Robert F Kennedy Jr. has sparked outrage and confusion by sensationally claiming he can gauge a child's 'mitochondrial challenges and inflammation' simply by looking at them.
The Health and Human Services Secretary said he assesses children in his head when he passes them on the street or at an airport.
'I know what a healthy child is supposed to look like,' he said alongside Texas Governor Greg Abbott at the signing of the Make America Healthy Again bill.
'I'm looking at kids while I walk through the airports today, as I walk down the street, and I see these kids that are just overburdened with mitochondrial challenges, inflammation.
'You can tell it from their faces, from their body movement, and from their lack of social connection.'
The remarks - which came after top medical experts were purged from HHS - sparked swift and sweeping backlash online, particularly from other health experts who challenged his comments.
'Speaking as a pediatrician, this is complete quackery,' one wrote.
RFK Jr. was appointed to the Health and Human Services portfolio despite his lack of medical experience after allying himself with Trump.
'If you ever have a medical provider tell you they can spot inflammation or so-called ''mitochondrial challenges'' from across the room, please find a different provider - before your child is potentially harmed by unnecessary or inappropriate treatments.'
'So we are now to the point of making CDC recommendations and rules on vaccines based on one non-medical person's observations of the looks on kids' faces who are walking through airports?' a second added.
A third added: 'To my American MD colleagues, the time for pithy comments about mitochondria has come and gone. The ACTUAL DAMAGE RFK Jr is doing to public health in the US is incalculable. DO something.'
Another snarkily wrote: 'Is it him or the brain worm making these on the spot medical diagnosis?'
The 'brain worm' comments - which have plagued RFK Jr. since his campaign - stem from a report in The New York Times that Kennedy had put in his divorce documents that a dead parasite had been discovered in his head, which had diminished his earning power.
RFK Jr. was lamenting the heath of America's youth when he made his latest shocking comments.
He also claimed that 38 percent of teenagers are 'diabetic or pre-diabetic' - a statistic challenged by his own Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the American Diabetes Association.
The Health and Human Services Secretary said he assesses children in his head when he passes them on the street or at an airport.
In actuality, as little as 0.35 percent of people under 20 years old are diabetic.
Some 38 percent of American adults are reported to be prediabetic, meaning it is likely RFK Jr. conflated or confused the two separate statistics.
'We have more chronic disease than any country in the world, and we know what it is, and we know it's the food that we're eating, it's environmental causes,' RFK Jr. said.
He also claimed that autism rates in the United States were as high as 'one in 25', when in reality adult autism rates are around one in 45 and childhood autism rates are one in 31, according to the National Library of Medicine.
'I came from a big family. I have seven kids; I had 11 brothers and sisters; I had about 70 first cousins; and I never saw anyone with diabetes; never knew anyone with a food allergy; never knew anyone with autism,' Kennedy said.
Kennedy is seeking to 'Make America Healthy Again' under his slogan MAHA.
He praised Abbott and the state of Texas for embracing his advice and implementing his MAHA policies, including prohibiting SNAP beneficiaries from using funds on certain drinks and candy, and removing some additives from free or discounted school lunches.
RFK Jr. faced harsh backlash for his comments online.
It comes after the director of the nation's top public health agency, Susan Monarez, was fired by President Donald Trump late Wednesday because she wasn't 'aligned with the president's mission' and refused to resign, according to the White House press secretary.
It is understood she and RFK Jr. 'clashed' on certain viewpoints.
Monarez is fighting to keep her job, and her lawyers say she was targeted for standing up for science.
Four other agency leaders resigned on Wednesday in solidarity with Monarez.
'We knew ... if she leaves, we don't have scientific leadership anymore,' one of the officials, Dr. Debra Houry, said on Thursday.
'We were going to see if she was able to weather the storm. And when she was not, we were done.'