HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s office abruptly called off a meeting of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) scheduled for Thursday, as many healthcare experts are concerned about potential political interference that could sideline independent experts.
The Immediate Office of the HHS Secretary sent an email to USPSTF meeting participants on Monday stating that the July 10 meeting was postponed, according to a source familiar with the USPSTF meetings. In the email, HHS noted that it looks forward to engaging with the Task Force to promote the health and well-being of the American people.
The email did not provide a rescheduled date for the meeting.
A HHS spokesperson confirmed that USPSTF will not be meeting on July 10 but did not provide a reason.
The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force is made up of 16 volunteer members who are nationally recognized experts in prevention, evidence-based medicine, and primary care. Task Force members, appointed by the Secretary of HHS, serve staggered four-year terms to ensure all 16 members are not appointed by the same presidential administration.
Members are screened to ensure that they have no substantial conflicts of interest, according to the task force's website.
The USPSTF was established in 1984 to make recommendations to general practice physicians and public health bodies on preventive care. Federal policymakers rely on the USPSTF recommendations, including the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
And, insurers must provide cost-free coverage for preventive services that have been recommended by the USPSTF, such as lung and colorectal cancer screenings, behavioral counseling, prevention of maternal depression, childhood vision screenings and adult diabetes screenings.
The Task Force meets remotely on a weekly basis and meets in person three times per year.
The USPSTF was slated to discuss healthy diet, physical activity and other approaches to prevent cardiovascular disease at the July 10 meeting, according to the source.
The Supreme Court last month upheld the key preventive services task force in a 6-3 ruling. The decision, Kennedy v. Braidwood, preserved the Affordable Care Act's preventive coverage mandate and also determined that members of the USPSTF are selected within the bounds of the Constitution.
In that case, both the Biden and Trump administrations argued that the task force was properly set up and its recommendations should be upheld because the HHS Secretary was able to name and fire its members.
Healthcare organizations are now concerned that the Task Force will be drastically revamped just as RFK Jr. did with the CDC's federal vaccine panel. Last month, Kennedy dismissed all 17 members of the CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices and replaced them with a group of eight advisors, including one who has already stepped down and others who have expressed their anti-vaccine views.
More than 100 healthcare organizations penned a letter (PDF) to key Congressional leaders Wednesday urging them to "protect the integrity of the United States Preventive Services Task Force."
"In the wake of the ruling in Kennedy v. Braidwood, which verified the constitutionality of the USPSTF and reemphasized the authority that has always existed for the Secretary of HHS to appoint and remove Task Force members at will, it is critical that Congress protects the integrity of the USPSTF from intentional or unintentional political interference," the 104 healthcare organizations wrote. "The loss of trustworthiness in the rigorous and nonpartisan work of the Task Force would devastate patients, hospital systems, and payers as misinformation creates barriers to accessing lifesaving and cost-effective care."
An article published today in The American Conservative urged Kennedy to dismantle the preventive services advisory panel. The article accused the USPSTF of using its authority to "launder left-wing ideological orthodoxy into its preventive care recommendations."
"USPSTF has operated for decades under both Democratic and Republican administrations as a trusted source of science-based guidance. But what we're seeing right now mirrors actions that have been taken elsewhere," said Aaron Carroll, M.D., the CEO of AcademyHealth, one of the organizations that signed the letter. "For instance, with ACIP; meetings canceled, potentially independent experts sidelined, and then decisions potentially shaped by ideology instead of evidence. It becomes a partisan issue as opposed to a strictly scientific or data-based issue, and it's a threat to the credibility of the entire healthcare system."
"Protecting the USPSTF is essential to maintaining public trust in its guidance," Carroll told Fierce Healthcare in an interview. "This protection ensures continued access to cost-free life-saving preventive services for patients, and unfortunately, political interference, as we've seen in the last few weeks or months, and as we may see again, could undermine the task force's vital role in improving health outcomes nationwide."
Making drastic changes to USPSTF or dismissing its members "sends a chilling message" to the healthcare industry, he said.
"It threatens not just healthcare coverage, but the role of science itself and policy making. The USPSTF is one of the clearest examples of how evidence can improve health. It's a model respected not only in the United States, but across the world, of what it looks like when science directly informs care. Its recommendations are based on rigorous systematic reviews of literature," he said.
The USPSTF has a transparent, rigorous and scientifically independent process that must be maintained, Carroll stressed.
"If all the members are appointed by one administration, if they're appointed in a less transparent, less rigorous way, if they abandon the strict methodology that has been used for decades, there's going to be a loss of public trust," he said.
"There are so few institutions and organizations left that have been able to maintain broad-based, both-sides-of-the-aisle public trust. The USPSTF is one of them. It is completely accountable. It is completely transparent. They define both their methodology and their outcomes, and that is why patients can trust it, clinicians can trust it, and policymakers can trust it. Interfering with it could have catastrophic consequences," he said.
In the letter to Congressional leaders, the healthcare organizations outlined certain structures of the USPSTF that must remain intact to maintain objectivity.
Members must have limited four-year terms to ensure that the panel evolves alongside scientific developments and staggered membership rotation to provide continuity and institutional knowledge, the groups said. Membership should consist of experienced primary care clinicians from institutions across the United States, ensuring both relevant expertise and broad geographic representation.
Members must volunteer their service to eliminate financial incentives and reinforce independence, the organizations said.
The USPSTF must maintain rigorous conflict-of-interest vetting for all candidates, who are reviewed by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, both before appointment and as each new topic review begins, the groups said. And there should be input from the scientific and public health sectors into the appointments.