On Thursday, May 29, 2025, the White House admitted there were significant issues with a major health report overseen by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. This came after several news organizations found that the document cited studies that do not exist.

The report from the “Make America Healthy Again Commission,” released last week, included at least seven citations of nonexistent research papers, according to investigations by NOTUS and other media outlets. The 73-page report, which focuses on children’s health issues, originally listed 522 citations to support its findings on chronic disease causes.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt attributed the citation issues to “some formatting issues” during a briefing on Thursday, adding that these issues would be corrected. However, experts argue that citation errors reflect deeper problems with scientific accuracy rather than mere formatting errors.

One of the fabricated citations was a December 2022 study supposedly published in JAMA Pediatrics, which examined changes in adolescent mental health during the pandemic. Katherine Keyes, a Columbia University epidemiologist listed as the study’s first author, confirmed she did not write the study and expressed concern about the citation methods used.

Another false citation attributed a study on medication use in children to psychiatric researcher Robert Findling, but Virginia Commonwealth University confirmed that Findling was not involved in the research. A spokesperson for the JAMA Network confirmed that the article referenced was never published in any of their journals.

The White House quietly revised the report on Thursday, replacing the fake citations with legitimate studies. It remains unclear if the replacement studies support the original claims. The revised version also adjusted statistical claims about adolescent mental health rates and removed sections about asthma medication overprescription.

Andrew Nixon, communications director for the Department of Health and Human Services, indicated that minor citation and formatting errors had been corrected, while the report’s substance remained unchanged. He described it as a historic assessment of chronic disease affecting children.

Experts suspect that artificial intelligence may have been used in creating some citations. The Washington Post reported that several reference URLs contained “oaicite,” a marker typically added by OpenAI’s systems to citations. The metadata embedded in the report’s PDF lists Heidi Overton, a medical doctor and deputy director in the White House Domestic Policy Council, as the author.

The MAHA report identifies four leading causes of chronic diseases in children: ultraprocessed food, environmental toxins, overprescribing of medications, and sedentary lifestyles. The commission responsible for the report consists of high-ranking federal officials, with only two being medical doctors. Kennedy has refused to release details about who authored the document.

Researchers at the Cato Institute criticized the report in a Wednesday blog post, stating the data bears little relationship to its conclusions. They highlighted instances where the report lacked context or misrepresented information, such as describing childhood obesity as a worsening crisis while showing stable rates over 20 years.

The citation issues have increased scrutiny of Kennedy’s tenure at the Department of Health and Human Services. Since taking office, he has fired thousands of federal health agency employees and cut billions from biomedical research funding. He has a long history of questioning vaccine safety, which has caused concern among medical professionals.

Columbia University’s Keyes expressed concern that basic citation practices were not followed, questioning the overall rigor of the report. While some public health experts acknowledge that the document addresses legitimate issues, such as the links between ultraprocessed foods and health problems, others argue that it overstates conclusions and offers few solutions.

The Democratic National Committee condemned the report on Thursday, calling it rife with misinformation, and accused Kennedy’s agency of justifying policy priorities with nonexistent studies. The controversy comes as Kennedy has announced plans to potentially ban federal scientists from publishing in respected medical journals, calling them corrupt and proposing government-run alternatives.

The report notably omits mention of guns as the leading cause of children’s deaths in the United States, despite its comprehensive examination of health threats. Multiple versions of the corrected document were uploaded on Thursday as the administration attempted to address the scientific credibility issues.