1. United States
2. Fla.
3. Letter

I urge you to vote against confirming Casey Means as surgeon general. The nation's top doctor position requires proven medical expertise and public health leadership, neither of which Dr. Means possesses. Dr. Means graduated from Stanford School of Medicine but did not complete her head and neck surgical residency at Oregon Health and Science University. She is not board-certified and does not hold an active medical license. Her primary experience comes from her work as a wellness influencer and co-founder of Levels, a health tracking company. As former surgeon general Richard Carmona stated, she has "no significant public health background experience" and "no scalable leadership experience," calling her nomination a "disgrace" to America's public health system. During her confirmation hearing, Dr. Means refused to give a straightforward answer when asked whether she would encourage parents to vaccinate their children with routine shots like the MMR vaccine. This evasiveness is particularly alarming given that South Carolina is experiencing its worst measles outbreak in over 30 years due to declining childhood immunization rates. When pressed on whether vaccines cause autism, a theory long discredited by science but promoted by health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., she avoided a clear response, stating that "science is never settled." The surgeon general must be capable of countering vaccine misinformation, not amplifying it. On her website, Dr. Means has questioned the childhood vaccine schedule and referred to an "$80 billion industry" having the "American population in a chokehold." This rhetoric undermines public confidence in immunizations that have saved millions of lives. At a time when the Department of Health and Human Services has experienced chaos under Kennedy's leadership, with mass exodus of officials and anti-vaccine loyalists installed on key advisory committees, we need a surgeon general with unimpeachable credentials and commitment to evidence-based medicine. Dr. Means does not meet this standard. Please vote no on her confirmation.