RFK Jr.'s Wi-Fi and 5G conspiracies appear to make it into MAHA report draft

https://arstechnica.com/health/2025/08/maha-draft-takes-on-electromagnetic-radiation-echoing-rfk-jr-s-conspiracies/

by duxup • 11 months ago

68 23 11 months ago

arstechnica.com

coin• 11 months ago

I wonder if smart meters are included. There’s a conspiracy theory around the RF emitted by smart meters.

mikestew• 11 months ago

They have 5G radios in them, IIRC. Of course there's crackpot theories about the RF.

(In fact, I'm pretty sure the reason I know that smart meters use 5G is because of the crackpot theories about "smart meters use 5G, and we all know what that does!!11One!".

jmclnx• 11 months ago

For instance, it includes no proposed restrictions

All this does for me is shows these people are in only for the kickbacks.

Outside of ignoring the constitution (ICE), giving/continuing a tax break worth billions to the top 1% and eliminating science nothing that will help the US in the future has been done.

If this is not stopped, all the US will have left is a weapon building industry. Remember, drug research, a huge growing industry that the US leads has just be killed by RFK jr.

amanaplanacanal• 11 months ago

Hopefully the upcoming midterm elections will allow some sanity to return.

Sniffnoy• 11 months ago

I know this isn't the point, but it really bugs me to see "conspiracy" used to mean "conspiracy theory" in this way. (And this is less of a proper conspiracy theory and more just a crackpot theory, tbh.)

jfengel• 11 months ago

Conspiracy theories and crackpot theories overlap a lot. A lot of crackpot theories include a conspiracy component: not only is my crackpot theory true, but also there is a conspiracy to suppress it.

The conspiracy theory element is a heuristic for evaluating the crackpot theory: setting aside the particulars of the theory, does it also require an utterly enormous, vastly powerful group to keep that secret (but not quite powerful enough to keep you from having discovered the truth)?

That's a heuristic, not a proof. But it does give you a hint about which notions are worth your time to investigate further.

hagbard_c2• 11 months ago

Is there any danger to WiFi, 5G and other similar technologies? I have not yet seen any definite proof or disproof of that but that does not mean these are 'conspiracy theories' nor that everyone who asks these questions are 'crackpots'.

The lab leak origin of the SARS2 unpleasantness was called a 'conspiracy theory' and those who supported it were called 'crackpots' and 'science deniers'.

Those who voiced doubt on the efficacy and safety of the mRNA therapies pushed for the same were called 'crackpots' and 'science deniers' by the same crowd.

The same was true for those who were open to other treatments for the disease, things like Ivermectin and the like.

It has taken many years and the jury is still out on the efficacy of many 'alternative therapies' but by now it is clear that the virus did escape from the very same lab pointed out by all those 'conspiracy theorists' and 'science deniers', that the mRNA therapies lacked efficacy and that the lack of a targeting mechanism for delivering mRNA to the right locations - in this case mucous membranes - while keeping it away from organs which stood to be harmed if the mRNA were to be delivered there - ovaries, testes, heart muscles and more - radically changed the risk profile for delivering these agents to younger people who were unlikely to be harmed by the virus but were (and are) at risk of harm from those same agents.

And what happened to the reputations of those who labelled these dissenters 'conspiracy theorists' and 'crackpots'? Nothing happened, they just moved to whatever cause the current desired narrative dictates - we've always been at war with Eurasia after all?

It is remarkable how risk-free it is to label people 'conspiracy theorists' or any of the other epithets bandied around by the chattering classes. Where in the pas nobody ever got fired for choosing $brand nowadays it seems to be that nobody ever gets fired for labelling those who do not follow the narrative 'conspiracy theorist' or 'crackpot' or 'racist' or '${identity_group}phobe'.

