https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2025/05/29/maha-rfk-jr-ai-garble/
https://archive.md/qqEBT
Some of the citations that underpin the science in the White House’s sweeping “MAHA Report” appear to have been generated using artificial intelligence, resulting in numerous garbled scientific references and invented studies, AI experts said Thursday.

Of the 522 footnotes to scientific research in an initial version of the report sent to The Washington Post, at least 37 appear multiple times, according to a review of the report by The Washington Post. Other citations include the wrong author, and several studies cited by the extensive health report do not exist at all, a fact first reported by the online news outlet NOTUS on Thursday morning.

Some references include “oaicite” attached to URLs — a definitive sign that the research was collected using artificial intelligence. The presence of “oaicite” is a marker indicating use of OpenAI, a U.S. artificial intelligence company.

A common hallmark of AI chatbots, such as ChatGPT, is unusually repetitive content that does not sound human or is inaccurate —as well as the tendency to “hallucinate” studies or answers that appear to make sense but are not real.

AI technology can be used legitimately to quickly survey the research in a field. But Oren Etzioni, a professor emeritus at the University of Washington who studies AI, said he was shocked by the sloppiness in the MAHA Report.

“Frankly, that's shoddy work,” he said. “We deserve better.”

“The MAHA Report: Making Our Children Healthy Again,” which addressed the root causes of America’s lagging health outcomes, was written by a commission of Cabinet officials and government scientific leaders. It was led by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has a history of misstating science, and written in response to an executive order from President Donald Trump.

It blames exposure to environmental toxins, poor nutrition and increased screen time for a decline in Americans’ life expectancy.

One reference in the initial version of the report cited a study entitled “Overprescribing of Oral Corticosteroids for Children With Asthma” to buttress the idea that children are over-medicated. But that study didn’t appear to exist. There is a similar Pediatrics article from 2017 with the same first author but different co-authors. Later Thursday, that Pediatrics article was swapped in for the apparently nonexistent study in the version of the report available online.

An article credited to U.S. News & World Report about children’s recess and exercise time was initially cited twice to support claims of declining physical activity among U.S. children, once with only part of the link shown. It listed Mlynek, A. and Spiegel, S. as different authors. Neither referred to Kate Rix, who wrote the story. Neither Mlynek nor Spiegel appear to be actual reporters for the publication. As of Thursday evening, Rix had been swapped in as the author on one of the references in the version of the report available online.

Nearly half of the 522 citations in the initial version of the report included links to articles or studies. But a Post analysis of all the report’s references found that at least 21 of those links were dead.

Former governor and current New York City mayoral front-runner Andrew Cuomo was caught up in controversy last month after a housing policy report he issued used ChatGPT and garbled a reference. Attorneys have faced sanctions for using nonexistent case citations created by ChatGPT in legal briefs.

The garbled scientific citations betray subpar science and undermine the credibility of the report, said Georges C. Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association.

“This is not an evidence-based report, and for all practical purposes, it should be junked at this point,” he said. “It cannot be used for any policymaking. It cannot even be used for any serious discussion, because you can’t believe what’s in it.”

When asked about the nonexistent citations at a news briefing Thursday, press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the White House has “complete confidence in Secretary Kennedy and his team at HHS.”

“I understand there were some formatting issues with the MAHA Report that are being addressed, and the report will be updated, but it does not negate the substance of the report, which, as you know, is one of the most transformative health reports that has ever been released by the federal government, and is backed on good science that has never been recognized by the federal government,” Leavitt said.

At some point between 1 and 2:30 p.m. Eastern on Thursday, the MAHA Report file was updated on the White House site to remove mentions of “corrected hyperlinks” and one of the “oaicite” markers. Another “oaicite” marker, attached to a New York Times Wirecutter story about baby formula, was still present in the document until it was removed Thursday evening. The White House continued to update the report into the night.

Department of Health and Human Services spokesman Andrew Nixon said that “minor citation and formatting errors have been corrected, but the substance of the MAHA report remains the same — a historic and transformative assessment by the federal government to understand the chronic disease epidemic afflicting our nation’s children.”

“Under President Trump and Secretary Kennedy, our federal government is no longer ignoring this crisis, and it’s time for the media to also focus on what matters,” Nixon said.

bottom 5 dead or alive

Kennedy has long vowed to use AI to make America’s health care better and more efficient, recently stating in a congressional hearing that he had even seen an AI nurse prototype “that could revolutionize health delivery in rural areas.”

Peter Lurie, president of the nonprofit Center for Science in the Public Interest, said he was not surprised by the presence of possible AI markers in the report. Lurie said he had asked his own staff to look into it after noticing that the report linked to one of his organization’s fact sheets but credited the Department of Agriculture and HHS as the authors.

“The idea that they would envelop themselves in the shroud of scientific excellence while producing a report that relies heavily on AI is just shockingly hypocritical,” said Lurie, who was a top Food and Drug Administration official in the Obama administration, where he wrote such government reports.

