The cover of The Lancet, and their article on RFK Jr.

[highplainsdem]

Last edited Fri Feb 27, 2026, 01:01 PM - Edit history (2)

Every senator who voted to confirm RFK Jr owns this tragedy. Every single one.

— Jon Cooper (@joncooper-us.bsky.social) 2026-02-27T14:51:35.805Z

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(26)00414-9/fulltext

Editing to add that because DU's software won't include the proper link above as a link, instead breaking it at the parenthesis, you'll have to copy the complete link into an address bar or search engine.
Editing again after finding out you can also use this link -
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2826%2900414-9/fulltext - which substitutes %28 for ( and %29 for ) as explained in replies 22 and 23 below.

The Lancet Journal
Editorial • Volume 407, Issue 10531, P825, February 28, 2026

Robert F Kennedy Jr: 1 year of failure


In his first speech as Secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Robert F Kennedy Jr laid out a plan to restore trust. The COVID-19 pandemic saw public faith in Federal health and science plummet—between April, 2020, and September, 2023, the percentage of polling respondents who trusted coronavirus and vaccine information from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) “a great deal” or “a fair amount”, fell from 83% to 63%—and the HHS employees to whom he was speaking were facing devastating mass lay-offs and funding cuts. Although Kennedy did not mince words about the likely fate of staff resistant to his ambitions, he promised open and honest engagement with everyone willing to work towards making the USA healthy again. To the Senate committee who confirmed his nomination, Kennedy promised a receptive and collaborative relationship, and to the public from whom he claims his mandate, he promised a new era of unbiased science without hidden conflicts of interest, secrecy, or profiteering. Radical transparency, gold-standard science, ethics, compassion, competency, and pride would restore to HHS the unimpeachable authority that the USA needs and deserves. Politicians are known to break promises, but Kennedy's record, 1 year in, has been a failure by most measures, especially his own.

10 days after his speech about trust and openness, HHS rescinded a 54-year-old policy of soliciting public comments for new rules and regulations, silencing the voices of many of the stakeholders he pledged to serve. Kennedy has summarily dismissed advisers and experts, communicated policy changes on pay-walled media, fired a whistleblower, and overseen the revisions of guidelines and recommendations, contradicting decades of established science, often to the benefit of industries he formerly condemned. Under Kennedy's leadership, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) shuttered programmes studying the health effects of air pollution, HHS withheld a report linking alcohol consumption to cancer, and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) withdrew warnings of potential harm from consuming products (such as raw milk and chlorine dioxide) falsely marketed as treatments for autism. His changes at CDC have driven 26 states to reject official guidance on vaccine policy, and in December the CDC awarded an unsolicited $1·6 million grant to conduct a vaccine study in Guinea-Bissau that raised so many ethical concerns—the design would have risked exposing thousands of unvaccinated children to hepatitis B—that it has been compared to the infamous Untreated Syphilis Study at Tuskegee.

HHS under Kennedy has made a habit of throwing good money after bad science. Amid the Trump administration's cuts to research funding and personnel there has been a harmful shift in priorities. Cutting-edge discoveries and clinical investigations—on subjects ranging from mRNA vaccines to diabetes and dementia—are denied crucial resources while junk science and fringe beliefs are elevated without justifiable explanation. Under Kennedy's leadership, politicisation at the NIH, FDA, and CDC is imperilling the future of US science and innovation and throttling the public health enterprise that keeps the country safe today.

The mechanisms maintained by the Federal Government to monitor and report health concerns such as drug overdoses, maternal mortality, and food security have been as beleaguered as the doctors and scientists who rely on them; thousands of datasets are no longer publicly available, leaving Americans—and the world—unprepared to respond to future crises. And crises are looming: in November, 2025, the first human infection (and death) from the H5N5 strain of avian flu was recorded in Washington state; pertussis, which killed 13 people in the USA in 2025, continues to spread across the country; and the measles outbreak that began in January of last year now threatens the elimination status of the USA and Mexico.

-snip-

More at the link.

[SheltieLover]

1. Kick

[BlueWaveNeverEnd]

7. Double kick

[Easterncedar]

2. Wanton, wholesale destruction

Evil manifested. Can you imagine what his father would suffer, seeing this?

