Kaiser Family Foundation analysis revealed that enhanced ACA premium tax credits helping over 20 million Americans afford health coverage are set to expire December 31, 2025, triggering an average 114% premium increase ($1,016 annually). Households at 150-200% of poverty level would see premiums …
Donald TrumpCongressKaiser Family Foundationhealthcareaca-sabotageeconomic-harmpublic-healthinstitutional-sabotage
The White House fired CDC Director Susan Monarez after she refused to resign amid pressure from HHS Secretary RFK Jr. to change vaccine policy, making her the shortest-lived CDC director in the agency’s history after less than one month in office. Monarez’s lawyers stated she …
HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. confirmed with ongoing financial interests in vaccine litigation, earning $856,559 in referral fees while controlling federal health policy. Despite resignation from consulting arrangements, he retains potential profit from Merck vaccine litigation, raising …
robert-f-kennedy-jrchildrens-health-defenseHHSNIHMerck+4 morerfk-jranti-vaccinehhsconflict-of-interestbiotech-investments+5 more
Podcaster Joe Rogan revealed he contracted COVID-19 and treated himself with ivermectin, a veterinary anti-parasitic drug not approved for COVID treatment, amplifying dangerous medical misinformation to his massive audience of 11 million listeners. The incident led to significant public health …
Joe RoganSpotifyThe Joe Rogan ExperienceFDADr. Anthony Fauci+2 morecovid-misinformationivermectinmedical-misinformationpodcast-influencepublic-health+2 more
Harvard researchers calculated that Trump’s environmental rollbacks would cause 80,000 excess deaths per decade from increased air pollution, with 18,000 deaths from repealing the Clean Power Plan alone. The administration reversed or weakened over 100 environmental regulations, including …
Donald TrumpEPAScott PruittAndrew WheelerDavid Bernhardt+1 moreenvironmental-destructionpublic-healthclimate-changemass-deathregulatory-capture
On Sunday evening, October 4, 2020, President Trump—still infected with COVID-19 and hospitalized at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center—left his hospital suite to drive past supporters gathered outside in a black Chevrolet Suburban SUV, forcing at least two Secret Service agents to …
Donald TrumpJames PhillipsSean ConleyCOVID-19Public HealthSecret ServiceAccountability Crisis
President Trump tested positive for COVID-19 on October 2, 2020, and was flown by Marine One helicopter to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center that evening, where he received an experimental monoclonal antibody cocktail developed by Regeneron Pharmaceuticals under “compassionate …
Donald TrumpMelania TrumpSean ConleyMike PenceHope HicksCOVID-19Public HealthHealthcareAccountability Crisis
Amazon Discloses 19,816 Workers Infected with COVID-19 After Months of Concealment
On October 1, 2020, after months of resisting transparency demands from workers, labor groups, politicians, and regulators, Amazon disclosed that at least 19,816 of its frontline employees had tested positive or been …
Jeff BezosAmazonWorker ExploitationCOVID-19Corporate AccountabilityAmazonPublic Health
On September 26, 2020, President Trump held a Rose Garden ceremony announcing Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination to the Supreme Court that became what Dr. Anthony Fauci would later call a “superspreader event,” with more than 150 attendees packed together without masks for both an …
President Trump held a campaign-style rally at Mount Rushmore on July 3-4, 2020, with approximately 7,500 ticketed attendees packed close together and mostly maskless, despite the United States setting a pandemic record on that same day with 57,497 confirmed COVID-19 cases. South Dakota Governor …
Donald TrumpKristi NoemKimberly GuilfoyleCOVID-19Public HealthSuperspreader EventAccountability Crisis
During a White House coronavirus briefing on April 23, 2020, President Trump publicly speculated about treating COVID-19 by injecting disinfectant into the human body or inserting ultraviolet light internally, asking “is there a way we can do something like that by injection inside or almost a …
Donald TrumpWilliam BryanCOVID-19Public HealthDisinformationAccountability Crisis
Principal Deputy Inspector General Christi Grimm of the Department of Health and Human Services released a report on April 6, 2020, documenting “severe shortages” of COVID-19 testing supplies and “widespread shortages” of personal protective equipment at hospitals nationwide. …
