How did Tatiana Schlossberg criticize RFK Jr.'s policies in her final New Yorker essay? Complete details explored as she dies at 35

Tatiana Schlossberg criticizes RFK Jr.
Tatiana Schlossberg criticizes RFK Jr.'s policies in her last article (Image via Getty)

Tatiana Schlossberg criticized her cousin's policies in her last article, which was published on The New Yorker. Tatiana was diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer after the birth of her second child, and was given less than a year to live. In her last article, she addressed Robert Francis Kennedy Jr., a.k.a. RFK Jr.'s policies, which could potentially hurt cancer patients like her.

She wrote:

"As I spent more and more of my life under the care of doctors, nurses, and researchers striving to improve the lives of others, I watched as Bobby cut nearly a half billion dollars for research into mRNA vaccines, technology that could be used against certain cancers; slashed billions in funding from the National Institutes of Health, the world’s largest sponsor of medical research; and threatened to oust the panel of medical experts charged with recommending preventive cancer screenings."

She added:

"Hundreds of N.I.H. grants and clinical trials were cancelled, affecting thousands of patients."

Her mother, Caroline Kennedy, has also urged senators to reject RFK Jr.'s confirmation.


What else did Tatiana Schlossberg write in her last article for The New Yorker?

Tatiana Schlossberg first shared her cancer diagnosis with the public in her last article, titled "A Battle With My Blood." It was published on November 22. Tatiana had been diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer a year ago. She begins the essay by writing:

"When you are dying, at least in my limited experience, you start remembering everything."

She also shared the first time the doctors suspected that it might be cancer by writing:

"On May 25, 2024, my daughter was born at seven-oh-five in the morning, ten minutes after I arrived at Columbia-Presbyterian hospital, in New York. My husband, George, and I held her and stared at her and admired her newness. A few hours later, my doctor noticed that my blood count looked strange... It could just be something related to pregnancy and delivery, the doctor said, or it could be leukemia."

Tatiana Schlossberg continued to reveal the kind of cancer she was diagnosed with, as well as the procedure for her treatment:

"The diagnosis was acute myeloid leukemia, with a rare mutation called Inversion 3. It was mostly seen in older patients... I could not be cured by a standard course of treatment. I would need a few months, at least, of chemotherapy, which would aim to reduce the number of blast cells in my bone marrow... Then I would need a bone-marrow transplant, which could cure me. After the transplant, I would probably need more chemotherapy, on a regular basis, to try and prevent the cancer from returning."

Tatiana Schlossberg also wrote about her family in the article, talking about her parents, who helped her raise her two children, writing about the sadness of seeing her fight for her life. She added:

"For my whole life, I have tried to be good, to be a good student and a good sister and a good daughter, and to protect my mother and never make her upset or angry... Now I have added a new tragedy to her life, to our family’s life, and there’s nothing I can do to stop it."

She concluded her article by writing:

"Mostly, I try to live and be with them now. But being in the present is harder than it sounds, so I let the memories come and go... Sometimes I trick myself into thinking I’ll remember this forever, I’ll remember this when I'm dead. Obviously, I won't. But since I don't know what death is like and there's no one to tell me what comes after it, I'll keep pretending. I will keep trying to remember."

Tatiana Schlossberg used her final article to share her cancer diagnosis and to speak against policies by RFK Jr. that could harm cancer patients. She wrote honestly about her illness and her family, as well as her fears. She left the world at 35 years old with a strong message about humanity and the importance of medical research.

Also read: What was Tatiana Schlossberg's debut book? Career highlights explored following her death at 35

Edited by Benidamika Jones Latam