[LetMyPeopleVote]

3. Great article

[kimbutgar]

4. He is smearing the Kennedy name for new generations !

[erronis]

14. That's why trump-putin brought him in. To damage the Kennedy name.

They knew that rfkjr was an unstable addicted narcissist - just like trump - so they hired him and probably keep him well stocked on some designer drugs.

[kimbutgar]

45. So sad but true

[SheltieLover]

89. Absolutely!

[Solly Mack]

5. K&R

[Goonch]

6. ;-{).....

[highplainsdem]

18. Please don't post AI art made using AI tools trained illegally on stolen intellectual property. AI slop

is something that MAGA loves, even from official government accounts. They're fine with AI companies stealing intellectual property, and the AI companies have aligned with and flattered Trump.

Generative AI is based on deliberate and continuing theft, and it creates lots of problems that liberals traditionally fight.

The Trump regime wants people to use genAI more and more. Including to answer health questions.

[Goonch]

34. ;-{).....

lf my art bothers you then you can always add me to your Ignore List. Otherwise, please stop stalking me.

[highplainsdem]

40. You know how I feel about how unethical genAI is. If you post AI slop in response to an OP I posted, I

will respond to it.

If you post AI slop anywhere on DU, one of the many DUers who dislike AI slop might respond to it, because it IS unethical and it makes DU look bad.

[Goonch]

41. ;-{)

You know how I feel about my art, but nothing about artistic process or, perhaps, art in general or freedom of artistic expression. However, you do seem to know about veiled threats and bullying.

Let's just agree to disagree and go our separate ways.

[highplainsdem]

43. What's generated by AI is not the AI user's art. I've tried AI image generators myself enough to know

how little control the user has over what's generated, and I've read of AI users rejecting hundreds or even thousands of images they don't like before finally getting one they do like enough to call their own.

I would have had to be kidding myself, when I tried those image generators, to call what the AI spat out from.stolen IP my own work.

[Goonch]

46. ;-{)

Tools have a learning curve and be dangerous, especially if used improperly.

A poor workman blames his tools.

You always need to have the last word.

[highplainsdem]

48. While you were posting that, I was looking for an article to explain to anyone who hadn't tried AI image

generators just how little control over what's generated the AI user has.

One striking comment I found was from an AI user who actually sells some AI art.

This was posted in the Adobe Community forum:

https://community.adobe.com/questions-38/too-many-rejected-ai-generated-images-lately-327849?postid=5992190#post5992190

Very poor quality. Are you using a custom model? Can you output at a higher resolution? Even then, expect to spend far longer correcting/editing/cleaning things up in Photoshop than you ever would in building/working the prompt. I sell a *lot* of AI images, but of course I generate 200-300+ for each one that I feel is worth working on, and even after editing only submit less than half I've done any kind of postprocessing on.

Emphasis added.

The most relevant words there are "of course" - and no one there expressed shock because they knew how many extra images were generated, each request for more using more electricity and water to cool data centers.

DUers probably don't realize that almost every piece of AI-generated art they see anywhere has a long, unseen trail of rejected images behind it, and even the best often needs a lot of correcting, because the AI user has so little control.

Here's a detailed article that goes into those problems with lack of control:

https://www.nngroup.com/articles/ai-imagegen-stages/

After defining their goal, participants used the tool to generate images. The exploration phase typically involved creating many images (anywhere from 20 to 80 images), to increase the likelihood that one image aligns with their vision enough.

-snip-

This technique involves repeating the same prompt to “exhaust the possibilities” related to one creative direction. Due to the inherent randomness of the AI image-generation algorithm, this practice resulted in many variations of the same concept, allowing people to choose what they liked best.

-snip-

One study participant wanted to create an image of a steampunk-themed sofa. After multiple iterations, she got an image of a sofa she was happy with but wanted to change the upholstery from plain to striped. This edit proved difficult, as the appearance of the sofa would change every time she tried to make an adjustment, due to the randomness of the AI tool.

