Latest news with #surgeonGeneral
The Independent
19-05-2025
- Health
- The Independent
Meet Dr. Casey Means: A wellness influencer, vaccine skeptic, and Trump's pick for surgeon general
Dr. Casey Means — a Stanford -educated surgeon, best-selling author, wellness influencer, and vaccine skeptic — has been nominated by Donald Trump for surgeon general, ensuring her place as a leading voice for the Trump administration 's Make America Healthy Again agenda. In a Truth Social post, the president even hailed Means, who will face Senate hearings for her confirmation in coming weeks, as having 'impeccable 'MAHA' credentials.' Trump announced the 37-year-old as his new nominee after his first pick, Janette Nesheiwat, withdrew from the post. When pressed about what led him to pick Means to inform the public of the best health advice, the president told reporters: 'Bobby thought she was fantastic.' The comment signals Means had the backing of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., known for his vaccine skepticism who has already made sweeping changes to the department. Without explicitly stating that she is part of the MAHA movement, she has voiced support for RFK Jr's agenda. The HHS secretary 'has a vision for the future that aligns with what I want for my family, future children, and the world,' Means wrote on social media after the president's announcement, praising his decades-long health and environmental advocacy. Means grew up in Washington, D.C. before heading west to attend Stanford, where she obtained a bachelor's degree in Human Biology with honors in June 2009 and her medical degree in June 2014, the school confirmed to The Independent. As a trained surgeon, specializing in head and neck surgery, she said she was operating multiple procedures a day before she, as she describes it, woke up to America's health crisis. 'The system is rigged against the American patient to create diseases and then profit off of them,' she told Tucker Carlson last August. Her wake-up call happened in the operating room during her fifth year in surgical residency. The patient lying before her was about to undergo her third sinus surgery. Although Means knew how to diagnose, write prescriptions for, and operate on the patient, she had no idea why the patient, who suffered from a variety of other ailments, was actually sick, the doctor told Carlson. It wasn't just her one patient; Americans were overall getting sicker. Noticing a recent rise in chronic illnesses, like dementia, diabetes, and obesity, she became disillusioned with the medical field. At 30, she ended up 'putting down her scalpel forever,' she told Joe Rogan last October. Means then decided instead to focus on the root cause of why Americans are getting sicker, and she believes the core problem is metabolic health. That's the focus of the book she co-wrote with her brother Calley Means: Good Energy: The Surprising Connection Between Metabolism and Limitless Health. The 2024 New York Times bestseller discusses how to take small steps to improve one's health. This includes eating healthily, sleeping more and leading an active lifestyle — aspects that Levels, the company she co-founded, tracks. For $199 per year or $40 per month, users can monitor their metabolic health insights through data, like diet, glucose levels, sleep and exercise. Means has echoed some of her future boss Kennedy's stances. She's spoken about raw milk, and how the issue is overregulation, not milk. 'When it comes to a question like raw milk, I want to be free to form a relationship with a local farmer, understand his integrity, look him in the eyes, pet his cow, and then decide if I feel safe to drink the milk from his farm,' she told Bill Maher in November. Before Trump was elected, Kennedy vowed to end the FDA's 'aggressive suppression' of raw milk. The CDC has said drinking raw milk can lead to ' serious health risks.' She's also a vaccine skeptic. She has advocated for research into the 'cumulative effects' of vaccines. 'There is growing evidence that the total burden of the current extreme and growing vaccine schedule is causing health declines in vulnerable children,' she wrote in her latest newsletter. Means has questioned why babies are inoculated within the first few hours of being born, claiming the practice puts people on a 'pharma treadmill for life.' She argued on Carlson's show that newborns don't need to be vaccinated with Hepatitis B shots, for example, because it's 'a sexually transmitted disease and IV drug-user disease, of course, which babies are not going to be exposed to.' According to the CDC, infants are usually given a Hep B vaccine because if they get infected, they have a 90 percent chance of developing a lifelong, chronic infection. Additionally, many women are not symptomatic and don't know they've been infected, so they could potentially pass along the infection at birth. Her brother also claimed that the FDA was only testing drugs — not vaccines — through the double-blind studies, a golden standard in the medical field in which one group is given a placebo and the other is given the drug but neither the participants nor the researchers know which group received which tablet. The HHS and its head repeated this claim last month when the department issued a new policy requiring placebo testing on all vaccines; the move essentially questions the safety of all longstanding vaccines. Many experts have pushed back against this allegation, stating that many childhood vaccines have been tested against a placebo, and warned of the dangers of adding a step to the vaccine approval process. Part of the issue with medical research, the brother-sister duo argued to Rogan, is that it is studied in isolation rather than as a whole. That includes the impact of vaccines and its potential link to autism, she said, referencing another Kennedy buzzword. 'I bet that one vaccine probably isn't causing autism but what about the 20 [vaccines] that [kids] are getting before 18?' Means asked Rogan. The surgeon has advocated taking a holistic approach to medicine. She's repeatedly argued to study the body as a whole. Means told Bill Maher in November about America's 'disconnection crisis' in treatment. 