Unhealthy
June 13, 2025 – Opinion by DEC Vice Chair Dan Lack.
Drug companies required about one year to bring a vaccine to market after COVID first appeared. Most of the 350,000 Americans who died during that time would have survived if the vaccine had been available earlier.
The bird flu virus may mutate at any time into a pathogen that easily infects and kills people. It has already affected millions of birds, cows, cats and other animals. More than 70 Americans, mostly farm workers, have been infected and one died. Imagine if every American who wanted a bird flu vaccine could have immediate access if an epidemic occurs? How many lives would be saved?
The Biden administration contracted with Moderna to develop bird flu vaccines for whatever mutated version starts to infect people and to buy millions of doses. HHS Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr. cancelled that contract.
Here are more examples of how the Trump administration is Making America Hurt Again:
Among the thousands of government employees forced out by DOGE are professionals who detected and investigated bird flu infestations.
Kennedy reversed the government recommendation that pregnant women receive the COVID vaccine despite research indicating that COVID places them at risk for stillbirth, premature birth, and death.
The largest measles outbreak in 20 years resulted in the deaths of two children whose parents didn’t vaccinate them after believing conspiracy theories from people like Kennedy.
Trump cancelled 1,389 grants for research in cancer, Alzheimer’s, and other diseases, according to the New York Times.
The budget bill that our Republican Congressmen voted for will kick 11 million people off Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act according to the Congressional Budget Office. Expect hospitals and nursing homes to shut down and more people to die if this bill becomes law.
This does not bother Republicans such as Sen. Joni Ernst, who commented, “We all are going to die.” According to experts, Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s USAID cuts caused the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people, mostly children such as Evan Anzoo, a 5-year-old Sudanese boy with HIV who lost access to his life-saving medication.
Ernst, Rubio and other Republicans are the same people who feigned revulsion over imaginary Obamacare death panels.
Contact our Senators Scott and Moody and tell them to vote against the “big beautiful” budget bill to mitigate at least some of the harm that Trump has unleashed.