National Nurses United (NNU) and Defend Public Health (DPH) are joining together to condemn the nomination of Casey Means for U.S. surgeon general, saying her unscientific, anti-vaccine rhetoric poses a serious threat to public health. 

“Nurses believe everyone has the right to health, and we work tirelessly every day, in health care settings across this country, to care for our patients and advocate for their right to health,” said Nancy Hagans, RN and NNU president. “The surgeon general should provide information that helps our patients, but Casey Means does the opposite: She promotes unscientific, anti-vaccine viewpoints that endanger public health.”  
 
“Confirming Casey Means as surgeon general means doubling down on the lethal public health malpractice we’ve been seeing all year from Robert F. Kennedy Jr.,” said virologist James Alwine, a member of the Defend Public Health coordinating committee. "The Senate needs to stand up and demand a surgeon general who respects science and cares about facts."

Means has touted unscientific viewpoints, including promoting raw milk consumption as superior over pasteurized products and spreading false claims about supposed dangers of vaccines. Giving her the platform of the surgeon general role will only harm public health. The surgeon general should provide Americans with the best scientific information on how to improve their health and oversees the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, which is vital to emergency and disaster response, such as infectious disease outbreaks. 

Means specifically promotes deregulation of food safety rules and other proven, science-based health protections, which have saved millions of lives since they were established, in addition to repeatedly disparaging childhood vaccination schedules. She has described public health protections as “being imprisoned by overburdensome regulation” and purports that less regulation will enhance public health—a cover for corporate privatization and profiteering. 

The current administration has already ravaged public health by cutting significant staff and funding for public health agencies and programs, with drastic impacts on people’s health. Researchers estimate that at least 90,000 adults and 188,000 children in the U.S. and around the world have died because of these cuts, with millions more deaths predicted over the coming years. Confirming Casey Means as U.S. surgeon general will only endanger more lives.

As the largest labor union and professional association for registered nurses in the United States, NNU fights for health justice and science-based protections for patients and health care workers. As a network of public health researchers, health care workers, advocates, and allies, DPH fights to protect the health of all from the current administration’s attacks on proven, science-based public health policies. 

National Nurses United is the largest and fastest-growing union and professional association of registered nurses in the United States with more than 225,000 members nationwide. NNU affiliates include California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee, DC Nurses Association, Michigan Nurses Association, Minnesota Nurses Association, and New York State Nurses Association.