Kennedy Says AI Gives Better Medical Advice Than Any U.S. Doctor at MAHA Summit
Updated
Updated · The New York Times · Sep 29
Kennedy Says AI Gives Better Medical Advice Than Any U.S. Doctor at MAHA Summit
3 articles · Updated · The New York Times · Sep 29
Summary
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told a Tuesday MAHA summit that AI can give patients a second opinion “much better informed than any doctor in the country” and help free them from “medical tyranny.”
Kennedy tied that claim to distrust of medical authorities, saying AI could challenge expert guidance on masks, social distancing and vaccines rather than asking the public to “trust the experts.”
Sam Altman, Kennedy said, recently told him it would be “malpractice” for doctors to diagnose or prescribe without checking AI, a view Kennedy appeared to endorse.
The remarks came at an industry-backed conference sponsored by companies with business before HHS, including AI firms Anthropic and OpenAI, as the Trump administration faces pressure to tighten AI oversight.
Earlier the same day, Kennedy had outlined a broader AI-driven health agenda using FDA, CDC and CMS data to study chronic disease, underscoring how central the technology has become to his HHS plans.
Can wider access to federal vaccine data improve transparency without turning complex safety research into misleading vaccinated-versus-unvaccinated comparisons?
Will linking Medicare, Medicaid, EHRs, and AI unlock chronic-disease answers—or create a new privacy crisis for millions of Americans?