Kennedy paints dire picture of children's health in new report

The White House on Thursday released its long-awaited "Make America Healthy Again" report, painting a dire picture of American children's health. The lengthy federal assessment's goal is to identify the root causes of chronic diseases such as diabetes, obesity and neurodevelopmental disorders in children.

"Our kids are the sickest kids in the world," Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said during a call with reporters Thursday morning.

Ultraprocessed food and environmental toxins were at the top of Kennedy's list of problems that need to be urgently addressed to curb increases in chronic diseases during childhood. The report also cited sedentary, technology-driven lifestyles and the overprescribing of medications.

The report was heavy on outlining problems, but light on concrete solutions.

"The next stage of this process is to come up with policy recommendations for the president," Kennedy said.

Trump commissioned the report in February in an executive order establishing the Make America Healthy Again Commission, a group of high-ranking federal officials tasked with reviewing research and making recommendations on chronic disease in children. The report echoes the priorities of Kennedy, who chairs the commission.

Kennedy said Thursday that the assessment will inform a follow-up report on policy recommendations to be released in the next 100 days. He added that there is "no budget" to support the initiative at this point, given that "there's no concrete policy that could be funded in a budget."

"I think everybody wants to prioritize the ultraprocessed food crisis" in those policy recommendations, he told NBC News on the call. Such foods have been linked to obesity, heart disease and cancer, but the strength and quality of these studies vary.

As health secretary, Kennedy has been outspoken about all four subjects highlighted in the report. In his first nearly 100 days in office, he announced that he was asking the food industry to phase out artificial dyes from the food supply and directed the Food and Drug Administration to revise a rule that allows food manufacturers to use additives that are "generally recognized as safe" without notifying the federal government. He also praised local efforts to restrict cellphone use in schools, ban fluoride in public water systems and prohibit the purchase of soda and energy drinks under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as food stamps.

Kennedy has also called attention to what he sees as serious health risks associated with pesticides — in particular, the weed killer glyphosate, which Kennedy has said is linked to a range of diseases, including cancer. The evidence itself is mixed.

While the MAHA report was widely anticipated to focus on pesticides, it instead highlights the "cumulative load of chemicals in the environment," mentioning pesticides alongside other chemicals like PFAS, microplastics, fluoride, phthalates and bisphenols.

Many Republican lawmakers and members of the agricultural industry had expressed concern leading up to the report's release that criticizing pesticide use could endanger farmers' livelihoods and erode public trust in the food supply.

Kennedy told the Senate Appropriations Committee on Tuesday that he would not take any action to jeopardize the jobs of farmers who rely on glyphosate. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin said on Thursday's press call that the federal government will continue to regularly review the safety of pesticides, but noted that abrupt changes in agricultural practices could adversely impact the domestic food supply.

While the MAHA report addresses some real issues, "the problem is that they need to come up with meaningful solutions," said Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association.

The report offers some hints of where the MAHA Commission might choose to place its focus. For instance, it recommends that the National Institutes of Health fund long-term trials comparing the effects of eating whole foods, reducing carbohydrate intake and minimizing ultraprocessed foods on obesity and insulin resistance in children.

It also criticizes the current federal dietary guidelines for not explicitly addressing ultraprocessed foods, claiming the guidelines have "a history of being unduly influenced by corporate interests." An independent advisory committee that evaluated the dietary guidelines under the Biden administration did not recommend any immediate changes for 2025-2030 to account for ultraprocessed foods.

The Trump administration is expected to release a new, updated version of the guidelines before the end of the year. Kennedy, whose department is overseeing the revision in tandem with the Department of Agriculture, has said that the new version will be scrubbed of influence by the food industry.

The MAHA report also recommends more research on the long-term health outcomes of commonly prescribed pediatric drugs. The report claims there are proven harms associated with overtreating children with antibiotics or medications for ADHD and depression, and "potentially major long-term repercussions" associated with selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (a class of antidepressants), puberty blockers and GLP-1 agonists (the class of weight loss and diabetes drugs that includes Ozempic).

Benjamin said many of the suggested research areas in the report are already being studied, adding that the Trump administration's massive cuts to NIH grants could be at odds with their goal.

"They keep saying that they want to do 'gold standard research' but they've cut funding from many of the nation's leading academic centers," he said.

The report made no mention of a leading cause of children's deaths in the country: guns.