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APHA has been busy standing up to the Trump administration's attacks on public health. Take a look at some of what we're doing to defend and speak for public health.

1. With the federal government working on a new budget, we issued statements on why Congress must reject the president’s dangerous FY 2026 budget request [ [link removed] ] and how the House reconciliation bill would take insurance coverage away from millions and roll back clean air and climate protections [ [link removed] ] .
 2. APHA is teaming up with the National Academy of Medicine and others for a free webinar on May 27 from 4-5 p.m. ET on Measles 2025: The state of the outbreak. Learn more and register to join us [ [link removed] ] .
 3. We partnered with Big Cities Health and Safe States Alliance to hold a briefing for the press sharing thoughts and concerns between Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s testimonies before two congressional committees on May 14.
 4. Our lawsuits against the administration continue and we are collecting information from APHA members directly impacted by NIH grant terminations to aid in that case.

The following are some of the recent media pieces including APHA.

1. RFK Jr. to Congress: ‘I don’t think people should be taking medical advice from me’ [ [link removed] ]
Washington Post
“His job description is the nation’s chief health strategist,” said American Public Health Association head Georges C. Benjamin. Kennedy is “constantly giving people advice,” Benjamin said, but it’s “bad advice,” referring to the health secretary’s promotion of treatments for measles that are not evidence-based.
 
2. RFK Jr. clashes with lawmakers over vaccines and HHS mass layoffs [ [link removed] ]
NBC News
Public health experts also pushed back on Kennedy’s responses about vaccines. While Kennedy has no medical training, “the problem is that the top line of his job description is the nation’s chief health strategist,” Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association, said during a call with reporters Wednesday. “His job is to give people the best advice that he can.”
 
3. RFK Jr. says people should not take medical advice from him, defends HHS cuts during congressional hearings [ [link removed] ]
ABC News
"The problem is that is his job — the top line of his job description — is the nation's chief health strategist. That is the top line of every health official, federal, state, local leader. That is his job, is to give people the best advice that he can. I believe that he's giving up on, in my view, his chief responsibility," Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association, told reporters on a call in which he and other health leaders responded to Kennedy's testimony in front of the House Appropriations Committee.
Benjamin pointed out that Kennedy has, in fact, seemed to advise people on how to treat measles, leading them toward unproven remedies.
 
4. Amid protests and Democratic pushback, House GOP begins work on Medicaid cuts [ [link removed] ]
Maryland Matters
American Public Health Association Executive Director Georges Benjamin wrote in a statement that House Republicans’ planned overhaul of Medicaid “does nothing to improve public health.”
“Instead, it would undermine much of the progress we have made to expand access to affordable, quality health insurance and implement other evidence-based measures to protect the public’s health,” Benjamin wrote. “We urge the House to reject this bill and instead work in a bipartisan manner on legislation to improve public health and expand access to health care for all Americans.”
 
5. Confronting the 2025 vaccination crisis: Expert physician panel discusses the way forward [ [link removed] ]
Medical Economics
“We've had a lack of consistent, coherent messaging. It's all right to get your measles shot, but maybe not. This lack of coherent messaging means that we've learned nothing about risk communication, about the importance of consistent messaging that's evidence-based…”
 
6. Americans still don’t know how and when to wash their hands [ [link removed] ]
CNN
Or the trend could be caused by a longer lifetime of habits, said Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association, who wasn’t involved in the research…“Older folks, we didn’t have the hand sanitizers when we were younger,” Benjamin said. “When I went outside to play, when I came back in, I was supposed to wash my hands. So I think that you’re looking at behaviors that may have changed from a generation to another generation.”
 
“However, other germs — like those that cause colds, norovirus, and other infectious diseases — can spread throughout the year,” according to the survey. “It is important to maintain proper hand hygiene all year round to help stay healthy.”
 
7. How federal vaccine skepticism could affect public health, pharma industry [ [link removed] ]
Healthcare Brew
“The data is clear: Vaccines do not cause autism. This is based on years of study, scrutiny, repetition of very sound science,” American Public Health Association Associate Executive Director Susan Polan told Healthcare Brew in a statement. “Bringing a discredited researcher to lead a study with the expectation that there will be evidence-based and unbiased conclusions by September is ludicrous.”
 
“It’s fair and at times responsible for people to ask questions, and I think it’s equally as important for those questions to be answered with facts, not fear,” she said. “We’re seeing misinformation has real-world consequences” and a “resurgence of preventable diseases.”

APHA is your public health home — the organization you can count on to champion your interests and advocate for the health of all communities. Stay connected and see how we’re making an impact.

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