Christi GrimmDonald TrumpJason WeidaDepartment of Health and Human ServicesInspector GeneralWhistleblower RetaliationObstruction of JusticeAccountability CrisisCOVID-19+1 more
President Trump declared COVID-19 a national emergency on March 13, 2020—approximately six weeks after Health Secretary Alex Azar had declared it a public health emergency—finally acknowledging the severity of a pandemic he had spent weeks downplaying and dismissing as a Democratic …
Donald TrumpAlex AzarMike PenceCOVID-19Public HealthAccountability CrisisFederal Response
President Trump visited the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention headquarters in Atlanta on March 6, 2020, wearing his red “Keep America Great” campaign hat and delivering a chaotic, politically charged performance that included false claims about testing availability, attacks on …
Donald TrumpRobert RedfieldAlex AzarMike PenceJay InsleeCOVID-19Public HealthHatch ActDisinformationAccountability Crisis
At a campaign rally in North Charleston, South Carolina on February 28, 2020, President Trump dismissed Democratic criticism of his administration’s coronavirus response by declaring “this is their new hoax,” comparing it to impeachment and other perceived attacks against him. The …
Donald TrumpCOVID-19Public HealthDisinformationAccountability Crisis
On October 26, 2017, President Trump declared the opioid crisis a public health emergency—but the declaration provided no new funding and stopped short of the national emergency designation Trump had promised in August. The move was widely criticized as a hollow gesture that failed to match the …
Donald TrumpEric HarganDepartment of Health and Human Servicesopioid-crisishollow-gesturestrump-administrationpublic-healthunderfunding
On March 15, 2016, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released its first-ever “Guideline for Prescribing Opioids for Chronic Pain”—twenty years after Purdue Pharma launched OxyContin with aggressive marketing based on false addiction claims, and nine years after …
Centers for Disease Control and PreventionU.S. Department of Health and Human Servicesopioid-crisisregulatory-failurepublic-healthdelayed-response
In 2016, illicit fentanyl and other synthetic opioids overtook prescription opioids as the leading cause of opioid overdose deaths in the United States, marking a deadly transition in the opioid epidemic. This shift represented the catastrophic unintended consequence of belated efforts to restrict …
Drug Enforcement AdministrationCenters for Disease Control and PreventionIllicit Fentanyl Suppliersopioid-crisisfentanylsynthetic-opioidspublic-healthunintended-consequences
Flint reconnects to the Detroit water system 18 months after the catastrophic switch to Flint River water, following Governor Rick Snyder’s approval of $9.35 million to restore the connection and provide relief. The switch comes only after independent researchers proved beyond doubt that the …
Rick SnyderDayne WallingFlint City Governmentflint-water-crisispublic-healthlead-poisoningchildren
The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS) reviews data from Hurley Medical Center and finally verifies what residents have been saying for 18 months: Flint’s water is poisoning children with lead. The state begins testing drinking water in schools and distributing free water …
Michigan Department of Health and Human ServicesRick SnyderGenesee County Health Departmentflint-water-crisisgovernment-accountabilitypublic-healthcover-up
Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha, a pediatrician at Flint’s Hurley Medical Center, publicly releases research proving that children’s blood lead levels have doubled since the water switch, nearly tripling in the inner city. Her analysis compares blood lead data for children under 5 from …
Mona Hanna-AttishaMichigan Department of Health and Human Servicesflint-water-crisiswhistleblowerpublic-healthlead-poisoningchildren
The City of Flint tests water at the home of LeeAnne Walters, a mother of four who has been complaining about health problems since the water switch, and finds lead levels at 104 parts per billion (ppb)—nearly seven times greater than the EPA action level of 15 ppb. Walters had first informed the …
LeeAnne WaltersMarc EdwardsCity of FlintEPAflint-water-crisiswhistleblowerlead-poisoningpublic-health
West Virginia emerged as the epicenter of the opioid crisis, with the highest rate of drug overdose deaths in 2015 at 41.5 deaths per 100,000 people—nearly three times the national average. From 2007 to 2012, drug wholesalers shipped 780 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills to the state, …