Changing small details of an AI-generated image can be an arduous, time-consuming task. Participants often experience frustration due to the lack of user control (usability heuristic #3) inherent to current AI image-generation tools. Unlike traditional image-processing software, these tools offer limited support for fine adjustments, which means users end up fighting against the AI to achieve desired outcomes. Consequently, users frequently end up dissatisfied as the final images often fall short of perfection.

Again, emphasis added.

Real artists don't have that lack of control. AI users do.

[Goonch]

49. The most relevant words

are in the well thought out, well written, highly detailed phrasing of your original instructions Garbage in garbage out.

So long, and thanks for all the fish ;-{)

[Doodley]

51. I support you with that.

[Goonch]

56. ;-{) Thank You

[KS Toronado]

71. AI is here to stay so we need to get used to it.

Believe the message a cartoon is attempting to convey is more important than how good or
poorly the artwork looks.

[Goonch]

72. ;-{) AMEN!

[Goonch]

73. ;-{) AI is here to stay so we need to get used to it.

[Qutzupalotl]

74. If only data centers would limit themselves to renewables.

Sadly, they cook the planet, and are growing exponentially.

[Goonch]

75. ;-{)....

[Qutzupalotl]

76. That makes it all worth it!

[highplainsdem]

80. AI slop just wastes water and electricity. And it isn't ususual for users of AI image generators to

have the AI vomit out dozens or even hundreds of images to get one that isn't too flawed to post. Those AI tools can generate a batch - typically 4 - of images in under 10 seconds. The free tier of Google's Gemini, the AI those images are from, allows, iirc, 100 images or maybe batches of images a day. The cheap $20/mo tier allows 1,000 images or batches a day. Each image wasting some water and electricity.

That slop is why they need data centers. It costs AI companies but gets people hooked on AI so they'll eventually pay more and more for it. And playing with AI and being told they're somehow creative having AI do something for them turns them into advocates for AI who will overlook intellectual property having been stolen to train the AI.

Editing to add that more data centers are also needed for more data-gathering and surveillance. But just generating all the AI slop out there takes a tremendous amount of compute.

[highplainsdem]

77. More AI slop.

[Goonch]

81. ;-{) I've asked you nicely twice to stop stalking me

this is the third and last.
Your baiting is transparent.

[highplainsdem]

83. You're baiting me, posting AI slop in this thread. I've helped you out when you posted misinformation

from a chatbot making stuff up in response to another DUer. I've tried to make you understand how unreliable and harmful that tech is. You've posted lots of AI-generated cartoons recently, treating other people's posts as excuses to post AI slop.

You know a lot of people here hate it.

It's also hated on Bluesky, because that's also a liberal forum.

If you want to post lots and lots of your AI-generated cartoons here, you could try the Artists forum - but they don't like AI slop either - or maybe the Humor forum, and see how much of a sense of humor they have about you posting multiple AI-generated cartoons a day.

But you posted a cartoon in this thread, apparently, because you know how I feel about AI slop. And you accused me of stalking you when I replied.

This isn't amusing, Goonch. DU is a message board. There are forums, for instance on Reddit, for AI users to show off the AI-generated images they have. There are websites where you can try to sell your cartoons, where people post a lot of AI slop.

[Goonch]

88. ;-{) Thanks for confirming you're stalking me and BTW

I had no idea this was your thread 'til you just mentioned it. (I'm partially blind).

[highplainsdem]

90. It isn't stalking you to notice you've started posting AI slop. I pointed out to you yesterday that when you

post in reply to my OP here, I will reply.

So you posted more AI slop here today and accused me of stalking you when I responded.

You posted one of your AI images in this thread I posted Wednesday about how dangerous AI is

https://www.democraticunderground.com/10143622015

and I posted this reply

7. Please don't post AI art here. It's part of the problem with this unethical, flawed tech.

and you self-deleted that, but then apparently decided it would be fun to bait me here.

I didn't attack you, Goonch, when I saw you taken in by a chatbot's misinformation and post it in a thread started by someons else, whom I'd already given the correct answer to, with links providing more information for them. I know chatbots can sound authoritative. That's why their answers have to be checked.

