By Kenneth Tiven
Josef Mengele was the Nazi “Angel of Death,” infamous for his grotesque medical experiments on Auschwitz inmates during World War II. Today’s US administration has its own “Doctor Death”—a hapless medical quack running US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
Robert F Kennedy Jr claims to wage a “war for health” while dismissing vaccines and mainstream science. To Donald Trump, who prizes contrarianism, Kennedy was the perfect choice. To medical experts, he is a disaster. To the Kennedy family, he is a disgrace. His father, if alive, would disown him. Most relatives already have, warning the public about their “crazy cousin” ever since he began proclaiming false expertise on autism years ago.
WHEN GOVERNMENT DECIDES WHO DESERVES TO LIVE
The Trump administration acts as if people who get sick deserve to die for having trusted American medical science. Their hostility goes beyond healthcare: budget decisions strip food support for low-income families. Reproductive health programmes are under siege, reflecting a puritanical worldview that treats The Handmaid’s Tale not as a warning, but as a guidebook.
At HHS, marketing has replaced medicine. They brand it “MAHA”—Make America Healthy Again. In practice, it means cutting off food and medical aid both domestically and globally. It is proof that life itself is not sacred to those determined to destroy America’s institutions.
THE REVOLT AT THE CDC
The crisis deepened when senior experts at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) resigned. Susan Monarez, the first-ever Senate-confirmed CDC director, refused to “rubber-stamp unscientific, reckless directives” or fire health experts. Her resistance triggered conflict with her boss, HHS Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr, who tried to fire her despite her presidential appointment.
Her departure was followed by a mass exodus of four top officials:
- Dr Debra Houry, Chief Medical Officer
- Dr Demetre Daskalakis, Director of Immunization and Respiratory Diseases
- Dr Daniel Jernigan, Director of Emerging and Zoonotic Infections
- Dr Jen Layden, Director of Public Health Data and Surveillance
Their collective loss stripped the CDC of decades of institutional knowledge, weakening America’s fight against infectious diseases.
A RESIGNATION LETTER THAT STINGS
Dr Daskalakis made his resignation public, calling the administration’s stance a catastrophic return to a pre-vaccine era: “The intentional eroding of trust in vaccines in favour of natural infection and unproven remedies will bring us back to a time when only the strong survive. Eugenics plays prominently in the rhetoric, a legacy medicine and science must reject.”
Daskalakis tied his decision to both personal history and political outrage: “My grandfather stood up to fascists in Greece and lost his life doing so. I resign to honour his legacy. I resign because of the cowardice of a leader who cannot admit his words created an environment of violence. I reject his thoughts and prayers. I have served the LGBTQ community on critical health issues and cannot be complicit in efforts to erase transgender populations, dismantle HIV programmes, and terminate equity research. Under Kennedy, science has been sidelined for conspiracists and grifters. The result: restricted access to vaccines that have saved countless lives.”
HEALTH AS HOSTAGE
The result of Kennedy’s reign at HHS is clear: the deliberate dismantling of America’s public health safety net. Long time experts with impeccable reputations have been forced out. Science is replaced by snake oil. Quacks and charlatans thrive, while ordinary Americans face a future where vaccines, food support, and health equity are casualties of political ambition.
In short, the Trump government behaves like a Mafia gang—and your health is the hostage.
—The writer has worked in senior positions at The Washington Post, NBC, ABC and CNN and also consults for several Indian channels