'We're disconnecting the body into 100 separate parts and not seeing it as a unified system,' she told the comedian. What humans have done to the environment is a reflection of what Americans have done to their bodies, Means added, citing pesticides and treatment of animals. This argument gets to another point Means frequently makes: she believes America is suffering from a spiritual crisis. 'We cannot go on poisoning the earth without destroying our own health; we are one with nature,' she wrote in her most recent newsletter. Humans used to be very connected to nature, the doctor has said. America's current health crisis is 'simply a reflection of a destroyed ecosystem and humans have become so powerful and so technologically advanced and so connected in the recent decades that we now actually do have the power to destroy our world and destroy our health.' Perhaps there's no greater metaphor for this disconnect between nature and humans today, as far as Means is concerned, than the birth control pill. Contraceptive medications 'are literally shutting down the hormones in the female body that create this cyclical, life-giving nature of women,' Means said. 'The spraying of these pesticides, the things that give life in this world — which are women and soil — we have tried to dominate and shut down the cycles. We have lost respect for life.' She praised the pill as 'liberation' for women, giving them the freedom to choose what to do, but then suggested it was being overprescribed. Birth control pills are being 'prescribed like candy,' Means told Carlson, arguing that they've also been used for treatment of acne and polycystic ovarian syndrome. The surgeon believes PCOS — the leading cause of infertility in the U.S. — could be treated naturally with a change of diet rather than with drugs. Infertility has become a recent talking point of the Trump administration. Trump has dubbed himself the ' fertilization president ' after expanding access to in vitro fertilization. Means has no children of her own but said she cannot wait to become a mother one day. She told Carlson: 'I can think of no greater thing that we can do than have children and keep them healthy.'
The Independent
18-05-2025
- Health
- The Independent
Who is Dr. Casey Means: wellness influencer, vaccine skeptic and Trump's pick for Surgeon General?
Dr. Casey Means — a Stanford -educated surgeon, best-selling author, wellness influencer, and vaccine skeptic — has been nominated by Donald Trump for surgeon general, ensuring her place as a leading voice for the Trump administration 's Make America Healthy Again agenda. In a Truth Social post, the president even hailed Means, who will face Senate hearings for her confirmation in coming weeks, as having 'impeccable 'MAHA' credentials.' Trump announced the 37-year-old as his new nominee after his first pick, Janette Nesheiwat, withdrew from the post. When pressed about what led him to pick Means to inform the public of the best health advice, the president told reporters: 'Bobby thought she was fantastic.' The comment signals Means had the backing of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., known for his vaccine skepticism who has already made sweeping changes to the department. Without explicitly stating that she is part of the MAHA movement, she has voiced support for RFK Jr's agenda. The HHS secretary 'has a vision for the future that aligns with what I want for my family, future children, and the world,' Means wrote on social media after the president's announcement, praising his decades-long health and environmental advocacy. Means grew up in Washington, D.C. before heading west to attend Stanford, where she obtained a bachelor's degree in Human Biology with honors in June 2009 and her medical degree in June 2014, the school confirmed to The Independent. As a trained surgeon, specializing in head and neck surgery, she said she was operating multiple procedures a day before she, as she describes it, woke up to America's health crisis. 'The system is rigged against the American patient to create diseases and then profit off of them,' she told Tucker Carlson last August. Her wake-up call happened in the operating room during her fifth year in surgical residency. The patient lying before her was about to undergo her third sinus surgery. Although Means knew how to diagnose, write prescriptions for, and operate on the patient, she had no idea why the patient, who suffered from a variety of other ailments, was actually sick, the doctor told Carlson. It wasn't just her one patient; Americans were overall getting sicker. Noticing a recent rise in chronic illnesses, like dementia, diabetes, and obesity, she became disillusioned with the medical field. At 30, she ended up 'putting down her scalpel forever,' she told Joe Rogan last October. Means then decided instead to focus on the root cause of why Americans are getting sicker, and she believes the core problem is metabolic health. That's the focus of the book she co-wrote with her brother Calley Means: Good Energy: The Surprising Connection Between Metabolism and Limitless Health. The 2024 New York Times bestseller discusses how to take small steps to improve one's health. This includes eating healthily, sleeping more and leading an active lifestyle — aspects that Levels, the company she co-founded, tracks. For $199 per year or $40 per month, users can monitor their metabolic health insights through data, like diet, glucose levels, sleep and exercise. Means has echoed some of her future boss Kennedy's stances. She's spoken about raw milk, and how the issue is overregulation, not milk. 'When it comes to a question like raw milk, I want to be free to form a relationship with a local farmer, understand his integrity, look him in the eyes, pet his cow, and then decide if I feel safe to drink the milk from his farm,' she told Bill Maher in November. Before Trump was elected, Kennedy vowed to end the FDA's 'aggressive suppression' of raw milk. The CDC has said drinking raw milk can lead to ' serious health risks.' She's also a vaccine skeptic. She has advocated for research into the 'cumulative effects' of vaccines. 