A top nutritionist at the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) has elected to retire from his post, citing “censorship” under health secretary Robert F Kennedy, Junior’s (RFK Jr) leadership.
In a series of posts to social media platform BlueSky, Dr Kevin Hall, senior investigator at the NIH, said his life’s work has been to scientifically study how “our food environment affects what we eat, and how what we eat affects our physiology”, with his recent focus on “unravelling the reasons” why diets high in ultra-processed food are linked to epidemic proportions of chronic diseases such as diabetes and obesity.
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Dr Hall told CBS News that NIH leadership ‘blocked’ him from taking an interview with the New York Times about recent research on how ultra-processed foods can be addictive.
The recent study had found that ultra-processed foods appear not to be addictive in the same way as addictive drugs, suggesting their excessive consumption may be happening for more complex reasons.
“It just suggests that they may not be addictive by the typical mechanism that many drugs are addictive. But even this bit of daylight between the preconceived narrative and our study was apparently too much,” Dr Hall said.
Dr Hall had been hoping to expand the NIH’s research programme, with “ambitious plans” to more rapidly and efficiently determine “how our food is likely making Americans chronically sick”.
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By GlobalData“Unfortunately, recent events have made me question whether NIH continues to be a place where I can freely conduct unbiased science,” Dr Hall said.
“Specifically, I experienced censorship in the reporting of our research because of agency concerns that it did not appear to fully support preconceived narratives of my agency’s leadership about ultra-processed food addiction.”
Dr Hall said that he hoped this was an “aberration”, and that he wrote to the NIH’s leadership in hopes of discussing his concerns but never received a response.
“Without any reassurance there wouldn’t be continued censorship or meddling in our research, I felt compelled to accept early retirement to preserve health insurance for my family.”
Since RFK Jr, a known vaccination sceptic, began swinging the axe at the agencies under the HHS, in an action that is purported to cut the combined workforce from 82,000 to 62,000 fulltime employees, Dr Hall is not the only prominent figure who has opted to tender their resignation. In March, Dr Peter Marks, director of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research at the FDA, resigned over the health secretary’s stance on vaccination safety.
While RFK Jr has since changed his tune, of the current measles outbreak in West Texas, the health secretary initially said the outbreak was “not unusual” after an unvaccinated child died from the virus, and suggested that Vitamin A may prove a suitable alternative treatment to measles than a vaccine.
Effective 5 April, in his resignation letter to Sara Brenner, acting commissioner of the FDA, Dr Marks said: “It has become clear that truth and transparency are not desired by the secretary [RFK Jr], but rather he wishes subservient confirmation of his misinformation and lies.”
Peter Stein, director of the Office of New Drugs in the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research division and viewed by many as the world’s leading drug regulator, also chose to resign. According to reports, Stein was offered a “reassignment” in patient affairs but turned it down.
RFK Jr more recently pushed a range of unfounded claims during a speech at the FDA, in which he invoked the ‘deep state’, accused staff of becoming ‘sock puppets’ for the industry they regulate, and expressed apparent scepticism over rising autism rates in the US, as per a transcript of the 40-minute diatribe seen by Politico. According to reports by the outlet, the health secretary’s talking points prompted staff walkouts during the event.
