Welcome to Part 2 of our Prevention Day coverage! Yesterday, we covered Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s launch of the STREETS Initiative, a $100 million program “for Americans experiencing homelessness and addiction.”

Secretary Kennedy was just the opening card for Prevention Day, an event sponsored by a private company that claims to be “the largest government-sponsored gathering dedicated to advancing the prevention of substance use,” according to event organizers.

I had thought that after the Great American Recovery Initiative (GARI), Prevention Day would show how STREETS would break down the silos that make it difficult to integrate services such as addiction treatment, housing, education, and job placement.

Instead of a parade of secretaries of labor, education, veterans’ affairs, or justice, Prevention Day went down the hierarchy at HHS from the Secretary to the Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS), to the CEOs of a bunch of companies vying for a piece of the CMS budget.

Dr. Mehmet Oz is the Administrator of the CMS and was the second speaker after Secretary Kennedy on the Prevention Day livestream. He was time-limited and shot out a few surprising statistics off the top of his head, including:

• 53% of all the children in America are covered by Medicaid
• Loneliness costs the American economy $100 billion a year
• The average American retires at age 61 — four years before qualifying for Medicare
• Getting everyone to work one more year would add $3 trillion to the economy

The first statistic is a dire indictment of life in America, where more than half the children grow up in households so poor they qualify for Medicaid. What other industrialized nation allows its children to mature under such extreme privation? Later in the Prevention Day program, a representative of insurer Blue Cross/Blue Shield says that “half the kids [they cover] have symptoms of depression.” 

As to why Americans choose to leave the workforce at an average age of 61 without medical insurance and years before qualifying for Social Security, Dr. Oz says the major reason is “mental health issues.” Dr. Oz stresses the need to figure out what works and what doesn’t work, which sounds like going back to ground zero. There is already a strong sense of what works and a lack of interest in implementing it.

And that’s when Dr. Oz delivered Prevention Day’s most memorable moment. The solution to America’s mental health crisis is “agentic AI avatars.”

An agentic AI avatar is an autonomous digital persona that uses conversational AI to assess and assist users. It’s like having, well, Dr. Oz in your pocket, alerting you to check in, then assessing your issues and providing support. Unfortunately, Dr. Oz exited the stage shortly after dropping the line about agentic AI avatars. He did say they are part of the solution to providing mental health services in rural communities.

According to Behavioral Health News, the agentic AI avatars conduct “virtual therapy sessions and support groups that allow patients to access care at any time.” They provide “social support,” thus reducing loneliness. They make it much easier to store and compare data. And Dr. Oz added one more feature before leaving the stage: doctor alerts. The agents can communicate with caregivers based on your responses to questions.

In all, Prevention Day felt like a rug pull: Secretary Kennedy sketched an accurate vision of what is needed to tackle addiction and homelessness in America, but that’s not what they’re going to do. Instead of flooding money into contingency management, they’re withdrawing money and replacing professionals with pocket docs. And if that doesn’t work, they’re willing to spend liberally on prisons and jails.

Written by Steve O’Keefe. First published February 13, 2026.

Sources:

“Secretary Kennedy Announces $100 Million Investment in Great American Recovery,” U.S. Health and Human Services Administration, February 2, 2026.

“WATCH: RFK Jr. and others launch new addiction and homelessness initiative,” PBS NewsHour, February 2, 2026.

“How Artificial Intelligence Can Help Combat Addiction,” Behavioral Health News, October 22, 2024.

Image Copyright: ghanemalyusef.