Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. recently asserted that the popular ketogenic diet can actually cure schizophrenia, a severe mental illness. That’s a massive statement, and experts are rightly calling it “simply misleading,” as it is an unfounded claim.
Kennedy made the remarks while traveling in Tennessee as part of his national tour designed to urge Americans to “eat real food.” He’s been a huge proponent of this message, especially since he recently oversaw an overhaul of federal dietary guidelines. Those new guidelines now emphasize proteins and fats, like steak, cheese, butter, and whole milk, over carbohydrates.
According to the New York Times, Kennedy told the crowd at the Tennessee State Capitol that the foods we eat are “driving mental illness in this country.” He then went even further, stating that a doctor at Harvard had “cured schizophrenia using keto diets.” He backed that up by adding that he had seen studies where people “lose their bipolar diagnosis by changing their diet.”
Who knew that mental illnesses are just a side-effect of hangriness
Kennedy was referencing a 2019 study by Dr. Christopher Palmer. He wrote about two patients with long-standing schizophrenia who experienced a “complete remission of symptoms” after adopting the keto diet, allowing them to stop their antipsychotic medication and stay in remission for a few years. More recently, Dr. Palmer and his colleagues have described the diet as a “promising therapeutic approach for schizophrenia.”
This is where the experts step in to provide a necessary reality check. Dr. Paul S. Appelbaum, a professor of psychiatry at Columbia University, pointed out that the small, short-term studies, including one at Stanford University, only offer “very preliminary evidence” that the diet “might be helpful” for these patients. There is a difference between “promising approach” and “cure.”
RFK Jr makes unfounded claim the keto diet can ‘cure’ schizophrenia
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RFK Jr’s endorsement of the keto diet for treating mental illnesses comes after he declared an end to the ‘war on protein’ and ‘war on saturated fats’ in Januaryhttps://t.co/B0NvQ4sqvCLauren Ashley Davis – OG Meidas Might
(@Meidas_LaurenA) February 6, 2026
Dr. Mark Olfson, another Columbia psychiatry professor, agreed, stating that, “There is currently no credible evidence that ketogenic diets cure schizophrenia.” Most patients in those early studies still needed to take their antipsychotic medication. Pushing this narrative is truly awful because it gives vulnerable people looking for alternatives false hope about tackling a severe, complex condition through diet alone.
Antipsychotic medications are the first-line treatment for psychotic disorders. However, they come with serious side effects like weight gain, which contributes significantly to the high rate of cardiac disease and early death among people with schizophrenia. The ketogenic diet is appealing because it is hailed as a way to lose weight, but it also poses its own risks to heart health.
Obviously the corpulent Trump does not seem to be on Keto. But it doesn't seem like schizophrenia is his precise mental illness either.
— Craig Calhoun (@craigjcalhoun) February 6, 2026
Kennedy Makes Unfounded Claim That Keto Diet Can ‘Cure’ Schizophrenia https://t.co/XCmxyL8J8m
This isn’t the first time Kennedy has promoted ideas without solid scientific backing. He has a history of opinions without a shred of scientific proof: providing religious exemptions for needed pediatric immunizations, asking for a review of an abortion pill based on junk science, and pushing the idea that Covid-19 was “ethnically targeted.”