And I know using genAI to have AI generate an image for you can seem tempting.

But I know what it's trained on, and I've met too many people it's hurt, some close to suicide, to think it's harmless.

I also know what real creativity is, and genAI isn't real creativity.

I like seeing real art from people. When I see genAI, it's like looking at something assembled from the bones of real artists killed off by that tech. There probably have been suicides already. There have been students abandoning art majors and dreams of careers as artists. That's tragic.

I'm sorry you're partially blind. But if you can see well enough to use AI to generate images, or to select other images to post as you have, you can see well enough to create your own artwork, rather than what an AI patches together for you from other artists' stolen work.

I'd be interested in seeing that. I'd be more impressed by that, even a rough sketch, than lots of images you ask an AI tool to make for you.

And from what I know of art and artists, and I've known a lot of artists, it would be more rewarding for you, too.

But if you are insistent on using AI to create images, you can, as I said, find places on the internet where that stuff is welcome.

[Goonch]

91. :-{) Well spoken, almost zealot-like.....

Now that I know this lawn it yours I'll stay off.

[highplainsdem]

79. We don't have to accept what's wrong with it. Including unethical AI tools trained illegally on stolen

intellectual property.

Using them doesn't show any real creativity/skill/talent, and in fact they dumb users down and keep people from developing any real skill.

And people have to make a conscious or subconscious decision that they don't give a damn about all the people who work was stolen, to use those tools voluntarily.

Which makes using them anti-art, anti-creativity, and ultimately anti-human.

[KS Toronado]

82. Can you ever accept the fact that AI is like McDonald's?

Some people are gonna love it and some people are gonna hate it?

[highplainsdem]

84. Would you eat at McDonald's if the business was built entirely on theft, as genAI is?

[KS Toronado]

85. Sure if it was the only place in town to eat.

The world is constantly changing and we need to adapt or get buried. This is my last comments on this
subject, have a nice day.

[highplainsdem]

87. Not comparable. Unless forced by work or school, no one has to use genAI. But thanks for letting

us know you'd eat at a restaurant built on theft.

[highplainsdem]

86. And btw, if you want to know why so many people hate it, I suggest you go to Bluesky and post

a message asking people there, especially artists, why they hate genAI and AI slop.

You'll probably have some people block you just for asking. Some might tell you to fuck off if you don't understand. But a lot of people will give you serious explanations, and maybe you'll finally understand how much harm this unethical tech has caused.

I've met artists who are nearly suicidal.

I've met teachers despairing of ever being able to get students to learn.

The AI bros knew they were stealing the world's intellectual property, they knew how much harm that would do to the people they ripped off, they knew people might become dependent on AI and addicted to chatbots. They knew it would cause massive unemployment and much greater wealth inequality.

They wanted it anyway.

If there was ever a technology and industry that represented everything harmful about oligarchies, it's generative AI.

It isn't a toy. The toy aspect of it is bait and a distraction.

[SheltieLover]

93. Well stated, HPD!

[jmbar2]

94. Agree

DU Karen seems hellbent on censoring people.

[SheltieLover]

52. Agreed!

[ShazzieB]

42. LOL

But this cartoon makes him look way too good imo, especially his face. He looks all happy and friendly here, but irl his usual facial expression is sour, scornful, and enbittered. Like he thinks has 1000% smarter than everybody else and and is mad at the world for not recognizing that.

[Wednesdays]

47. Please stop posting AI SLOP. nt

[MayReasonRule]

78. 😊We're An Inclusive Big Tent😊 -- One Person's 'AI SLOP' Is Another Person's Assisted Artistic Endeavor

I see no reason to deride others over such endeavors utilizing vision aids, hearing aids, physical aids or creative aids.🥹

We each seek to overcome our human foibles by employing tools of our own choosing.

We each seek to communicate in a manner easily understood, each in our own way.

Happy Saturday to ya!

[highplainsdem]

92. There are a lot of artists who are actually disabled who hate AI art, who've had some success as

artists and had their own careers hurt by completely unethical AI tools trained on data sets of intellectual property stolen by AI robber barons.

