en.Wedoany.com Reported - U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is pushing the federal government to obtain the medical records of most Americans to study the link between vaccines and autism. The medical community has conducted decades of research on this topic and denies any association.
According to KFF Health News, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is seeking data from a state-level system known as health information exchanges, which allow hospitals and clinics to exchange detailed, identifiable patient information. In private meetings, some public health leaders have opposed allowing Kennedy's team access to this data, questioning the legality of the move and suspecting the data may be of no practical use. They also expressed concerns about allowing the federal government to view details of Americans' medical records, potentially ranging from doctor's notes to prescription histories. HHS has not disclosed how it will protect or handle the personal health information obtained.
Kennedy stated that medical records are crucial for investigating the causes of autism, vaccine safety, and chronic disease issues. According to state records, millions of dollars in grant funding have been funneled to a nonprofit organization in Nebraska that has assisted Kennedy's efforts. Kennedy has expressed frustration over restrictions on federal access to Americans' medical records. In a May interview, he said the current health records system is broken, requiring contact with individual states to obtain data, and noted that databases available for research already exist.
HHS has not publicly announced any new projects involving medical records and research on autism or vaccines. Last year, Kennedy proposed compiling medical records of individuals with autism to create a federal disease registry, though health department officials later denied that such a plan was underway. However, Kennedy stated in May that a comprehensive set of research plans would be completed within the next year.
Although the White House has guided Kennedy to avoid further changes to U.S. vaccine policy ahead of the critical midterm elections in November, President Donald Trump often echoes Kennedy's doubts about vaccine safety and signed an executive order last week calling for a reduction in the number of vaccines recommended for children. Kennedy's political appointees and allies, including his senior advisor William "Reyn" Archer III, have led the push for the health department to collect and examine medical records.
According to seven individuals involved in the discussions, federal officials have met multiple times over the past year with leaders of state health information exchanges to inquire how the personal medical records they maintain could be used for vaccine research. Craig Behm, director of the Maryland Health Information Exchange, said Kennedy's team asked how these medical records could be used to study vaccines. Behm declined to share more data for vaccine research, stating that broad approval from hospitals, state political leaders, and research committees would be required.
In June of last year, Behm and other state exchange directors met with Kennedy's senior advisors to discuss sharing more medical data. Subsequently, in October, these state organizations proposed a new monitoring system that would provide the federal health department with "real-time, 24-hour data streams on opioid and chronic disease trends" over the next year, with a goal of enabling HHS to access medical records for 90% of the population by 2028. John Kansky, CEO of the Indiana Health Information Exchange, said the organization is still weighing whether to participate in the project.
Nearly every state has at least one health information exchange, typically regulated by state law and operated by private companies or nonprofit organizations. These systems allow hospitals and health systems to share patient medical records in real time. Health officials noted that using them for broader public health purposes could raise complex privacy, legal, and ethical issues. Emily Hilliard, an HHS spokesperson, did not respond to questions about the number of states participating in the project, new data types, project funding, patient privacy protections, or data access permissions.
Jaime Bland, former CEO of CyncHealth, Nebraska's health information exchange, said several states are seeking to provide more data to Kennedy's team. According to a presentation during the October meeting, Bland was one of the team members who proposed CyncHealth launch the project. The proposal indicated that the federal government would pay exchanges $3 per person per year. After the meeting, the Nebraska health department received a $18.7 million grant from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the highest amount of any state that year. Subsequently, CyncHealth received three contracts totaling $13.6 million from the state. A CyncHealth spokesperson said $2.4 million of that was for Kennedy's project.
Bland left CyncHealth in December, with an annual salary of nearly $420,000. She was appointed in April as the chief data strategist for the MAHA Institute, founded by Kennedy and Trump allies. Bland believes that data from state health information exchanges could provide greater insight into the causes of autism or vaccine injuries.
Former senior CDC official Daniel Jernigan said he attempted to provide Kennedy with de-identified databases, but Kennedy appeared uninterested. In July of last year, Kennedy sent two senior advisors to download millions of identifiable patient records from the CDC's Vaccine Safety Datalink system, though these records were decades old. Jernigan noted limitations in using only electronic health record data, as it can only capture what is recorded during medical visits and cannot provide satisfactory answers to questions about the link between vaccines and autism.
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