'If RFK Jr. doesn’t resign, physicians should join a limited strike'

 

By Richard L. Kravitz,

professor of medicine at UC Davis.

On behalf of the misleadingly named Make America Healthy Again movement, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has launched an undisciplined assault on biomedical science and public health: defunding research at the National Institutes of Health, canceling mRNA vaccine studies, purging dedicated government scientists, gutting the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices and potentially the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, and trying to force millions off Medicaid. Kennedy’s recent actions have, in less than a year, substantially degraded the nation’s health security. The brouhaha between Kennedy and (now former) Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Susan Monarez is just the latest scene in this unfolding horror flick.

Physicians committed to promoting human health within a scientific frame need to start considering responses that would ordinarily be off the table. Major medical societies like the American Medical Association, American Academy of Family Physicians, American Academy of Pediatrics, and American College of Physicians need to show some brio. If Kennedy does not resign by Oct. 19, the beginning of National Health Education Week, they should collectively declare a limited physicians’ strike.

Americans like and trust their doctors (though not necessarily the health care system as a whole). They also depend upon physicians for disease prevention, care of acute and chronic conditions, and guidance. Physicians have a responsibility not only to inform current patients of the ongoing damage but also to defend future patients from the destructive forces that Kennedy has unleashed.

https://www.statnews.com/2025/09/12/rfk-jr-resignation-doctors-strike/