In a Senate hearing that focused more on vaccines and the safety of the abortion drug mifepristone than the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) oversight of what Americans eat, President Trump’s nominee for FDA Commissioner said Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., the Health and Human Services secretary, had started a grassroots movement around healthy foods.
“Childhood obesity is not a willpower problem, and the rise of early onset Alzheimer’s is not a genetic cause,” Marty Makary said in his opening statement. “We should be and we will be addressing food as it impacts our health.”
Makary is an accomplished surgeon and public policy researcher at Johns Hopkins Medicine. He’s also been an outspoken critic of the medical establishment’s emphasis on disease treatment over prevention for years. Before the presidential election, he emerged as a close Kennedy ally and supporter of his Make America Healthy Again campaign.
When asked by Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-Alabama) about the FDA’s controversial list of food additives that are subject to almost no regulation because they’re deemed Generally Recognized as Safe (GRAS), Dr. Markary said he’s concerned about chemicals added to food that create inflammation in the gastrointestinal tract and alter the gut microbiome.
“There’s a body of research now that suggests concern with some of these ingredients. We have to look at those ingredients, and you have my commitment to do so if confirmed as FDA commissioner,” he said. Tuberville also asked him to speed up the timeline on phasing out the use of Red Dye No. 3, which the Biden administration banned at the very last minute, and about seed oils, which Kennedy frequently rails against. Most nutritionists say there is no evidence that they cause harm.
“Seed oils are a good example of where we could benefit from a consolidation of the scientific research,” Dr. Makary said, “and I don’t think it’s any one ingredient in the food supply that’s making our nation’s children sick.” He added that he’d like to work on a pilot program to make school lunches healthier, although the FDA does not run the school lunch program, the USDA does.
