Most of Donald Trump’s high-level nominees will be confirmed by a Republican-controlled Senate. That’s not good news.

For PSARA members – and anyone else who is concerned about protecting our rights to affordable, science-based health care – two are especially problematic: Dr. Mehmet Oz and Robert Kennedy, Jr.

Mehmet Oz: From Respected Doctor to Snake Oil Salesman

Oz has been picked to head CMS (Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services), the agency that manages Medicare and works with state government to oversee Medicaid.

Oz was once a respected heart surgeon and a professor at the Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons. He then became a TV celebrity, appearing regularly on the Oprah Winfrey Show from 2004 through 2009.

Winfrey then began producing Oz’s own TV show, on which he promoted so-called “alternative medicine” schemes.

In 2012, Oz entered into an arrangement with Usana Health Sciences, a multi-level marketing company selling “nutrition” supplements. Oz was paid over $50 million over a five-year period to promote Usana products on his show.

During the COVID epidemic, Oz falsely claimed the antimalarial drug hydroxychloroquine is an effective treatment for COVID-19.

What Oz did not reveal at the time was that he owns at least $630,000 of stock in two companies that manufacture or distribute hydroxychloroquine, Thermo Fisher and McKesson Corporation.

Not only is the drug ineffective against the COVID virus, but it can also actively harm patients who take it to combat COVID-19, according to the World Health Organization.

Along with internet entrepreneur Jeff Arnold, Oz is also a an owner of Sharec- are, Inc., an online medical “information” venue that accepts paid advertisers

and promotes the use of their products. Among their advertisers: Colgate-Pal- molive; Pfizer; Unilever (Dove skin-care products); health insurer UnitedHealth- care; and Walgreens drug stores.

All this naked profiteering and all these potential conflicts of interest should be disqualifying in and of themselves. But wait! There’s more. We haven’t even gotten to Oz’s views on Medicare, the public health service he’ll be overseeing in the Trump administration.

You remember the old saying about the fox guarding the henhouse? Oz thinks of health care as just another commodity. If you’re rich enough to pay for good care, fine. If you’re not… Well, Oz has already told us what he foresees for low-income Americans.

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In a 2012 speech to the National Governors Association, Oz declared that "(low-income people) don’t have the right to health, but they have a right to access – a chance to get that health."

How do they “get that health?” Oz proposed that lawmakers host cheap 15-minute health screenings “in a festival-like setting" to help those who are uninsured.

During his 2020 campaign for the US Senate, Oz announced a health care plan, which he called "Medicare Ad- vantage for All.” That’s right, Oz wants to turn all health care in the US over to private insurance companies and all the overpayments, outright fraud, de- lays, and denial of claims that go along with private Medicare Advantage plans.

Oz will be a disaster in his role as head of CMS.

RFK Jr.: The Worm Ate More Than We Thought

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., has been nominated to be the Secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), and therefore Dr. Oz’s boss.

True, RFK Jr. has some interesting ideas about eating healthy foods and restricting artificial additives, but his views overall align with the contrarian anti-science ideology of right-wing populism.

Kennedy chairs the Children's Health Defense, an anti-vaccine advocacy group he joined in 2015. The group claims that exposure to vaccines, certain chemicals, and radiation has caused a wide range of conditions in many American children, including autism, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), food allergies, cancer, and autoimmune diseases.

Children's Health Defense has actively campaigned against vaccines, fluoridation of drinking water, acetaminophen, aluminum, and wireless communication, among other things. The group has been identified as one of two major buyers of anti- vaccine Facebook advertising in late 2018 and early 2019.

Kennedy and Children's Health Defense have falsely claimed that vaccines cause autism. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Kennedy promoted multiple conspiracy theories related to COVID, including false claims that Anthony Fauci and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation were trying to profit off a vaccine, and suggesting that Bill Gates would cut off access to money of people who do not get vaccinated, allowing them to starve.

In August 2020, Kennedy appeared in an hour-long interview with Alec Baldwin on Instagram and touted a number of incorrect and misleading claims about vac- cines and public health measures related to the pandemic. Public health officials and scientists criticized Baldwin for letting Kennedy's claims go unchallenged.

In addition, Kennedy has spread the false HIV/AIDS denialist claim that no one has isolated the HIV virion and "No one has been able to point to a study that demonstrates their hypothesis using accepted scientific proofs." He has also asserted that anti-HIV drugs, which have saved millions of HIV-positive patients, are toxic and should be banned.

The Kennedy-Oz team managing HHS and CMS would be a one-two punch to the gut for affordable, science-based health care in the US.