Robert Kennedy has vowed to continue his role in the vaccine case if he is confirmed as Trump's health chief.

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Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is Donald Trump’s top U.S. health official, but he is defending his share of the litigation against pharmaceutical company Merck, ethics records show.

In the ethics agreement he published Wednesday, Kennedy said he would take part in a possible victory in a lawsuit brought by the law firm Wisner Baum against Merck’s Gardasil vaccine, which protects against the human papillomavirus, also known as HPV.

“I am entitled to a 10 percent fee on contingency fee cases referred to the firm,” Wisner Baum counsel Kennedy said in a letter to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ top ethics czar. .

Kennedy, a vaccine skeptic whom Trump chose to be health secretary in November, said he had the right to protect interests in matters where America was not involved or where the state did not have a “direct and significant interest.”

Mike Crapo, the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, announced that Kennedy’s confirmation hearings would be held next Wednesday after the ethics records were released Wednesday.

Kennedy, a member of a prominent Democratic political family, has stressed that he is playing no direct role in the Merck affair and has vowed to avoid doing anything to interfere with the outcome if he is named Health and Human Services secretary.

It is the first of a series of lawsuits filed in a Los Angeles court alleging that young people have been harmed by the Merk vaccine. Kennedy

The former Democrat, who endorsed Trump last year, said he would step down from his consulting job at Wisner Baum after completing an independent bid for the White House.

Kennedy disclosed $11.6 million over the past two years in various financial filings filed Wednesday with the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, including $8.8 million from his work as a local attorney for Kennedy & Madonna. He promised to quit his role in the company.

Kennedy was paid $856,559 by Wisner Baum during the same period, records show. He also held minority stakes in Biotex Crispr Therapeutics and Dragofly Therapeutics, according to financial statements.

The statements highlight the controversy surrounding Trump’s decision to choose a vocal vaccine skeptic and campaigner to oversee the US Department of Health – including its 13 departments and agencies, such as the Food and Drug Administration and the National Institutes of Health, which have the greatest influence over drug control in the US.

The delay in Kennedy’s congressional hearing, originally scheduled for this week, was taken as a sign by some in his camp that he would struggle to win approval from the crucial Health and Finance Committees, which need support before a full vote. In the Senate.

Some senators have raised questions about his record on vaccines and abortion and other issues.

The Gardasil lawsuit against Merck is one of several anti-vaccine lawsuits in which Kennedy has been involved. Gardasil is recommended for 11- and 12-year-olds as usual in Japan by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 160mn. According to official statistics, it will be distributed by the end of 2022. Some high-risk types of HPV can cause cervical cancer.

Kennedy did not respond to requests for comment. “Plaintiff’s allegations are without merit, and we are committed to vigorously defending these claims,” Merck said.