The overhaul by Health Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr of an influential federal advisory group has stalled an update that would have highlighted “encouraging” new evidence on helping children quit tobacco, according to a recently departed member of the group.
Meetings postponed for over a year
The Trump administration has postponed or canceled all meetings of the US Preventive Services Taskforce since March 2025, effectively preventing members from issuing binding recommendations for more than a year. As a result, 14 topics under consideration have been stalled – including cervical cancer screening, perinatal depression, and autism screening.
The taskforce was created by the Reagan administration; the Affordable Care Act tied its recommendations to insurance coverage for preventive services.
New evidence on youth tobacco cessation
“There was a lot of new, very encouraging evidence on tobacco cessation for kids,” said Dr Michael Silverstein, who served on the taskforce from 2016 to March 2025. “We’re talking about children and tobacco – I can’t imagine there’s anything controversial about that.”
As the taskforce was prevented from voting as a group, it is unclear what its recommendation on the new evidence would have been.
Kennedy’s actions and criticism
Kennedy also fired two taskforce leaders in May and called members “lackadaisical and negligent for 20 years” at a congressional hearing in April.
Emily Hilliard, senior press secretary for HHS, said in a statement: “Due to an unprecedented number of nominations received for Task Force membership, the forecasted July US Preventive Services Task Force meeting has been postponed until late August to allow additional time for selection and onboarding of new task force members.”
Previous recommendations and delays
The taskforce last considered childhood tobacco cessation in 2020, making formal recommendations for preventing children from taking up smoking but finding insufficient research to recommend cessation. The topic was revisited in 2025 with hopes of publishing an updated recommendation. Silverstein said the issue moved through subcommittees but without formal meetings, a draft recommendation was never reached.
Since Trump took office for a second term, the administration has dismantled several anti-smoking health programs. The CDC’s office on smoking and health has been shut down for over a year, and the “Tips from Former Smokers” ad campaign went off the air last year. The FDA’s lead tobacco regulator was removed in April 2025.
Dr Marty Makary, a former Trump FDA commissioner, resigned in protest against a new FDA policy allowing sale of flavored vapes by tobacco companies. The policy decision came shortly after a Reynolds American subsidiary donated $5m to a Trump-backed Super Pac, according to the New York Times.
Broader implications
Silverstein said the taskforce’s inability to meet has also delayed recommendations on perinatal depression and cervical cancer screening, issues with “very, very important public health implications.”
The changes come after the Supreme Court clarified in 2025 that Kennedy has the power to appoint and fire members of the taskforce. The court case stemmed from a taskforce recommendation requiring insurance to pay for PrEP. Hard-right medical organizations argued PrEP was a medication “for risky lifestyles.”
Outside groups expressed concern. Dr Aaron E Carroll, president of AcademyHealth, said: “Republican and Democratic administrations, including the previous Trump administration, were not like this. The fact we can’t get answers to the most basic of questions after a full year is staggering.”
Kennedy has made few statements about his priorities. In April, he called for more screening for Alzheimer’s. Hilliard did not respond to a question about the secretary’s priorities. In that vacuum, some test and device makers have begun lobbying, according to Politico. Guardant Health, which makes a blood test for colorectal cancer, spent $241,000 in the first three months of 2026 lobbying AHRQ and launched a public petition urging Kennedy to update guidelines on colon cancer screening blood tests.
“It’s somewhat humorous, but also sad, that we have to keep guessing what is going on in our government instead of actually knowing,” said Carroll.