There are many pitfalls in modern AI, which is “happy to make up citations,” said Steven Piantadosi, a professor in psychology and neuroscience at the University of California at Berkeley.

“The problem with current AI is that it’s not trustworthy, so it’s just based on statistical associations and dependencies,” he said. “It has no notion of ground truth, no notion of ... a rigorous logical or statistical argument. It has no notions of evidence and how strongly to weigh one kind of evidence versus another. ”

The Post previously reported that the document stretched the boundaries of science with some of its conclusions. Several sections offer misleading representations of findings in scientific papers.

>>1408740
>Kennedy has long vowed to use AI to make America’s health care better and more efficient, recently stating in a congressional hearing that he had even seen an AI nurse prototype “that could revolutionize health delivery in rural areas.”
Man, it can do that but it can't write a fucking paper.

>>1408735 (OP)
This level of laziness is why I don't worry that much about the Trump administration.
They don't want to actually do the work of governing, which is too dry and boring for spoiled rich kids like RFK, Trump, and Elon who have never done a real day's work in their lives, just played around with their fortunes and lives their fathers handed them.
There's a ceiling for how effective an administration run by people with no work ethic can be, which means there's a ceiling for how much damage they can do.

>Bezos-employed luddites are complaining about tech.
Fucking losers.

>>1408735 (OP)
this is fake news. I'm a doctor and I've read the report. All the science is 100% sound. The MSM is lying about President Trump AGAIN

Why did that worm brained plague rat even bother publishing this shit stain of a report? He's publicly admitted that no one should take his medical advice seriously.

>>1408754
the report is scientifically sound and not written by AI. you haven't even read it, you're just blindly believing the MSM.

>>1408753
THIS is fake news. I'm a gay man and I've had gay sex with this anon. He is not a doctor, and during the time he claims to have read the report we were kissing each other on the penis.

>>1408735 (OP)
>several studies cited by the extensive health report do not exist at all
May I see them?

>>1408757
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/05/29/rfk-jr-maha-report-citation-errors/83925319007/
The MAHA report erroneously said an article on the impact of light from computer monitors was published in the journal Pediatrics when it wasn’t, according to the study’s author Mariana Figueiro, a professor at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.

The report also cited Figueiro’s research as evidence that electronic devices in children’s bedrooms disrupted sleep onset. However, she said the study was on college students and researchers measured melatonin suppression, not sleep.

“The study is ours, but unfortunately, the conclusions in the report are not accurate and the journal reference is incorrect,” Figueiro told USA TODAY via email. “We have other papers on the topic… but again, none of them were performed with children.”

The MAHA report also cited Columbia University epidemiologist Katherine Keyes as first author of a study on anxiety in adolescents. As first reported by NOTUS and confirmed by USA TODAY, Keyes said she did not write the paper cited by the MAHA report.

“I was surprised to see what seems to be an error in the citation of my work in the report, and it does make me concerned given that citation practices are an important part of conducting and reporting rigorous science,” Keyes told USA TODAY via email.

>>1408755
>It's not written by AI
>Just ignore the various studies that have no sources
If your report is built on random, unsourced and unverified information, it's fucking worthless.

Not to mention it has a bunch of classic AI errors. Like repeating sources multiple times in the citations, or listing fucking oaicite.

>>1408761
>various studies that have no sources
this is fake news

>>1408763
Just because they deleted them from the study doesn't mean it wasn't true. For example, in the old version of the study they cited specific percentages when they were talking about asthma medication overprescription. Then someone pointed out the study they were citing didn't exist and they quietly edited it to remove any mention of specifics.

>>1408758
I'm asking to see the citations that are in question not a 5 paragraph narrative from USA Today which is lacking even the name of the fake citation.

Does anybody even provide what citations these are that are fake or do they just spin some long yarn about this one doctor claiming she didn't write a paper?

>>1408765
Here's the screenshots comparing the new version to the previous one. They claimed a "formatting error" to cover up how they cut entire paragraphs because they got caught making them the fuck up.
>https://www.cnn.com/2025/05/29/health/maha-report-errors

>>1408766
>Does anybody even provide what citations these are that are fake or do they just spin some long yarn about this one doctor claiming she didn't write a paper?
There's more than one lmao. I've already seen half a dozen names that were cited either without regard for the original study or referencing a study that doesn't exist. All of them have now been removed from the updated version of the study.

>>1408766
OK wise guy good luck on your search.

>>1408766
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/29/well/maha-report-citations.html?unlocked_article_code=1.LE8.yY-o.TV5JJai4FK2y

>>1408763
Just because you don't like the facts of something does not mean that it is fake news.

While it is stupid to be a supporter of any of the "leadership" within the Trump administration, you can simultaneously support them, and acknowledge that HHS got caught trying to lie using AI. If anything, supporters of this admin should be the most upset about this, and demanding that those responsible for this report be replaced.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2025/05/30/maha-report-ai-white-house/