WASHINGTON – Secretary of Health Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced the U.S. Surgeon General’s recommendations urging families, schools and health care providers to reduce screen time for children, according to a draft report reviewed by STAT.
The report, filed by the Surgeon General’s Office despite no Senate-confirmed nominees, calls for parents, schools and all levels of government to work together to transition the use of devices with screens, saying some patterns of use “have the potential to cause real harm to children.”
The report provides a long list of requests for action from policymakers, industry and parents, but stops short of providing prescriptive language or a plan to make those changes a reality.
For example, tech companies can design their products “with user happiness as opposed to engagement in mind,” according to the report, and are required to display warnings about the harms of screen time before each use and encourage users to stop using the product. However, it does not include a roadmap for how industry giants will be forced to make such changes.
Still, the report, “Surgeon General’s Warning on the Harms of Screen Use,” expresses widespread bipartisan concern about the impact of technology on young people’s mental health. This is not the first time the Directorate General of Public Health has tackled such a problem. Under the Biden administration, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy has called for warning labels on social media and issued recommendations regarding potential mental health risks for young people.
Muscle dysmorphia is on the rise in boys and men due to social media
The new report makes no reference to the previous government’s warnings, but acknowledges that evidence on the effects of screen use is evolving, but says the public “cannot wait for all questions to be answered before acting”. The report encourages young people to “live authentic lives,” similar to President Kennedy’s “Eat Real Food” campaign, which he announced to Americans in January.
Unlike the 2024 report, the new recommendations suggest that schools can impose “bell-to-bell” phone restrictions. This is a policy that has already been widely adopted in recent years.
Health care providers can ask about screen use during annual visits, the report says.
In the report, policymakers call for “pursuing policies that give parents greater control” over their children’s digital lives, imposing age requirements on some platforms, funding research into the effects of screen use, and strengthening community programs that provide in-person alternatives to digital activities.
The report advises parents to delay screen time “as early as possible” and limit device use once introduced. Here the report gets more specific, stating that “recommended viewing time limits may be none for children under 18 months, less than 1 hour per day for children under 6 years, and less than 2 hours per day for children 6 to 18 years.” The report suggests parents consider their “family media plan,” model healthy behaviors, and consider removing devices from children’s rooms overnight.
Stephanie Khalidopoulos, whom President Kennedy appointed to fill the Surgeon General’s duties in the absence of a Senate-confirmed nominee, helped lead the Surgeon General’s warning, according to an email he sent to staff.
Kennedy told staff in an email that Khalidopoulos was authorized to issue the recommendation late Monday.
Mario Aguilar contributed reporting.