'There is growing evidence that the total burden of the current extreme and growing vaccine schedule is causing health declines in vulnerable children,' she wrote in her latest newsletter. Means has questioned why babies are inoculated within the first few hours of being born, claiming the practice puts people on a 'pharma treadmill for life.' She argued on Carlson's show that newborns don't need to be vaccinated with Hepatitis B shots, for example, because it's 'a sexually transmitted disease and IV drug-user disease, of course, which babies are not going to be exposed to.' According to the CDC, infants are usually given a Hep B vaccine because if they get infected, they have a 90 percent chance of developing a lifelong, chronic infection. Additionally, many women are not symptomatic and don't know they've been infected, so they could potentially pass along the infection at birth. Her brother also claimed that the FDA was only testing drugs — not vaccines — through the double-blind studies, a golden standard in the medical field in which one group is given a placebo and the other is given the drug but neither the participants nor the researchers know which group received which tablet. The HHS and its head repeated this claim last month when the department issued a new policy requiring placebo testing on all vaccines; the move essentially questions the safety of all longstanding vaccines. Many experts have pushed back against this allegation, stating that many childhood vaccines have been tested against a placebo, and warned of the dangers of adding a step to the vaccine approval process. Part of the issue with medical research, the brother-sister duo argued to Rogan, is that it is studied in isolation rather than as a whole. That includes the impact of vaccines and its potential link to autism, she said, referencing another Kennedy buzzword. 'I bet that one vaccine probably isn't causing autism but what about the 20 [vaccines] that [kids] are getting before 18?' Means asked Rogan. The surgeon has advocated taking a holistic approach to medicine. She's repeatedly argued to study the body as a whole. Means told Bill Maher in November about America's 'disconnection crisis' in treatment. 'We're disconnecting the body into 100 separate parts and not seeing it as a unified system,' she told the comedian. What humans have done to the environment is a reflection of what Americans have done to their bodies, Means added, citing pesticides and treatment of animals. This argument gets to another point Means frequently makes: she believes America is suffering from a spiritual crisis. 'We cannot go on poisoning the earth without destroying our own health; we are one with nature,' she wrote in her most recent newsletter. Humans used to be very connected to nature, the doctor has said. America's current health crisis is 'simply a reflection of a destroyed ecosystem and humans have become so powerful and so technologically advanced and so connected in the recent decades that we now actually do have the power to destroy our world and destroy our health.' Perhaps there's no greater metaphor for this disconnect between nature and humans today, as far as Means is concerned, than the birth control pill. Contraceptive medications 'are literally shutting down the hormones in the female body that create this cyclical, life-giving nature of women,' Means said. 'The spraying of these pesticides, the things that give life in this world — which are women and soil — we have tried to dominate and shut down the cycles. We have lost respect for life.' She praised the pill as 'liberation' for women, giving them the freedom to choose what to do, but then suggested it was being overprescribed. Birth control pills are being 'prescribed like candy,' Means told Carlson, arguing that they've also been used for treatment of acne and polycystic ovarian syndrome. The surgeon believes PCOS — the leading cause of infertility in the U.S. — could be treated naturally with a change of diet rather than with drugs. Infertility has become a recent talking point of the Trump administration. Trump has dubbed himself the ' fertilization president ' after expanding access to in vitro fertilization. Means has no children of her own but said she cannot wait to become a mother one day. She told Carlson: 'I can think of no greater thing that we can do than have children and keep them healthy.'
New York Times
13-05-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
Corrections: May 13, 2025
An article on Saturday about Laura Loomer's vocal criticism of President Trump's selection of Dr. Casey Means as his next surgeon general misstated the status of Dr. Means's medical license. While she holds an inactive medical license, it is current. An article on Sunday about an energetic group of educators, parents and researchers advancing an ambitious agenda for learning despite the lack of national direction misstated the title of the book George W. Bush read in a second-grade classroom. It was 'The Pet Goat,' not 'My Pet Goat.' An article on Saturday about trade negotiation talks between the United States and China in Geneva misstated how many Americans have died after using the drug fentanyl. It is tens of thousands of Americans, not millions. Because of an editing error, an article on May 8 about efforts by the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture to grapple with an executive order from President Trump misstated the role of the Association of African American Museums in a rally to protect the museum. The association supported the rally, but did not help to organize it. An article on Sunday about Fabrizio Brienza, who is among a handful of gatekeepers who decide which people are allowed inside various nightclubs and lounges for drinking and dancing, misidentified the man wearing Converse sneakers and standing in line in front of Paul's in the early morning. His name is not Cameron Gucker. Because of an editing error, an article on Sunday about a project by Allan Wexler and Michael Yarinsky to update 'The Futurist Cookbook' misstated the employment status of Natasha Pickowicz. She is no longer a pastry chef at the restaurant Altro Paradiso. The article also misidentified the location of Jane Lombard Gallery, where Mr. Wexler recently exhibited. It is in TriBeCa, not SoHo. Errors are corrected during the press run whenever possible, so some errors noted here may not have appeared in all editions.
