On the receiving end of her ire: U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The day after the shooting, Kennedy went on Fox News. He suggested without evidence that a common type of antidepressant medications, known as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), could be contributing to violence like this. He also said — wrongly — that the medications have a black box warning about “homicidal ideation.”
Smith: To me, the availability of mental health care for Minnesotans is deeply personal … not only because of my own experience battling depression when I was younger, but because I’ve talked to so many young people about their own struggles and how important it is that they have access to the health care that they need. And so RFK Jr.’s slippery and unaccountable way of throwing out statements about the dangers of antidepressants with no evidence or backup infuriates me.
Smith: Well, I’m deeply concerned about that … after the horrible shooting at Annunciation School, he went on Fox News and said he was launching a study to examine the linkage between psychotropic drugs, antidepressants and school shootings. And so that gives me great concern. Who’s going to do this study? Who’s even left at the [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] to make sure that this study would be based on actual science? And let’s be clear. There has been research into the question of whether there’s any linkage. And that research has shown that there is no linkage.
Smith: Yes … and that number has grown [over time] pretty significantly and probably represents an increase in people’s needs and also an increase in access to treatment. And I can say as somebody who greatly benefited from SSRIs … that it was such a help to me and kind of getting my brain wired correctly, working the way it needed to work so that I could get over that depression.
Smith: I had been … immersed in the deeply personal tragedy that was unfolding at Annunciation School. And also thinking about what it’s like for these families to be thrust into the public eye in such a brutal way when they have just had this unimaginable loss. And so that’s where my brain and my heart were … and then here’s RFK going on Fox News and saying this. I felt so angry [that] I needed to point out the hypocrisy of what it is that he was saying. And I was [also] thinking about what I wanted to say to the Annunciation parents compared to what he was basically saying. And that was the gist for the tweet that I wrote.
Smith: I can always tell when something [is] resonating with people or breaking through because people that I don’t even know will just come up and say something to me at the grocery store or walking around the lake or at the airport, and say some version of “You said what I was feeling.”
Smith: Well, he was, by saying that, illustrating my entire argument, which is that when he’s confronted with facts that don’t agree with his view of the world, he just says you’re making stuff up. And, of course the reason I had so much confidence in … bringing that up is because we had the damn clip from him on Fox News saying exactly what I was saying that he said. So I wasn’t making it up. He was trying to get out of having any accountability.
Smith: I’m doing everything that I can think of to try to protect that access … [We have to] make sure that he doesn’t use the Centers for Disease Control and the [Food and Drug Administration] to undermine the best science about when SSRIs should be prescribed. With vaccines … he’s basically saying “Well, go ahead and take a vaccine, but we’re not recommending that vaccine anymore.” And that means that insurance companies won’t pay for it. And that means people have less access. And that’s very, very dangerous. We have to guard against him doing anything like that with other medications, including SSRIs. And then, of course, people listen to what he says. And if there are people out there who think that SSRIs aren’t safe, just like they are thinking that vaccines aren’t safe, they won’t get the medication they need. That could have terrible impacts on their health, so that’s why it’s so important to stand up to him.