Since my son had a seizure at an indoor playground a year ago, I'd stopped taking him to them. But now, even this play space was not an option for him. My child and I were both upset. He loves going to Ikea to walk through the showroom and eat in the cafeteria ― a place open enough that it was the only indoor restaurant he ate in during our four years of masking during the COVID-19 pandemic. We have several Ikea furniture items, including bunk beds, a coat/shoe cubby and a toy chest. He helped us build them all. Since his severe seizures began about two years ago, he's had to change his life in significant ways. Heat, sports, just running around to play, illness and excitement have all become triggers for him. Summer is especially hard — on hot days, he can't be outside. In fact, we had driven the hour to Ikea in traffic just so he could walk and have a change of scenery in a large, air-conditioned space because the temperature outside was dangerous for him. I told him, 'This isn't OK.' He said, 'We should talk to someone.' I was proud of him. After talking to a few staff members, we spoke with a manager, who said he wasn't familiar with the policy, and he'd get back to me the next day. He didn't. Later, I looked online, and there was a section on the Ikea website directing caretakers of children with disabilities to start a conversation with the Ikea store manager about how the child can best have their needs accommodated in the play area. I was hopeful that when we went in the future, we could show the policy to the staff. However, that doesn't undo the pain my child felt after hearing that he wasn't welcome in that play space because of his disabilities. During the hour-long car ride home afterward, we talked a lot about discrimination. I reinforced that what happened wasn't OK, and that the more than 3 million kids with disabilities in our country deserve to be included. I told him about my older sister, his late aunt, who had microcephaly and faced various barriers to equal access too, like having to sit on the sidelines of playgrounds in her wheelchair. It upset me. When I was 10 in 1993, I read about new accessible playgrounds in an issue of Scholastic News, and I hoped we could build one for her. Sadly, she died a few weeks later, but in her memory, my family and I worked with the Cincinnati Parks Department to build an accessible playground. My son thought that was cool. I also explained that many groups of people face discrimination for reasons such as gender, race, sexual orientation, immigration status and more, and we need to be allies and stand up against all forms of discrimination. I also told him that one way to help is to make disabilities more visible and raise awareness, as we have done in his school class for the past three years. This June, for Dravet Syndrome Awareness Month, he and I held a neighborhood lemonade and cupcake fundraiser and donated money to the Dravet Syndrome Foundation, which helps fund the kind of critical epilepsy research that the Trump administration has recently cut. After our experience at Ikea, as one of his bedtime books, we re-read the picture book All the Way to the Top, about a child who protested and helped advocate for the Americans with Disabilities Act, which passed 35 years ago. Afterward, I told him about children with disabilities who went to Congress this summer, asking their leaders not to make it harder for them to go to the doctor and get the medicine and treatment they need. Unfortunately, President Donald Trump's domestic policy bill has since passed, and many people, including children with disabilities, will be harmed as a result. Two days after the bill passed, my child woke up and said, 'I want to make a sign about disabilities.' He asked for my help with spelling before writing the words 'People with disabilities are important' in pencil and then tracing over them with marker. He stood by our Disability Pride yard sign, and then, since the temperature was cooler out, he walked down our street and held it up for cars passing by. He said that when he grows up, he wants to be an 'activist' and 'protester.' I told him that he already is. [Editor's Note: HuffPost reached out for a response, and Ikea US issued the following statement: 'At IKEA, we strive to offer a safe and inclusive environment for children to play while in our stores. Our Småland policies are in place to keep children safe when they are in our space. Regarding this family's recent experience in our College Park, MD store, we are incredibly sensitive to feelings of exclusion, and so we have shared information with the family about our accommodations process, so that they may have a more positive experience at IKEA. We are constantly working to improve how we create an inclusive space while maintaining policies that keep all children safe.']
Axios
9 hours ago
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At-home cervical cancer test rolls out in California
The first FDA-approved at-home cervical cancer screening device launched this week in California. Why it matters: Cervical cancer is largely preventable, yet 1 in 4 U.S. women aren't up to date on screenings for the disease, per the CDC. Teal Health's goal is to make the testing experience feel less invasive than a Pap smear, which can often cause pain. Driving the news: The Teal Wand allows people to self-collect a vaginal sample to test for HPV, the virus that causes nearly all cervical cancers. The San Francisco women's health company spearheading the device says it uses the same HPV test used in clinics and merely differs in the method of collection. The big picture: California records about 7.3 cervical cancer cases per 100,000 people every year, slightly under the national rate of 7.5. The incidence rate varies among racial groups, however, with Hispanics generally seeing higher figures. Nationwide, Black and Indigenous people also experience higher rates of cervical cancer and mortality compared to white women. "Several studies have shown that the availability of self-screening can boost participation in cervical cancer screening among underscreened persons—a population most likely to benefit in terms of cancer prevention," UCSF obstetrician-gynecologist George F. Sawaya told Axios via email. In 2023, cervical cancer screenings in the U.S. remained 14% lower than pre-pandemic levels, per a March journal article. Yes, but: It's equally critical to ensure those with positive test results get reliable follow-ups and treatment, Sawaya added. How it works: To take a sample, the wand — similar to a tampon in its dimensions — is inserted into the vagina and deploys a sponge to collect cells from the cervix. Once the sponge is extracted, it's placed in a vial and mailed to the lab. Teal medical providers then review the results and follow up via telehealth. The kit, which is shipped to your door, is available for purchase online and costs $99 with in-network insurance and $249 via credit card or HSA/FSA payment. By the numbers: Self-collected samples using the wand have proven to detect cervical precancer 96% of the time, similar to clinician-collected ones, Teal Health's 16-site clinical trials found. Eighty-six percent of participants said they'd be more likely to stay up to date with screenings if they could do it at home, per the trials. What they're saying: A lot of people don't recognize the importance of getting tested regularly because it's not always clear what a Pap smear is for, Teal Health co-founder and CEO Kara Egan told Axios. Lack of appointments, time conflicts and discomfort with the exam are also top reasons for not screening, Egan added. The wand was designed to alleviate those concerns, she said, offering the "same accuracy, but just comfortably and privately from home."