Yahoo
10-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Who is Dr. Casey Means? A look at Trump's pick for US surgeon general
Earlier this week, President Donald Trump announced he will be nominating Dr. Casey Means for U.S. surgeon general, replacing his former pick, Dr. Janette Nesheiwat, after questions emerged about her credentials. Means has been prominent in the "Make America Healthy Again" movement championed by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. In a post on social media, Trump said Means would work closely with Kennedy "to ensure a successful implementation of our Agenda in order to reverse the Chronic Disease Epidemic, and ensure Great Health, in the future, for ALL Americans." MORE: As RFK Jr. prepares for Senate confirmation hearings, here's where he stands on vaccines, food dyes Means describes herself online as a "former surgeon turned metabolic health evangelist" who is "striving to create a happier and healthier world and planet." Here is what we know about Means' background and what her views are on various health topics. Means graduated from Stanford University in 2009 with a bachelor's degree in human biology and a doctor of medicine degree from Stanford School of Medicine in 2014, according to her LinkedIn profile. She was a resident physician at Oregon Health and Science University with the goal of becoming an otolaryngology surgeon, also known as a head and neck surgeon, but she dropped out in her fifth year. "During my training as a surgeon, I saw how broken and exploitative the healthcare system is and left to focus on how to keep people out of the operating room," she wrote on her website. Means went on to study functional medicine, which looks to prevent disease and illness. She is not board-certified in a medical specialty. The Oregon Medical Board currently lists her medical license as inactive. Following her exit from the residency, she was a guest lecturer at Stanford for less than a year and an associate editor at the International Journal of Disease Reversal and Prevention for two and a half years, according to LinkedIn. Over the course of her career, she 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. Means wrote a book with her brother, Calley Means, titled "Good Energy," which was published in May 2024 and allegedly takes a look at why Americans are sick and how to fix it. The Means siblings appeared on podcasts, including The Tucker Carlson Show in August 2024 and The Joe Rogan Experience in October 2024. MORE: RFK Jr. unveils plan to phase out 8 artificial food dyes in the US On Tucker Carlson's show, Casey Means said birth control is being "prescribed like candy" and that Ozempic has a "stranglehold on the U.S. population." The siblings rose to prominence within the Trump campaign and among Trump allies, including Kennedy. They appeared at a September 2024 roundtable discussion on health with Kennedy hosted by Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wisc. "The message I'm here to share and reiterate is that American health is getting destroyed," Casey Means said during her opening remarks. "It's being destroyed because of chronic illness." Meanwhile, Calley Means currently serves as White House senior adviser and special government employee. He has worked closely with Kennedy and has touted many of his health proposals. Casey Means' views mirror those of Kennedy's with a focus on tackling the chronic disease epidemic, creating a healthier food supply and expressing vaccine skepticism. She has called for the removal of ultra-processed foods in school lunches and has advocated for organic, regenerative foods in school meals. In 2021, she wrote in a post on X that glucose "as a molecule has caused more destruction of the human mind and body than any other substance in human history." Glucose is a naturally occurring molecule that our body depends on for energy. Casey Means has expressed skepticism about the safety of childhood vaccines and has called for more research on the "safety of the cumulative effects" of vaccines when following the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) vaccine schedule, she wrote in her Good Energy newsletter. "There is growing evidence that the total burden of the current extreme and growing vaccine schedule is causing health declines in vulnerable children. This needs to be investigated," she continued. She has also criticized the administration of hepatitis B vaccine among infants, which is recommended by the CDC. There is currently no evidence to suggest that childhood vaccines or the current CDC vaccine schedule are unsafe. ABC News' Katherine Faulders and Kelsey Walsh contributed to this report. Who is Dr. Casey Means? A look at Trump's pick for US surgeon general originally appeared on
Washington Post
09-05-2025
- Business
- Washington Post
Tracking Trump: Trade talks with China to begin; how the federal deficit has grown; Trump's new surgeon general pick; and more
President Donald Trump suggested lowering tariffs on China ahead of trade talks. The U.S. has spent $166 billion more this year than last year. The Trump administration is moving detainees to a Texas facility. Trump shut out refugees, but is making an exception for one group. Trump's new surgeon general pick is facing widespread criticism.
