Demand RFK Jr. Resign: Petition for a Healthy America
Join over 4,000 who have already signed including six Nobel Prize winners and 27 members of the National Academies
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The Petition
We, the undersigned clinicians, scientists, public health workers, and their supporters call for the immediate resignation or removal of Health and Human Services Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.. Mr. Kennedy poses an immediate and long-term threat to the health of the American public. He has repeatedly and aggressively disregarded the consensus view of the scientific community, dismissed experts from review committees without grounds, hired or given influential positions to people whose viewpoints aligned with his own despite no directly relevant expertise, defunded critical research without scientific justification, spread public health misinformation, and demonstrated a profound misunderstanding of science coupled with a failure to grasp his own limitations, all while limiting transparency. A few key examples include:
Banning mRNA research
This is the most promising vaccine technology in decades, and its use saved millions of lives during the pandemic. Investigations were underway on hundreds of vaccines for more than a dozen infectious diseasesas well as many non-infectious diseases, including cancer.
Firing of ACIP experts and replacement with vaccine skeptics
When Kennedy took office, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices included 17 researchers and clinicians with overlapping expertise in every field relevant to vaccine policy, including immunology, epidemiology, vaccinology, and diverse fields of medicine. He promptly removed them all, providing no explanation. He immediately announced a new committee of just 8 people, none of whom were that included no immunologists or epidemiologists. , to varying degrees, endorsed an anti-vaccine agenda. He then moved to exclude representatives of major medical societies from future meetings.
Generating the deeply flawed MAHA report
This report cited non-existent or incorrectly summarized references and, in a mere 72 pages, purported to lay out the evidence for a crisis in children’s health involving 24 different diseases and their relationship to 39 causal factors based primarily on Kennedy’s bizarre and unfounded take on disease etiology. A serious scientific report typically takes hundreds of pages to consider just one disease or disease group and its causes, or to cover one risk factor and its effects.
Undermining transparency
One of Kennedy’s first acts as HHS Secretary was to eliminate eleven independent FOIA offices, including those at CDC and FDA and consolidate them in a single office. The dramatic reduction in staffing inevitably limits access to HHS records for the public and media, especially small, independent media.
In sum, RFK Jr brings a profound lack of understanding of science and scientific methods with a baseless certainty that his simplistic notions about disease causality, vaccine risks, and public health policy are valid. He has surrounded himself with senior staff selected primarily for their agreement with his fringe notions rather than their expertise. He has presided over drastic changes in research and policy that diminish America’s global scientific leadership. Almost none of his policy decisions are firmly grounded in science. These actions will lead to increases in death and disease.
Equally damaging, if not more dangerous, is his use of the megaphone of the Secretary of Health and Human Services to promote unfounded health advice and misinformation with a particular focus on vaccines. Not only will this lead to a deadly loss of confidence in vaccines, but it has generated an antipathy toward vaccines and the public health community so profound that an individual who believed himself to be vaccine injured was prompted to open fire on the CDC, shattering windows and sadly killing a security guard. This must end.
RFK Jr. must resign or he should be removed.
Sign Here
Following the American Public Health Association Rally for America’s Health on November 5, 2:30 – 4:00 in Washington, DC we invite all interested supporters to march to the Capitol where the Science Accountability Institute, Doctors for America, and Stand Up for Science will be publicly presenting their combined petitions to the Congress. For more on the rally and march, click here.
Show Your Support Wherever You Are
November 5 in Washington, DC.If you can’t make the rally, but want to show your support, click here.
Signatories
(Note: Affiliations and memberships are provided for identification purposes only and do not reflect endorsement by the named institutions.)
Nobel Laureates
Victor Ambros, Ph.D.
2024 Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Lou Ignarro, Ph.D.
1998 Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine.
UCLA School of Medicine
Ardem Patapoutian Ph.D.
2021 Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine
Scripps Research Institute
Richard Roberts, Ph.D.
1993 Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine
New England Biolabs
Gary Ruvkun, Ph.D.
2024 Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine
Harvard Medical School
Randy Schekman, Ph.D.
2013 Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine
University of California, Berkeley
Members of the US National Academies
Bruce Alberts, PhD
Emeritus Professor
University of California, Berkeley
Member and Former President of the National Academy of Sciences
Michele Barry, MD, FACP, FASTMH
Drs. Ben and Jess Shenson Professor of Medicine
Director of the Center for Innovation in Global Health (CIGH) and Senior Associate Dean for Global Health, Stanford University
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Mary T. Bassett, MD, MPH
FXB Professor of the Practice of Health and Human Rights, Harvard University
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Robert Black MD, MPH
Professor of International Health, Division of Global Disease Epidemiology and Control, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Claire Broome, MD
Assistant Surgeon General, US Public Health Service (retired)
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Thomas J. Coates, Ph.D.