There's nothing ethical or acceptable about choosing to use tech based on theft, especially work stolen from other artists.

If you're aware that the tech is built on theft, using it might be what you would like to call a creative choice, but it's also an unethical one.

It looks terrible for liberals to promote tools from oligarchs who exploited creatives and workers of all types by stealing intellectual property in the hope of putting the people they stole from out of work.

And anyone who's actually done anything creative knows that giving prompts to AI that does the work for you is no more creative than asking someone else to create something for you. It's no more creative than shopping online using keywords, or ordering from a menu.

[Initech]

8. Of all the clowns in the clown car, RFK Jr is the one who will do the most long-term damage in this shit show.

Worst HHS director in American history. Fuck him.

[NNadir]

10. The most unqualified cabinet member in history which is saying a lot....

...because there have been some absymal cases, with the highest concentration of absymal cabinet members ever in this current capacious set. They cannot be called an administration so much as vandalizing looters.

[Initech]

11. We are being run by a cabinet full of James Bond villains.

And each one is more horrifying than the next. They exist to do two things - destroy whatever department they're in charge of, and kiss his worthless, disgusting ass on Fox News nightly. Fox News got their dream president and administration - and we're all paying the price for it.

Fox News has done more damage to the United States than Al'Qaeda or the Taliban could ever dream of.

[NNadir]

13. Your last sentence recalls the line...

...in the original Wizard of Oz spoken by tge cowardly lion, "Ain't it the truth! Ain't it the truth!"

[erronis]

15. And the other plutocrat-owned and controlled "news" media are doing the same.

[Initech]

32. Seriously. It's like watching the new Nazis take over in real time.

Nothing is spared from these sick fucks.

[highplainsdem]

19. They're evil and incompetent, but they're not smart enough to be James Bond villains.

[Mysterian]

59. James Bond villains are typically very intelligent

This clusterfuck of an administration is a bunch of fucking morons.

Kristi fucking Noem in charge of DHS.

Jesus Fucking Christ.

[Layzeebeaver]

12. I'm completely unqualified for the job and yet more qualified than him

Just sayin’

[NNadir]

16. The main qualification for an HHS Secretary is to listen to scientists, not to assume...

Last edited Fri Feb 27, 2026, 01:06 PM - Edit history (1)

...that one knows more than scientists.

You could not do worse than brain worm Bob.

He's the worst kind of moron, an arrogant moron, the class into which his boss fits.

[AZ8theist]

60. It might be a toss-up between him, Miller, and Noem.....

...oh, fuck it. They ALL SUCK.

Not one intelligent , redeeming person in the lot. But then again, just look at their boss. Nuf said.

[MLWR]

9. RFK Jr. was put at the head of HHS, so that he would destroy all these programs and so trump could take that money

which had been appropriated for those purposes and either put it in his own off-shore accounts or use it to fund his thugs in ICE or his invasions of sovereign nations to deflect from the EPSTEIN FILES.

[erronis]

17. I found this link to The Lancet to work better. YMMV.

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(26)00414-9/fulltext

[highplainsdem]

20. That's the same link I posted, and doesn't work directly from DU either because DU's software won't

incorporate the section starting with a parenthesis as part of the link. You have to copy the link into an address bar or search engine.

And I just edited the OP to make that clear.

The same thing happens if, for instance, someone posts a YouTube video with a time stamp to start playing the video at a particular time. The time stamp part of the link won't work on DU, so you have to explain which point in the video you mean, even if the link includes it.

[hunter]

23. Try this:

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2826%2900414-9/fulltext

I don't think it's peculiar to my operating system or browser.

[highplainsdem]

25. Thanks!

[hunter]

26. For the record, eggplant beat me too it.

[highplainsdem]

27. Yes, I saw, and posted a thank you, and mentioned both your replies in the edited OP.

[CBHagman]

21. It's chilling to note that the word "promised" appears repeatedly in the passage shown.

Promises do not mean a thing from this administration, but Kennedy in particular cannot be trusted in a conversation, let alone on testimony and on policy.

[eggplant]

22. Try this url

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2826%2900414-9/fulltext

You can substitute %28 for ( and %29 for ).

