Optimum’s hot topic: RFK Jr. and Vivek Ramaswamy in the “huddle” as Trump decides on health secretary

By Richard Staines, Optimum Strategic Communications

The re-election of Donald Trump as President of the Unites States represents a seismic shift in the U.S. political system, with huge ramifications for all policy areas including healthcare. 

But, at the time of writing, the identity of the next Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services has not been revealed. 

Trump suggested during his re-election campaign that vaccine conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. would be given a “big role” on health policy that will allow him to “go wild”. 

While the announcement typifies Trump’s campaign style, he made the announcement knowing that there’s enough awareness about Kennedy and his views for the public to build a picture of what may happen in health policy after 20th January 2025. 

Kennedy has been in the “huddle” with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago resort as he decides who will be taking leading roles in his administration, indicating he may be influencing the thinking of the President-elect. 

More recently, a report cited a source in Trump’s transition team that Kennedy will not get the top health job, but it may show the direction of travel. 

Another key figure in healthcare seen at Mar-a-Lago is Vivek Ramaswamy, the serial biotech founder who initially competed against Trump to get the Republican nomination. 

Ramaswamy dropped out in late 2023 after finishing fourth in the Iowa Caucasus – the first round of the Republican nomination process – but it’s intriguing to see a key biotech figure still so closely involved. 

So far, Trump’s pronouncements on healthcare have involved replacing Obamacare – described as “lousy health care” in one speech. People close to his campaign have also mentioned a possible return to Trump’s “Most Favored Nation” policy, where drug prices are cut to the level in comparable developed countries. 

This would replace measures in Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act that allow Medicare to negotiate prices on the top selling drugs in the U.S. 

One thing is clear: with Trump’s hatred of all policies associated with previous Democratic administrations, healthcare in the U.S. could look very different in four years’ time.