FDA Commissioner Marty Makary says the “Make America Healthy Again” report on potential causes of chronic diseases in American children calls for a shift from a “reactionary” to a “proactive” healthcare system in the United States.
The Trump administration official, who appeared for “Sunday Morning Futures” interview with Fox News anchor Jackie DeAngelis, argues that more focus should be placed on food and environmental toxins rather than fixating on drugs and treatments.
“Scientists have been waving the flag for years, saying you have got to look at this body of scientific data. And the modern medical establishment really has been disconnected. We have been so busy focusing on treatment, on billing and coding in a high-throughput model,” Makary said.
“We have got to stop and ask ourselves, should we be focusing more on school lunch programs, not just putting every kid on Ozempic?” he added, referring to a drug widely used for weight loss. “We have got to talk about food as medicine and gut health and the microbiome. We have got to talk about environmental toxins that cause cancer, not just the chemo to treat it.”
“And maybe we need to treat more diabetes with cooking classes, not just throwing insulin at people. This report is a fresh new approach that really calls for a transformation of our health care system from a reactionary system to a proactive system.”
Makary said he could “not be more excited” about the report with its takeaways about ultra-processed foods, environmental toxins, stress, and the lack of physical activity, as well as the reliance on medications and vaccines. The Daily Wire covered its findings last week when it was released by Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
“There are no sacred cows. It talks about 70% of the diet being ultra-processed. It talks about pesticides, microplastics, natural light exposure in children, sleep quality,” he said. “And, remember, Republican, Democrat and independent moms showed up in high numbers to vote for President Trump over this very issue.”
Makary emphasized the findings come from a “purely independent scientific report on the state of health in America” when DeAngelis pressed him about the power of the food industry and lobbyists in Washington who might try to fight to stop change.
“This report talks about how we fix our broken health care system by getting at the root causes and the ultimate issue that we have not been talking about, and that is the health of the population,” Makary said. “When you have 40% of our nation’s children with a chronic disease, that portends for a very expensive future health care system. We can address it. There are many things that we can do even at the FDA addressing food, which many people forget is, the first letter of the FDA is food. It’s not just drugs.”
