RFK Jr. threatens to stop NIH scientists from publishing in corrupt medical journals

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F.Kennedy Jr.

threatened to bar National Institutes of Health (NIH) scientists from publishing in three top medical journals Tuesday, alleging that the publications are “all corrupt.” RFK Jr.argued the New England Journal of Medicine, the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) and The Lancet all have ties to the pharmaceutical industry that influence research findings and prevent the publication of “anything where the results may diminish corporate profits,” during an appearance on the “Ultimate Human” podcast. “We’re probably going to stop publishing in The Lancet, New England Journal of Medicine, JAMA, and those other journals because they’re all corrupt,” the HHS chief told podcast host Gary Brecka. Kennedy Jr.

went on to claim that “even the heads of those journals” believe their publications are “no longer science journals” but instead “vessel[s] for pharmaceutical propaganda.” The HHS secretary appeared to be referring to a 2015 commentary piece published by The Lancet’s Editor-in-Chief Richard Horton, in which he argued that the “much of the scientific literature, perhaps half, may simply be untrue” partly because of “flagrant conflicts of interest” and research findings that cannot be replicated; and a 2009 New York Review article by former NEJM editor-in-chief Marcia Angell, where she wrote that it “is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published” due to involvement by the pharmaceutical industry. “Unless these journals change dramatically, we are going to stop NIH scientists from publishing there and we are going to create our own journals, in-house, in each of the institutes … and they are going to become the preeminent journals,” RFK Jr.said.

“Because if you get NIH funding, it is anointing you as a good, legitimate scientist.” The New England Journal of Medicine, the Journal of the American Medi...