Director Emeritus, University of California Global Health Institute
Distinguished Research Professor of Medicine, UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Peter Daszak, Ph.D.
President, Nature Health Global
Former Chair, National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, Forum on Microbial Threats
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
William Herbert “Bill†Foege, MD, MPH
Professor Emeritus, Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University
Presidential Medal of Freedom 2012
Member of the National Academy of Sciences & the National Academy of Medicine
James M. Hughes, MD
Rear Admiral, USPHS, (Ret.)
Professor Emeritus of Medicine, Emory University School of Medicine
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Howard Frumkin, MD, Dr.P.H.
Professor Emeritus, University of Washington School of Public Health
Hagler Fellow, Texas A&M University School of Public Health
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Cutberto Garza, MD, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus, Former Director, Division of Nutritional Sciences, Former Vice Provost, Cornell University
Former Director of the United Nations University’s Food and Nutrition Program
Former Provost and Dean of Faculties, Boston College.
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Jerome Kassirer MD
Professor, Tufts University School of Medicine.
Former Editor-in-Chief, New England Journal of Medicine
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Gerald Keusch, MD
Emeritus Professor of Medicine, Chobanian & Avedisian Boston University School of Medicine
Former Director, Fogarty International Center, National Institutes of Health
Former Chairman of the Infection and Nutrition Subcommittee of the NASEM Food and Nutrition Board
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Ken Olden, Ph.D.
Former Director, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, National Institutes of Health
Founding Dean, School of Public Health, City University of New York
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Nancy S Padian, Ph.D., MPH
Emeritus Professor of Global Health Sciences UCSF
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Arthur L. Reingold, MD
Professor of Epidemiology, University of California, Berkeley School of Public Health.
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Josiah “Jody†D. Rich, MD, MPH
Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology, Infectious Diseases and Immunology Center, The Miriam and Rhode Island Hospitals. Brown University
Co-founder and Senior Medical Advisor, Center for Health and Justice Transformation, Brown University
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Barbara K. Rimer, DrPH
Professor Emerita Health Behavior & Dean Emerita, University of North Carolina Gillings School of Global Public Health
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Mark L. Rosenberg, MD, MPP
Assistant Surgeon General (Ret), USPHS
Founding Director, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
David A. Savitz, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus of Epidemiology, Professor Emeritus of Obstetrics & Gynecology and Pediatrics, Brown University
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Susan Scrimshaw, Ph.D.
Former Dean of the School of Public Health, University of Illinois Chicago
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Alfred “Al†Sommer, MD, MHS
Professor Emeritus Johns Hopkins Schools of Medicine and Public Health
Dean Emeritus, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Frank E. Speizer, MD
E.H. Kass Distinguished Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School
Professor of Environmental Science, Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health
Channing Division of Network Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Ajit Varki, MD
Distinguished Professor of Medicine and Cellular & Molecular Medicine, University of California, San Diego
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Paul Volberding, MD
Professor of Medicine Emeritus, University of California San Francisco
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Judith N. Wasserheit MD, MPH
Emeritus Professor of Global Health & Medicine, University of Washington
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
Dyann Wirth, Ph.D.
Richard Pearson Strong Professor, Immunology and Infectious Diseases, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
Member of the National Academy of Medicine
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Kristian G. Andersen, PhD
Professor
Scripps Research Institute
David H. Gorski, MD, PhD, FACS
Professor of Surgery and Oncology
Wayne State University School of Medicine
Managing Editor, Science-Based Medicine
Jonathan Howard, MD
Associate Professor
Department of Neurology
NYU School of Medicine
Elizabeth T. Jacobs, PhD
Professor Emerita of Epidemiology and founding member of Defend Public Health
University of Arizona
David Morens MD
Adjunct Professor, Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health
Former Senior Advisor to the Director, NIAID
Robert Morris, MD, PhD
Affiliate Associate Professor
Department of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences
University of Washington School of Public Health
Wendy Orent, PhD
Anthropologist and Science Writer
Author of Plague: The Mysterious Past and Terrifying Future of the World’s Most Dangerous Disease
Angela L. Rasmussen, PhD
Principal Scientist
University of Saskatchewan
Jessica Malaty Rivera, MS
Senior Science Communication Advisor | The deBeaumont Foundation
Research Program Assistant | Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security
Mathuram Santosham, MD, MPH
Founder and Director Emeritus of the Center for Indigenous Health, Johns Hopkins University.
Daniel M Wilson, PhD
Molecular Biologist and Science Communicator
Creator of Debunk the Funk podcast