The Trump administration released a detailed report on Thursday that highlights a serious and growing public health crisis affecting American children. The 72-page document, titled “The MAHA Report: Make Our Children Healthy Again,” describes a sharp rise in chronic diseases such as obesity, asthma, autoimmune conditions, and behavioral disorders among children.
The report comes from the MAHA Commission, which President Trump created through an executive order on February 13. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. leads the commission. Other members include top officials from the Departments of Agriculture and Education, as well as the Environmental Protection Agency. The commission held private meetings over the past several months.
Speaking at a White House event on Thursday, President Trump said, “There is something wrong, and we will not stop until we defeat the chronic disease epidemic,” standing beside Secretary Kennedy and other commission members.
The report identifies four main causes behind the rise in chronic disease among children: unhealthy diets, exposure to environmental chemicals, chronic stress and physical inactivity, and excessive medical treatment. It blames corporate influence and conflicts of interest in the food, chemical, and pharmaceutical industries for making these problems worse.
The report sets the stage for the MAHA Commission to propose a national strategy to address these health issues. The executive order states that a formal plan should be ready by mid-August.
Experts in public health say the idea that diet, pollution, and lifestyle are harming children is not new. Dr. James Perrin, a pediatrics professor at Harvard Medical School, said, “Many of us have been calling for attention to these issues for decades. This is a real American problem. Other countries are not seeing this to the same degree.”
However, critics say the report falls short when it comes to solutions. Dr. Philip Landrigan, a professor at Boston College, said, “They make a great diagnosis, but they have a very weak treatment plan.”
One major concern is that the report fails to fully address poverty, a key factor in children’s health. Dr. Carmen Marsit, an environmental health professor at Emory University, said the report notes that ultra-processed foods are cheaper but does not explain how rising poverty and income inequality are pushing more families to rely on unhealthy food.
The report also questions vaccine safety and suggests that links between vaccines and chronic disease have not been studied enough. Dr. Landrigan disagrees. “That is simply not true. There have been abundant studies,” he said.
Some critics point out that the administration’s actions conflict with the report’s message. For example, the report warns that toxic chemicals harm children’s health — an issue Dr. Sheela Sathyanarayana of the University of Washington says needs urgent attention. But at the same time, the Trump administration is cutting staff at key agencies and has closed a division at the EPA that focused on chemical safety.
“We need to move into a prevention model,” Sathyanarayana said. “But some of their actions actually undermine prevention.”
Secretary Kennedy has led efforts to reduce staff at the Department of Health and Human Services, cut funding at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and cancel billions of dollars in grants from the National Institutes of Health. These cuts threaten the same research and data the report depends on.
Dr. William Dietz, a childhood obesity expert at George Washington University, said the report is right to focus on the dangers of ultra-processed food. But he warned that the report oversimplifies the issue, since not all processed foods are equally harmful. He also fears that cuts to the CDC could make it harder to track progress in fighting childhood obesity.
“I’m really concerned the scalpel that’s been taken to CDC in general threatens the ability to monitor health. We need that data to measure progress,” he said.
Near the end, the report outlines several possible solutions. These include asking the NIH to fund new research on whole-food diets and harmful food ingredients, urging the FDA to improve monitoring of drugs used by children, supporting new drug safety studies, and launching a national lifestyle medicine program.
But it remains unclear how these efforts will be funded or staffed.
Dr. Lauren Wisk of UCLA, who studies chronic illness in children, said the disease statistics in the report seem accurate. Still, she worries that Kennedy’s focus on simple fixes — like banning food dyes — avoids more difficult but necessary changes.
“This administration hasn’t shown much interest in social policies that address the real roots of pediatric disease,” she said. “They go after flashy targets, but if they want real results, they need broader, more effective strategies.”
