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What I'm Learning from MAHA
And why public health needs to catch up with
the curiosity-driven movement

Author: Katelyn Jetelina, PhD, MPH

EDITOR'S NOTE: This article was originally published on June 6, 2025 by Your Local Epidemiologist on Substack. 

About a month ago, a few of us in public health began meeting with members of the grassroots advocacy group Make America Healthy Again (MAHA). I shared some initial reflections, and our conversation aired on the podcast Why Should I Trust You. It went viral, sparked by an immense wave of curiosity—people wanted to understand what it looks like when two seemingly opposing sides sit down and actually talk.

I’m happy to report that we’ve continued exchanging emails and texts, met again, and even planned more conversations to expand our circle. And… we still haven’t killed each other!

That might not sound like much, but in today’s polarized climate, it feels like progress. Honestly, it’s given me more hope than I’ve felt in a long time.

We’ve tackled some hard topics: vaccines, mistrust, government overreach, scientific credibility. On our side, the damage is real. On theirs, the opportunity of the current landscape is exciting. What’s kept us at the table isn’t agreement but a shared curiosity, some common ground, and a growing recognition that we each have something to learn from the other.

Here’s what I’ve taken from these conversations over the past month—about communication, community, and trust—and what I hope they’ve taken from us, too.

 But first, a note to fellow health professionals

One of the hardest parts of engaging with MAHA hasn’t been the conversations themselves. To me, it’s the anticipation of backlash from within my field. The quiet fear of a thousand paper cuts. So before this post circulates more widely, I want to make an important distinction. One that I think many of us are struggling to see clearly:

There’s a real difference between the leadership of MAHA, like RFK Jr., and the grassroots supporters drawn to the movement.

I don’t believe RFK Jr. is acting in good faith. His record is riddled with contradictions and falsehoods. His tactics often erode trust under the guise of restoring it. Treating him as a serious partner would be a mistake.

But many people who support MAHA at the grassroots level are asking real, good-faith questions. They’re responding to gaps and failures that public health professionals recognize, too.

If we fail to see that difference, we risk further alienating those who already feel unheard. We confirm the very narrative they’ve been fed: that the health ecosystem doesn’t listen, doesn’t care, and paints all its critics with the same brush.

There’s meaningful common ground to build on—clean food, chronic illness, safe schools, and air quality. That’s a good place to start.

What I’ve learned so far

Over the past month, I’ve learned a LOT! Here are three key lessons from these conversations.

1. Trusted messengers and co-developing is the name of the game

A recurring theme in our conversations was this: “Communication just doesn’t reach us.” At first, I didn’t buy it. There’s no shortage of information online. But the more I listened, the clearer it became: information being available is not the same as being accessible, understandable, or shared by or within their trusted networks.

They mainly get information from long-form podcasts, like Joe Rogan’s, and rarely see evidence-based information on social media—which I think is largely due to algorithms, because it’s there!

So I followed up. I sent one of MAHA’s leaders a plain-language vaccine FAQ that the YLE team and Yale created in November 2024. It’s been downloaded 50,000 times—but I hadn’t heard much from folks who weren’t already in our corner.

She responded almost immediately. Her feedback was kind, sharp, and incredibly constructive.

Here’s what I learned:

♦        Nuance matters. She appreciated that the FAQ wasn’t trying to convince anyone. It didn’t oversimplify. It acknowledged uncertainty and gave people room to make their own informed decisions.

♦        Context builds trust. The original version included over 100 studies—but only as a bibliography. She suggested including one sentence per study summarizing what was found and why it matters.

♦        Access is empowerment.