Officials in Flint, Michigan switch the city’s water supply from treated Detroit water (sourced from Lake Huron) to the polluted Flint River as a cost-cutting measure, beginning one of the worst public health disasters in modern American history. The decision, made by state-appointed emergency …
Darnell EarleyFlint Department of Public WorksMichigan Department of Environmental Qualityflint-water-crisisemergency-managerenvironmental-racismpublic-healthcost-cutting
On April 5, 2010, the FDA approved Purdue Pharma’s reformulated OxyContin designed to make it more difficult to crush, snort, or inject—14 years after the original drug’s launch and three years after the company’s guilty plea to criminal misbranding. Purdue ceased shipping the old …
Purdue Pharma’s lucrative bonus system paid sales representatives an average of $71,500 in annual bonuses—more than their $55,000 base salary—with bonuses ranging from $15,000 to nearly $240,000. In 2001 alone, Purdue paid $40 million in sales incentive bonuses, systematically incentivizing …
Purdue Pharma launched the most aggressive marketing campaign ever undertaken for a narcotic drug, introducing OxyContin with false claims about addiction risk. At the 1996 launch party, Dr. Richard Sackler predicted the debut would “be followed by a blizzard of prescriptions that will bury …
In a landmark case of regulatory capture, Dr. Curtis Wright IV, leading the FDA’s Division of Anesthetic, Critical Care, and Addiction Drug Products, approved OxyContin with controversial language that misrepresented the drug’s addictive potential. Wright held private meetings with …
Curtis Wright IVPurdue PharmaFood and Drug AdministrationDivision of Anesthetic, Critical Care, and Addiction Drug ProductsDepartment of Justiceregulatory-capturepharmaceutical-industryopioid-crisisfda-corruptionpublic-health
By early 1987, over 25,000 Americans have died of AIDS-related illnesses, yet President Reagan has still not delivered a major public address on the epidemic despite six years of crisis. Reagan does not give his first comprehensive AIDS speech until May 1987, by which time the death toll exceeds …
Ronald ReaganAIDS patientsLGBTQ communityPublic health officialsACT UPaidspublic-healthreaganlgbtqgovernment-negligence+1 more
Surgeon General C. Everett Koop releases “The Surgeon General’s Report on Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome” after being muzzled by the Reagan administration for five years. The groundbreaking 36-page report provides frank, explicit guidance on AIDS prevention including …
C. Everett KoopRonald ReaganDepartment of Health and Human Servicesaidsc-everett-kooppublic-healthsurgeon-generalsex-education
Hollywood icon Rock Hudson dies at age 59 of AIDS complications, becoming the first major U.S. celebrity to die of the disease and forcing President Reagan to finally acknowledge the epidemic publicly. Hudson’s death marks a turning point: Reagan had maintained complete public silence on AIDS …
Rock HudsonRonald ReaganNancy ReaganC. Everett Koopaidsrock-hudsonreaganpublic-healthlgbtq+1 more
The CDC publishes the first report on unusual immune system failures in five previously healthy gay men in Los Angeles, marking the medical recognition of what becomes the AIDS epidemic. President Ronald Reagan’s administration responds with years of complete public silence while the epidemic …
Ronald ReaganCenters for Disease ControlC. Everett KoopLarry Speakesaidspublic-healthreaganlgbtqepidemic+1 more
The Reagan administration launches systematic dismantling of environmental protections through regulatory capture: appointing industry advocates to lead EPA and Interior, slashing enforcement budgets, weakening Clean Air and Water Act regulations, and opening public lands to resource extraction. EPA …
Ronald ReaganAnne GorsuchJames WattEnvironmental Protection AgencyDepartment of Interiorenvironmental-deregulationeparegulatory-capturereaganpublic-health
The Reagan administration prohibits Surgeon General C. Everett Koop from publicly addressing the emerging AIDS epidemic from 1981 through early 1986, demonstrating deliberate suppression of public health information during a catastrophic disease outbreak. Journalists receive advance instructions …
C. Everett KoopRonald ReaganDepartment of Health and Human Servicesaidsc-everett-koopcensorshippublic-healthreagan+1 more
Major multinational tobacco companies secretly coordinated a long-running
strategy to resist regulation and scientific consensus on smoking harms—an
effort known as ‘Operation Berkshire.’ Internal documents and litigation
disclosures show executives met in the late 1970s (including a …
British American TobaccoPhilip MorrisRJ ReynoldsImperial Tobaccocorporate-collusionpublic-healthinfluence-operations