First Thing: RFK Jr condemned as ‘clear and present danger’ after Trump nomination

Robert F Kennedy Jr ‘shouldn’t be allowed in the building at the department of health and human services, let alone be placed in charge of the nation’s public health agency’, a consumer group said. Photograph: Evan Vucci/AP

Good morning.

Donald Trump’s nomination of the anti-vaccine activist and conspiracy theorist Robert F Kennedy Jr for US secretary of health and human services has been decried by consumer advocacy groups, public health experts and pundits across the political divide, who say his appointment would cost lives.