Not Political...Informational

Our New USA head of Health and Human Services (where we can check for updates on many health issues, including diabetes) is the young Kennedy with the worm in his brain (fact). Besides that, he is a long-time anti-vaccer (fact)…I’m not so sure that this was anticipated. Obviously, decide for yourselves how much weight to give information from his department. Not a reassuring choice for those of us with chronic illnesses (I battle 3, myself)…Judith in Portland

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The US has the highest rate of people with multiple chronic conditions and an obesity rate nearly twice the OECD average. The past administrations have only seen our situation worsen while the food industry becomes wealthier at the expense of our population’s health. The MAHA movement plans to turn that around and greatly reduce or eliminate the poisons that are put into our highly processed foods and the environment.

The theory is sound. Has the best person been appointed to handle that task? Perhaps yes, perhaps no, and only time will tell. Virtually everyone on this forum has a chronic illness(es), and so we all have a vested interest in seeing the quality of our food and environment improve.

The money (stock market) has reacted, and the food industry is not pleased. Their stock took a hit with the Kennedy appointment. To me, this is the first sign that we are on our way to positively shaking up the disastrous status quo.

MAHA will be led by one person. However, it is a noble movement, and although not everyone may support the leader, it is desperately needed to improve our countrymen’s health.

There will be successes, and there will be failures as those are the consequences of improving anything. Let’s concentrate on the wins and then evaluate over the next few years how much better, or worse, off we are as this movement plows forward.

Not being overtly political, but I imagine things would generally get worse. Sure, some things will get better - there are some competent people in these organizations - but my general sense is that hiring unskilled people to run major divisions of a government is a recipe for disaster.

  • Considering the business-friendly, anti-consumer attitude of the incoming administration it is unlikely it will push back on big-agro, big-pharma, big-corporate-*.

  • Generally, disrupting anything will usually have immediate negative effects. Although I think of RFK as simply a quack - not being political about this, but science-oriented - I believe his long-term effect will be negative, and that short-term effects of changes in policy will cause problems.

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As a member and a T1 I have a lot of concerns as to where things are going politically right now. As a Moderator, though, I also have to police the boundary of discussions that have the potential to become vitriolic, which—sadly—is all too high here. I’ve been DM’d by other members on this one already. So for the moment I’m locking it, pending further consideration among my fellow mods.

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