1970-01-012• 11 months ago

Read the draft. Overall, it's a decent take on the situation. Yes, they have included anti-vax and other stupid ideas, which should be ignored for the majority, but the overall take is still accurate enough to execute and provide a benefit. It seems as if they are putting out a strategy and have been forced to include the duck. Just get rid of the duck and it's good.

https://blog.codinghorror.com/new-programming-jargon/

happytoexplain2• 11 months ago

Are you just using the metaphor loosely, or are you actually suggesting that they explicitly do not believe in the duck and are counting on others to ask for it to be removed to reduce scrutiny on the parts they do believe in?

1970-01-012• 11 months ago

I'm using it tightly and rightly. Keep the bits about clean water, clean air, microplastic pollution, screentime, drug commercials, etc.

Have your doctor selectively ignore the anti-vax and non-ionizing EM radiation ducks.

genman• 11 months ago

Or, they are just this stupid.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_razor

wasabi9910112• 11 months ago

I'd say it's more of a mixed bag.

There's some good (microbiome research, cracking down on influencers advertising drugs), some bad (anti-fluoride, autism scare, vaccine scare, EM radiation scare), some I can't evaluate (usefulness of non-animal models, usefulness of AI in cancer research and in diagnostic medicine), and some that depend heavily on implementation (prescription impact on mental health, building a general data platform, changing nutrition labelling).

It's certainly doesn't seem like a dismantling of the agency nor an attempt at corruption.

However, RFK Jr. and the rest of this administration has a lot of baggage, I heavily disagree with the idea that the bad ideas here are just a distraction duck.

goyagoji• 11 months ago

Their mixing their scams into everything is worse than if they stuck entirely to their scams. No one will believe future research in an area they bring up hasn't been tainted by their reality distortion field. China will have more credible medicine than the US since the Chinese party isn't that interested in pushing a lot of quack theories to the math and science illiterate as a way to gain and maintain political power.

DemocracyFTW2• 11 months ago

Notably, the report does not mention the leading causes of death for American children, which are firearms and motor vehicle accidents. Cancer, another top killer, is only mentioned in the context of pushing new AI technologies at the National Institutes of Health. Poisonings, another top killer, are also not mentioned explicitly.

These people don't care for you. You are just Menschenmaterial to them, something to be be used, abused, exploited, then discarded.

pyman• 11 months ago

the report does not mention the leading causes of death for American children, which are firearms and motor vehicle accidents.

I'm honestly tired of seeing all these AI wannabes bragging on Twitter and LinkedIn about how they've built a tool that does "10x better" than something else, and how they only hire people willing to work 80 hours a week, with no life and no need for money. They're trying to normalise tech sweatshops because their VCs told them that being a psychopath is the fastest way to get a return on investment. These founders are so driven and so dumb that I have more respect for flat-earth conspiracy theorists than for this new wave of brainless, heartless founders.

And I don't buy into their Mother Theresa's story either, that they'll exploit people for decades, cash out billions, and then magically turn into philanthropists to fix all the harm they caused.

This is the time to use technology to solve real problems. That's the mission, that's why we're here. The leading causes of death for American children are firearms and motor vehicle accidents. The Volvo engineer who invented the seatbelt is a hero because he saved millions of lives.

We need to stop these shallow founders from destroying the reputation of our industry.

(Sorry for the rant)

hypefi• 11 months ago

It's a matter of time before physicists and biologists crack the complex interaction between EMFs in the range of 4G/wifi and the human biology, the old idea around ionizing and non-ionizing radiation explanation is no longer enough to explain why a lot of people complain about symptoms, quantum physics and quantum biology research will open up new doors of understanding.

klohto• 11 months ago

Electromagnetic Radiation: HHS in partnership with other Departments and federal agencies will undertake a study on electromagnetic radiation and health research to identify gaps in knowledge, including on new technologies to ensure safety and efficacy.

This is absolutely fine by me. There is nothing hyperbolic about the statement and it's quite literally just a research request. How did it got turned into this headline?

RFK Jr.'s Wi-Fi and 5G conspiracies appear to make it into MAHA report draft

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