Vaccine critic RFK Jr confirmed as US health secretary

Washington: The Republican controlled US Senate confirmed Robert F Kennedy Jr as health secretary on Thursday, elevating his anti vaccine advocacy to...

Washington: The Republican-controlled US Senate confirmed Robert F Kennedy Jr as health secretary on Thursday, elevating his anti-vaccine advocacy to the highest levels of government despite dire warnings from the medical community.

Known widely as "RFK Jr," the 71-year-old nephew of the late president John F Kennedy secured confirmation in a 52-48 vote largely along party lines, becoming the latest contentious addition to President Donald Trump's cabinet.

Kennedy now heads a department overseeing 80,000 employees and a $1.7 trillion budget as scientists warn of a potential bird flu pandemic and with declining vaccination rates leading to the resurgence of once-vanquished childhood diseases.

World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus was quick to offer congratulations on X. Trump has announced the United States, the WHO's top donor country, will leave the organization -- a decision Tedros has urged him to reconsider.

Once a celebrated environmental lawyer who sued chemical giant Monsanto and accused climate-change deniers of being traitors, Kennedy has spent much of the past two decades touting conspiracy theories: from linking childhood vaccines to autism and suggesting the Covid virus spared Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese people to casting doubt on whether germs truly cause infectious diseases.