[highplainsdem]

24. Thanks! Didn't know that. I'll edit the OP again.

[Dave Bowman]

28. That crazy baboon is incredibly dangerous.

[highplainsdem]

30. They all are. The Trump regime would be one of the craziest sitcoms ever if the characters were just

fictional and harmless. But these loons are real and a threat not just to the US but often to other countries as well.

I saw Bobby Kennedy give a speech in 1968, and I'd arrived so late I was still outside the building and was able to shake his hand as he went past.

He would have been so ashamed of RFK Jr.

[Dave Bowman]

57. Yeah, he sure would be ashamed of the ignorant fool who's playing with people's health. 🙁

[maxsolomon]

29. If it wasn't RFK Jr it would have been another clown like Dr. Oz or some Covid Conspiracy nut

NIH was always going to be wrecked by MFer, in retaliation for Fauci.

[AZJonnie]

31. Look up "HTML encoding" to fix links that break like this in the future if you want :)

THE. BILLIONAIRES. WANT. TO. KILL. US.

Couldn't be more obvious

[highplainsdem]

33. Thanks!

And I agree that the billionaires - the ones causing so much trouble, anyway - want to kill us.

Those villains don't think they need very many of us, and they sure as hell don't want to share any of the wealth they expropriated from the less wealthy.

[AZJonnie]

36. No problem sistah! 👍

Also HTML encoding is also how you can get the emoji I put in the subject line, and many others

https://www.w3schools.com/html/html_emojis.asp

On DU this encoding only survives one save though, if you try to edit your post, or even preview it, it will break.

[TexasBushwhacker]

38. Yup. People will die because of this

And they will be disproportionately elderly, non-white and/or female. Meanwhile, Dr. Oz says our GDP would go up if more senior citizens worked another year before retiring or more young people delayed going to college and just worked at a shitty job for a year or two.

[dalton99a]

37. Trump chose well.

[3catwoman3]

39. Secretary Brainworm's thing about "shared decision making" for vaccines really irks me.

Does he think that staff pediatric offices just walk into an exam room and inject a child without so much as a by-your-leave?

We have extensive discussions with parents. Information sheets are given and reviewed. Questions are answered. Informed consent/permission forms are signed by parents. Every time.

[Wounded Bear]

44. They're not wrong...nt

[orangecrush]

50. Completely intentional

Appointing this oaf was an act of war against the American people.

[Doodley]

53. There is no surprise about anything Kennedy does. Those that confirmed him have no excuse.

[spanone]

54. And a medical doctor cast the deciding vote for RFKjr...

Senator Bill Kennedy

[bmichaelh]

55. Means is an ally of RFK Jr.

We will see if the senators who regretted voted for RFK Jr will do the right thing in regard to his surgeon general's pick.

She and her brother are allies of RFK Jr.

Voting for her is a vote for RFK Jr.

Trump has nominated someone that is not even a practicing physician.

Reminds me of the line from Shakespeare's Macbeth that describes an upside-down world.
May also describe the Trump administration.

Fair is foul and foul is fair.

[Jarqui]

58. I campaigned for his father ...

The world is upside down

[Skittles]

61. SOMEONE PLEASE TELL ME

WHAT EXACTLY is the INCENTIVE for repukes to fuck with PUBLIC HEALTH - WHAT?!?!?!

[highplainsdem]

63. Getting rid of people who might be on Social Security, Medicaid, or any government program repukes

would like to cut.

[Skittles]

64. but....fucking with vaccines

that can kill CHILDREN

fucking with CANCER research - that affects ALL AGES

[highplainsdem]

65. They assume they'll still have good medical care. That mostly the poor will suffer and die.

[Skittles]

66. sounds so PRO-LIFE and CHRISTIAN

[highplainsdem]

67. They're anything but true Christians.

[Skittles]

68. sad to say but...

they behave like most "Christians" I know

[highplainsdem]

69. Most self-professed Christians I know don't follow Christ's teachings very well, either.

[OMGWTF]

62. No worries, T💩p's Surgeon General nominee is a medical school dropout.

What could possibly go wrong in this Kakistocracy of psychopaths?