168 - #MASA (Make America Sleep Again): Wake Me Up When September Ends

Did you know…

• Only 57% of Americans now say science has a mostly positive effect on society—down 16 points since before COVID?
• And yet, 83% of people still trust their doctor more than anyone else when it comes to vaccine advice?

We’ve all lived through it—the pandemic reshaped our health, our trust, and our divisions, and those dividisions have been on full display recently as hearings have highlighted a growing distrust in the medical and scientific communities. In this episode, we will:

• Explore why COVID was not just a disease, but a collective trauma—and how trauma often drives blame and denial
• Examine the promise of MAHA (Making America Healthy Again) and the peril of dismantling expertise in the process
• Confront the deep health inequities that make the U.S. lag behind other developed nations in life expectancy and outcomes
• Ask why preventive medicine never fulfilled its promise in our healthcare system
• Review how vaccines remain one of the greatest public health successes—even as skepticism grows
• Unpack why rare side effects feel amplified when billions of doses are given
• Revisit the vaccine rollout as both a modern miracle and a “fog of war” moment with inevitable missteps
• Challenge the myth of “doing your own research” and why interpretation of science matters more than access
• Discuss how shaming during the pandemic hardened divides instead of fostering change
• Look ahead: why questioning science is healthy, but abandoning it could cost us the cures and treatments of the future

Produced by: Maeve Winter

More

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• Bluesky: @drchriswinter
• The Sleep Solution and The Rested Child

Thanks for listening and sleep well!