WASHINGTON — Health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is issuing a U.S. surgeon general’s advisory urging families, schools, and providers to reduce children’s screen time, according to a draft of the report reviewed by STAT.
The report, which comes from the surgeon general’s office even though there is no Senate-confirmed nominee, calls on parents, schools, and all levels of government to work together to shift the use of devices with screens, saying some patterns of use “can pose real harm to children.”
The report offers a long wish list of actions from policymakers, industry, and parents — but stops short of prescriptive language or laying out plans to make those changes a reality.
Tech companies, for example, could design their products “for user well-being, not engagement,” according to the report, which asks them to display warnings about the harms of screen time before each use and nudge users to stop using the products. But there is no roadmap included for how industry giants might be pushed to make such changes.
Still, the report, “Surgeon General’s Warning on the Harms of Screen Use,” speaks to a broad bipartisan concern about the impact of technology on youth mental health. This is not the first time the surgeon general’s office has addressed such issues: under the Biden administration, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy called for a warning label on social media and released an advisory about its potential mental health risks for young people.
The new report, which does not reference the last administration’s warning, acknowledges that evidence around the impacts of screen use is evolving, but says the nation “cannot wait for every question to be settled before acting.” The report encourages young people to “Live Real Life,” similar to the campaign Kennedy unveiled in January for Americans to “Eat Real Food.”
Unlike the 2024 report, the new advisory suggests that schools can impose “bell-to-bell” phone restrictions — a policy that has already been widely adopted in recent years.
Health providers, the report says, can ask about screen use at annual visits.
Policymakers are asked in the report to “pursue policies that provide parents with robust controls” over their children’s digital lives, create age requirements for some platforms, fund research on the impacts of screen use, and bolster community programs that offer in-person alternatives to digital activities.
Parents in the report are advised to delay screen time “from the earliest age as long as possible,” then limit device use once introduced. Here the report does get more specific, saying: “Suggested screen time limits could be: none for children under 18 months old, less than 1 hour per day for children under 6, and 2 hours per day for 6–18-year-olds.” The report suggests parents consider a “family media plan” and model healthy behavior — and consider removing devices from children’s bedrooms overnight.
The surgeon general’s warning was led, in part, by Stephanie Haridopolos, whom Kennedy raised to perform the duties of a surgeon general in the absence of a Senate-confirmed nominee, according to an email he sent to staff.
Haridopolos was given the ability to issue advisories late Monday, Kennedy told staff in an email.
Mario Aguilar contributed reporting.