“We’ve progressively built a disease system,” Dr. Robert Redfield, former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said at a recent panel discussion in Washington, D.C. “We need to flip the switch and have it a health system so that we pay for wellness.”
America is confronting a growing health crisis. Chronic diseases affect more than half the population, and public trust in health institutions is low. Rising health care costs and system inefficiencies have compounded the challenges for families.
On Dec. 18, Redfield joined other health and policy experts to propose strategies for tackling these issues and restoring public confidence.
Hosted by The Heritage Foundation, the “Restoring American Wellness: How Can Policy Help Make America Healthy Again?” event brought together health leaders, including Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) and nutrition expert Nina Teicholz. The panel proposed reforms centered on revising dietary guidelines, improving transparency in public health institutions, and enhancing accountability measures.
Top 5 Ways to Restore American Health
At the core of the discussion were five critical areas identified by panelists as requiring urgent reforms to address the chronic disease epidemic and rebuild trust in America’s health systems.
The event explored health reform, with sessions focusing on policy issues and patient empowerment, which offered insights into what it will take to restore wellness in America, summarized through five key themes.
Restore Trust in Public Health
The panel began by addressing one of the most pressing issues: the erosion of trust in public health institutions. The panel participants pointed to missteps during the COVID-19 pandemic as significant factors contributing to this decline, emphasizing a lack of transparency and accountability.
Johnson called for greater transparency from federal health agencies, pointing to issues such as the expedited approval of mRNA vaccines and the delay in releasing Pfizer trial data. Johnson argued that such actions undermined public confidence.
These concerns have also been raised in court rulings. On Dec. 6, U.S. district judge Mark Pittman ordered the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to disclose additional records related to Pfizer’s vaccine authorization, stating there was no “legitimate reason for concealing” this information now that the pandemic had ended.
Broader trends illustrate a significant decline in trust in public health institutions. Only two in 10 Americans trust the federal government to do what is right most of the time, according to an April Pew Research survey.
Redfield argued that a lack of transparency damages public confidence in science itself. Suppressing diverse viewpoints during the pandemic only deepened skepticism, saying, “We’ve lost trust in science,” he noted.
Bring Back Evidence-Based Science
Building on the theme of trust, the panel stressed the need to restore evidence-based science as the foundation of public health policy. They pointed to the pandemic as a time when key scientific principles were often disregarded. Dr. Martin Kulldorff, a Harvard epidemiologist, described policies like school closures and lockdowns as lacking rigorous scientific backing and open debate.
Redfield emphasized that openness in the scientific process and the inclusion of diverse perspectives are essential to rebuilding trust.
Johnson linked these challenges to deeper systemic issues in research funding, arguing that public health agencies have been unduly influenced by corporate and political interests. He emphasized how public funding often intersects with private agendas, leading to predetermined outcomes. “When you pay for research, you get the result you want,” Johnson said, pointing to Big Pharma’s control over expensive placebo trials, which positions them as gatekeepers of medical research.
“What we need to do is to get back to evidence-based medicine and the basic principles of public health,” Kulldorff said.
Revitalize America’s Diet
Shifting the focus to nutrition, the panel identified outdated dietary guidelines as a significant driver of America’s chronic disease crisis. Despite decades of official advice to reduce saturated fats and cholesterol, the prevalence of obesity and diabetes has continued to rise. A 2015 Open Heart study stated that the guidelines were not based on randomized controlled trials and lacked evidence to support claims of reducing heart disease or death. Panelists argued for a need to revise nutritional recommendations.
America has gone from a 1 to 3 percent obesity rate in the 1960s to upwards of 40 to 70 percent today, Redfield said, attributing the rise to controversial nutritional guidance.
Panelists also pointed to the role of food additives and highly processed ingredients in driving the obesity epidemic. Calley Means, author and health care advocate, criticized the widespread use of chemicals in food production, noting that substances like glyphosate, a common pesticide, can “kill every organism in sight” and disrupt the microbiome. He added that such chemicals, often banned in other countries, remain pervasive in American diets.
Teicholz traced the roots of these guidelines to the 1950s when the diet-heart hypothesis gained prominence. The hypothesis, which wrongly implicated saturated fats as a cause of heart disease, led to recommendations to cut saturated fats and replace them with vegetable oils and carbohydrates. By 1980, these recommendations were codified into federal dietary guidelines, shaping public health campaigns and school lunch programs. Teicholz argued that the shift away from nutrient-dense foods like meat and dairy contributed to the rise in obesity and diabetes.
“We can reverse Type 2 diabetes” in more than 50 percent of cases in as little as 10 weeks—just by changing what people eat, she said, citing clinical trials.
Empower Patients and Doctors
A key message from the panel was the need to shift the health care system’s focus from managing symptoms to promoting wellness and addressing root causes of illness.
Means criticized the current system for prioritizing treatments that benefit pharmaceutical companies. Describing it as a “massive nanny state apparatus,” he noted that 95 percent of medical spending is funneled into top-down mandates for drugs rather than preventive or holistic care.
“Prescription pads should be the last thing we use,” said Dr. Tammy Born Huizenga, an integrative health physician, noting that while medications are necessary in some cases to stabilize patients, identifying and addressing underlying health issues can lead to long-term solutions that reduce dependence on pharmaceuticals.
Both speakers highlighted the importance of patient education and informed consent. Huizenga said that helping patients understand their treatment options through accurate, evidence-based information empowers them to make choices that improve long-term health outcomes.
Make Health A Shared Bi-Partisan Goal
The panel concluded that health reform provides an opportunity to transcend political divisions. Johnson cited the collaboration between President-elect Donald Trump and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as a model of bipartisan cooperation and a way to “heal and unify a nation.”
Redfield stressed the importance of shifting priorities from treating disease to maintaining wellness. “We pay for illness,” he said. “Everything’s there for as long as you’re sick.” He advocated for an approach that incentivizes keeping people healthy.
The panel urged transparency and open dialogue to address chronic illness, with Johnson stating, “Let’s figure out what’s causing chronic illness. Let’s stop destroying people for just asking the question.”
By framing health care as a bipartisan issue, the panel said, the nation has an opportunity to rebuild trust in its institutions and foster unity.