The Trump administration issued a surgeon general’s advisory for parents, schools, and communities to limit screen time for children and adolescents, as a growing body of evidence suggests too much technology use can harm cognitive development and mental health.
The 43-page advisory warns that exposure to screens often begins before a child’s first birthday and only increases with age, putting them at lifelong risk for negative health outcomes.
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Various officials within the Department of Health and Human Services, including Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., signed onto the new advisory report, published Wednesday and obtained by the Washington Examiner, that parents should do their best to limit young children’s screen time and continue to do so as much as possible as they grow up.
A surgeon general’s advisory carries the weight of a public service announcement about a growing societal health concern, containing recommendations rather than official rules or guidance. But the report comes without an official surgeon general in office since President Donald Trump took office last year.
Before the report’s release, Kennedy tapped Dr. Stephanie Haridopolos, officially the director of National Health Communications for the Office of the Surgeon General, to effectively serve in the national health spokesperson role until the Senate confirms the next surgeon general.
Trump nominated Dr. Nicole Saphier, a radiologist and former Fox News contributor, to be his surgeon general late last month after the confirmation process for his initial nominee, Dr. Casey Means, was stalled by nearly a year.
Haridopolos, a family medicine specialist, told the Washington Examiner in an exclusive interview about the surgeon general’s advisory addressing a growing public health crisis.
“Harmful screen use has become one of the most urgent issues facing our children today, and it doesn’t matter what your party is, this is about the future and the children, of this generation and the next generation,” Haridopolos said.
The advisory notes that the average time spent on screens reaches four or more hours each day by the time a child becomes a teenager. Research cited in the advisory indicates that excessive screen use can be associated with worse sleep, reduced functioning in school, less physician activity, and weakened interpersonal relationships.
Haridopolos said this is a “very important issue” to her personally as a mother to three children who are part of Gen Z, the generation born between 1997 and 2012. As a parent, Haridopolos said she fears for Gen Z and the subsequent generation, Gen Alpha, because they have never known life without nearly constant screen use.
“I think that because kids are being exposed earlier more intensely than ever, at any other point before, it is affecting overall health development in daily lives, and we really can’t overlook it any longer,” Haridopolos said.
For parents, the advisory references guidelines from the Council on Communications that recommend no screen time for children under 18 months old, less than one hour per day for children ages 18 months to 6 years, and two hours per day for children ages 6 and above.
The advisory recommends parents implement what it calls the “5 Ds” framework to help reduce the negative impacts of harmful screen use.
- Discuss healthy screen use with household members.
- Do model the healthy screen use behaviors you would like to see.
- Delay screen time as long as possible from the earliest age and then establish age-appropriate screen-time limits.
- Divert attention from screens to other healthy activities, such as physical activity.
- Disconnect from screens regularly.
The surgeon general’s advisory also recommends that school districts incorporate tools to teach digital literacy while still “assigning work in books or on paper whenever possible” and prioritizing “pen-and-paper curricula.”
This is not the first time the surgeon general’s office has attempted to warn the public about the health effects of too much technology.
Former Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, who served in the post during both the Obama and Biden administrations, called for health hazard warning labels on social media in June 2024.
Via an opinion piece in the New York Times, Murthy said social media platforms are “associated with significant mental harms for adolescents” and accused companies of using tactics that “prey on developing brains and contribute to excessive use.”
Conservative Republicans at the time sharply criticized Murthy’s call as demonizing free speech and an example of excessive government overreach.
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Haridopolos defended the new report against similar criticism by saying it empowers parental action rather than solely relying on top-down, prescriptive warnings.
“We are not trying to tell parents they’re not doing a good job,” Haridopolos said. “We need to just let them know what the evidence is out there, so they can be empowered with knowledge to make those decisions.”
