{"id":115838,"date":"2025-02-09T21:30:00","date_gmt":"2025-02-10T06:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/opinion\/letter-murkowskis-vote-could-benefit-alaskans-health\/"},"modified":"2025-02-09T21:30:00","modified_gmt":"2025-02-10T06:30:00","slug":"letter-murkowskis-vote-could-benefit-alaskans-health","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/2025\/02\/09\/letter-murkowskis-vote-could-benefit-alaskans-health\/","title":{"rendered":"Letter: Murkowski&#8217;s vote could benefit Alaskans&#8217; health"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Doesn&rsquo;t everyone value their health over corporate profits? We need a Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) who courageously places us first and roots out causes of chronic disease to Make America Health Again.<\/p>\n<p>Former CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield wrote in the Sept. 24, 2024, issue of Newsweek that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is the right choice. Sen. Sullivan, after meeting with Kennedy, posted on Facebook on Dec. 19 that he was impressed with Kennedy&rsquo;s knowledge of Alaska, the Indian Health Service, and rural health care issues. He looked forward to working with him.<\/p>\n<p>Sen. Lisa Murkowski, currently noncommittal, asked Kennedy one question in his Jan. 30 Senate hearing. In answering , he stated:<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;I spent a lot of time in your state. It&rsquo;s my favorite place to go. I&rsquo;ve been&#8230;been all over the state in the remote areas. I understand&#8230;the unique needs of Alaska because of remote health care, because some of these areas are not even accessible except for airplane&#8230;and we really need to&#8230;make sure that even in remote places in Alaska&#8230;people can get high quality health care, and we can do that today.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Appointing Kennedy to lead HHS is a unique opportunity for Alaskans to have an advocate aware of Alaska&rsquo;s special challenges directing health nationwide.<\/p>\n<p>Will you join me in asking Sen. Murkowski to vote &ldquo;yes&rdquo; for Kennedy as Secretary of Health and Human Services? Her crucial vote is expected this week.<\/p>\n<p>Margaret Testarmata<\/p>\n<p>Juneau<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Doesn&rsquo;t everyone value their health over corporate profits? We need a Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) who courageously places us first and roots out causes of chronic disease to Make America Health Again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1129,"featured_media":115839,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,8],"tags":[97,106],"class_list":["post-115838","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-letters","category-opinion","tag-letters-to-the-editor","tag-opinion"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Letter: Murkowski&#8217;s vote could benefit Alaskans&#8217; health - Juneau Empire<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/2025\/02\/09\/letter-murkowskis-vote-could-benefit-alaskans-health\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Letter: Murkowski&#8217;s vote could benefit Alaskans&#8217; health - Juneau Empire\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Doesn&rsquo;t everyone value their health over corporate profits? 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