Do No Harm
Image: Adobe Stock By Alernon77
When Public Health Becomes Political Theater
There is an oath at the foundation of medicine: First, do no harm.
It is simple. It is ancient. It is nonpartisan.
And it should guide every public health decision made in Washington.
Recent actions by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., questioning or recalibrating longstanding childhood vaccine recommendations, have ignited a national debate. The debate itself is not dangerous. In fact, a free society depends on scrutiny. But scrutiny must be disciplined by evidence.
When federal health leadership signals doubt about established vaccine schedules without overwhelming, peer-reviewed, consensus-driven medical justification, the consequences extend far beyond politics.
Public health is not performative art. It is not ideological branding. It is a system of trust.
The Independent Position: Leave Us Alone Until You Must Lead
Independents tend to share two instincts that can seem contradictory but are actually deeply consistent:
1. The government should leave us alone whenever possible.
2. The government has a legitimate and necessary role when collective risk is involved.
Public health is one of those areas where collective risk is undeniable.
Pandemics, COVID-19 reminds us, do not respect personal preference.
Infectious disease does not honor political identity.
There is a clear constitutional and historical precedent for limited but real public health authority when protecting the population from communicable disease. The role of government is not to micromanage daily life, but it is to provide stable, evidence-based guardrails when individual choices create community-wide risk.
That is not authoritarianism. That is public order.
Vaccines and the Architecture of Stability
Vaccines represent something larger than individual medical decisions. They represent institutional predictability.
For decades, routine childhood immunization schedules have been built on:
Long-term clinical trials.
Ongoing safety monitoring.
Global replication.
Advisory panels of epidemiologists and pediatric specialists.
The dramatic decline in measles, the near eradication of polio in the United States, and the reduction of childhood mortality from preventable diseases are not ideological outcomes. They are measurable, evidence-based public health achievements.
Independents understand something fundamental: You can dislike bureaucratic overreach and still recognize when a stable public health system works.
The question is not whether government should exist in this space. The question is whether it is acting with evidence or misguided emotion.
The Problem with Political Theater
What frustrates many independents is not policy review. It is tone and method.
When vaccine recommendations are reframed through the language of grievance or distrust of institutions, rather than transparent, peer-reviewed scientific reassessment, it feels less like careful governance and more like spectacle. And spectacle destabilizes.
Parents become uncertain. Schools become inconsistent. Doctors become defensive rather than directive.
Consequently, public trust erodes quietly, and rebuilding it takes years.
This Is Not About Mocking Citizens
Some Americans are skeptical of vaccines. Some distrust federal agencies broadly. Some have absorbed misinformation. Some want more transparency.
Dismissing them is counterproductive. But validating skepticism without scientific rigor is worse.
Independents do not want Washington to inflame distrust. They want Washington to reduce it with facts.
If changes to vaccine schedules are medically warranted, then the pathway is straightforward:
Publish the complete scientific review.
Release comparative risk-benefit analyses.
Present longitudinal modeling.
Invite independent medical associations into the evaluation process.
Make the data transparent and replicable.
That is how governments operate.
Stability is the Goal
A stable middle class – a theme we return to often at Thomas – depends on predictable institutions.
Parents should not have to wonder whether vaccine guidance is grounded in peer-reviewed science or in political positioning.
Independents are practical.
We do not want the government inserting itself into every decision. But we also understand that preventing pandemics, managing communicable diseases, and coordinating national health responses are legitimate public functions.
That balance – limited but competent government – is the American tradition.
Do No Harm
Public health should not be weaponized in cultural battles. It should not be re-engineered for rhetorical disruption. It should not be destabilized for political differentiation.
If federal leadership wishes to question long-standing medical consensus, it carries the burden of proof – transparently and rigorously.
Because when it comes to children’s health, experimentation in messaging can become experimentation in consequences.
And the quietest principle in medicine remains the strongest one in governance: First, do no harm.
