HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. visits Tennessee, pledges drug‑price cuts, AI fraud fights and rural health funding

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. visited Tennessee and used a speech to outline a portfolio of federal policies he said would lower drug costs, expand rural health care and increase patient access to health records.

"We are doing something horrible to our children," Kennedy said as he described rising rates of chronic illness and autism diagnoses he said are driving downstream health and economic harms. He argued the federal agenda includes price‑setting tools, enforcement of transparency rules and new technology to reduce waste.

Kennedy said HHS has negotiated with pharmaceutical firms under a Most Favored Nation (MFN)‑style approach and reached agreements with manufacturers that he said will allow the United States to obtain the lowest international prices for covered medicines. "Whenever the lowest price is, they're selling anywhere in the world, we will get that price or lower," he said. He cited an example that the list price of a weight‑loss injection in the U.S. can be about $1,300 versus about $88 in England.

He also described agency plans to deploy artificial intelligence to detect fraud in Medicare and Medicaid, saying the tools will save "billions of dollars" and are being rolled out at both federal and state levels. Kennedy said HHS has convened major insurance and technology companies to reduce prior‑authorization burdens and end information blocking so patients can access their medical records on mobile devices.

Kennedy highlighted prevention work, including revised dietary guidance created with external nutrition experts and a campaign urging Americans to "eat real food"—protein, fruit, vegetables and high‑fiber grains. He said HHS will release a comprehensive review of contaminants in baby formula in April and is updating the nutrient standards for formula formulated decades ago.

The secretary framed his remarks as part of a broader HHS push to increase price transparency by requiring hospitals and insurers to publish prices and payment information, which he said will create a more functional marketplace for patients and employers.

The speech included several statistical claims about disease prevalence and costs that Kennedy presented as evidence of a national health crisis; those claims were made onstage and not independently verified in the event transcript. Kennedy did not announce a formal rulemaking timetable for every initiative but identified concrete near‑term actions such as the forthcoming baby‑formula contaminants report and enforcement of existing price‑transparency rules.

The visit was billed as part of Secretary Kennedy's wider public outreach and policy promotion; he framed many of the changes as reliant on federal‑state cooperation and private‑sector participation. HHS provided no vote or formal state action at the event; several Tennessee leaders used the visit to underscore state priorities and existing state laws.

Kennedy said the administration will continue to roll out these measures in the coming months and pointed to planned transparency and enforcement actions already underway at the agency.