President Trump nominated Dr. Erica Schwartz to be the next CDC Director.
According to the Persident, “I am pleased to announce the new leadership of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). It is my Honor to nominate the incredibly talented Dr. Erica Schwartz, MD, JD, MPH, as my Director of the CDC. Erica graduated from Brown University for College and Medical School, and served a distinguished career as a Doctor of Medicine in the United States Military, the Greatest and Most Powerful Force in the World, and then served as my Deputy Surgeon General during my First Term. She is a STAR! I am also pleased to announce the appointment of Sean Slovenski as the CDC Deputy Director and Chief Operating Officer, Dr. Jennifer Shuford, MD, MPH, as the CDC Deputy Director and Chief Medical Officer, and Dr. Sara Brenner, MD, MPH, as Senior Counselor for Public Health to Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.”
Commenting on the nomination, Secretary Kennedy said, “Thank you, President Trump, for nominating Dr. Erica Schwartz to serve as CDC Director. I congratulate Dr. Schwartz and the new CDC leadership team. I look forward to working together to restore trust, accountability, and scientific integrity at the CDCso we can return it to its core mission and Make America Healthy Again.”
Secretary Kennedy testified before the House Ways and Means Committee. During the marathon hearing, the HHS Secretary defended budget cuts, stating that HHS and particularly, CDC were running bloated budgets which empowered bureaucracy at the expense of prioritizing the fight against chronic disease.
Addressing the Ways and Means Committee, the HHS Secretary noted: “For too long, the agencies meant to protect us have become the marketing arms of the industries they are supposed to regulate. We are going to turn the lights back on and restore the gold standard of science at the CDC and FDA.”
Kennedy argued that the current $4 trillion healthcare industry is incentivized to maintain a sick population rather than a healthy one. He suggested that a reprioritized budget—one emphasizing prevention, nutrition, and transparency—serves public health goals far better than a bloated budget that has presided over declining public health. He also said that these goals are nonpartisan and serve the interests of all Americans.
Regarding foster care reform, the HHS Secretary criticized the Biden administration for anti-Christian bias, saying, “They [the Biden administration] excluded an entire class of people because of their religious beliefs. They told states to pass laws refusing families with certain (mainly Christian) beliefs the right to care for children.”
HHS released the following statement about President Trump’s proposed “Great Healthcare Plan.” According to HHS, “The Great Healthcare Plan funds a cost-sharing program for health care plans that would save taxpayers around $36 billion and reduce the most common Obamacare plan premiums by over 10%, according to the Congressional Budget Office.”
FDA Commissioner Dr. Marty Makary and HHS Assistant Secretary Admiral Brian Christine made a statement about new treatments for men with low testosterone. According to Admiral Christine, “For years, men dealing with low testosterone without a specific known cause—and that’s a condition called idiopathic hypogonadism—have had limited options for treating symptoms like low libido. And that’s because FDA-approved testosterone therapy products have been restricted to a really small subset of men with low T.”
Dr. Makary added, “Today, the FDA is taking a strong step to make treatment options more accessible to men with symptomatic low T. We're encouraging companies currently approved with TRT products to contact the FDA about expanding their product labels to include this broader set of men with low T and symptoms.”
he FDA also announced that in Dr. Makary’s first year leading the agency, approvals for new treatments were exponentially higher than under his recent predecessors.
HHS announced the “2026 KidneyX EMPOWER Prize Challenge, a $4 million national competition to accelerate innovation supporting living kidney donors and patients who depend on them.” In an official statement, HHS added, “To further enhance nephrology care, HHS will also support data standardization and health information technology improvements across the kidney care ecosystem. The challenge will be run through the Kidney Innovation Accelerator (KidneyX).”