Investors in pharmaceutical companies are selling their shares after Donald Trump killed anti-vaccine activist Robert F Kennedy Jr. has nominated to lead the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
RFK Jr has embraced numerous health-related conspiracy theories and is one of the most persistent and influential vaccine deniers in the US.
Trump’s announcement sent shares in some of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies — including Moderna, AstraZeneca and GSK — plunging Friday morning.
RFK Jr has said that vaccines are linked to autism in children, that HIV is not the cause of AIDS and that some antidepressants are linked to an increase in school shootings.
RFK Jr – and Trump – are considering a ban on fluoride in drinking water, while he has also called for a ban on hundreds of food additives and chemicals and wants to remove ultra-processed foods from school lunches as part of a plan to reduce diet-related chronic diseases. diseases.
In announcing his choice, Trump said the Department of Health would play a “major role in helping to ensure that everyone is protected from harmful chemicals, pollutants, pesticides, pharmaceuticals and food additives that have contributed to the overwhelming health crisis in this country.” country”.
The possible consequences of RFK Jr. the unit leads, caused panic among investors with shares in Moderna, which produces mRNA vaccines, falling 5% last night and down almost 2% so far on Friday.
BioNTech, the German drugmaker that helped develop a Covid vaccine with Pfizer, fell 7%. In London, AstraZeneca and GSK shares fell about 3%, making them among the biggest fallers on the FTSE 100.
Shares in the chemical company Croda, that makes ingredients for food products and vaccines fell 4% Friday morning. Germany’s Roche is down 2%, while Denmark’s Novo Nordisk – the company behind Wegovy and Ozempic, which also makes vaccines – is down 2.5%.
RFK Jr’s nomination has drawn widespread criticism, with California Democratic Rep. Robert Garcia calling it “damn insane.”
“He is a vaccine denier and a tinfoil conspiracy theorist,” Garcia said in a post on X. “He will destroy our public health infrastructure and our vaccine distribution systems. This is going to cost lives.”
RFK Jr has long led a nonprofit anti-vaccine group, Children’s Health Defense, and three years ago he appeared in a video campaign alongside a sticker that read: “If you’re not an anti-vaxxer, you’re not paying attention.”
He parted ways with the group when he announced he would run for president. In August, he suspended his US presidential bid and endorsed Trump.
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He has also advanced conspiracy theories, including that Covid-19 could have been “ethnically targeted” to spare Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese.
RFK Jr has claimed he is not against vaccines but wants them to be rigorously tested. However, he has also said that there is no vaccine that is safe and effective.
He said in a podcast in 2021: “I see someone on a hiking trail with a small baby in his arms and I say to him: better not let him or her be vaccinated.”
Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell, said Trump’s appointment of RFK Jr as head of HHS had “scared investors in the pharmaceutical sector”.
“The impact … is difficult to fully assess at this stage, but will at least create a lot of uncertainty,” he said.