One pillar of the MAHA movement is its ability to undermine the medical establishment. For reasons we’ll get into, it’s hard to blame them. The goal of this piece is to help you understand where your MAHA friends or neighbors are coming from, and to have a productive conversation with them (rather than shaming & blaming). Before we dive in, let’s establish some common understanding.
Modern medical knowledge comes from medical research, which is rigorous but flawed.
While the Left focuses on healthcare delivery and debates facts, the Right uses these real and exaggerated flaws to undermine the legitimacy of medical knowledge itself.
Historically, the Left coalition hasn’t acknowledged these flaws, which do sometimes lead to bad patient experiences. Bad experiences drive people away (why do you think Yelp reviews are so influential?).
The Right prioritizes individual autonomy. That manifests in health by centering intuition and “listening to your gut.”
Western medicine has historically ignored or belittled patient intuition. But why does it have to be either-or?
Good doctors listen to patient intuition AND use the best research.
Alright. Let’s get into it.
As a family doctor with a Master’s in Public Health, I have been struck by MAHA’s use of two tactics to engage people in its movement. First, they question the limits and validity (and sometimes transparency) of medical research. Second, they emphasize the importance of autonomy, often through the lens of intuition, in pursuing one’s health.
Many of us on the Left also feel our intuition telling us that this is not how healthcare should be. The system is broken. That doctor visit shouldn’t have gone like that. Our health includes more than numbers from a lab, or the absence of disease – it includes safety and stability, as well as creativity, community, and purpose. These are areas of our well-being where intuition leads, and medical research will often fall short. This is common ground for connecting with MAHA.
Our collective health has greatly improved thanks to modern medical research. That said, some things can only be known by the person who is immediately affected. The Right understands the power of the individual experience, and has successfully weaponized intuition to question the validity of modern medicine.
But two things can be true. Individuals who are tuned in to their bodies bring important insight to their health, AND modern medicine can be a powerful tool for healing.
Oftentimes on the Left, we focus on healthcare delivery, or argue the scientific facts, or center the collective well-being. That conversation doesn’t break through to the MAHA movement. MAHA asks: is the system worth saving at all? Is science reliable? Why should I listen to the medical establishment when they don’t bother to understand my intuition?
So let’s look at how we might connect the dots, in an effort to build shared understanding with those who are MAHA or MAHA-curious.
THE FOUNDATION OF MODERN MEDICAL PRACTICE: EVIDENCE-BASED MEDICINE
Physicians are trained to study science - biology, chemistry, physics and math - things we can see or touch physically, or using tools and math.
We also center medical research: types of studies, statistics, and how to critique any research paper. This is because modern medical care is based on “evidence-based medicine” or EBM. EBM means doctors treat patients based on the best available research. The gold standard study in medical studies is a highly-powered, double-blinded, randomized control trial (RCT). This can sound like Charlie Brown’s teacher (wah wah wah wah wah) but it basically means:
The study has lots of patients
There is a control (placebo or current routine care) that is being compared to the new treatment
The doctors and patients don’t know who is getting the treatment or the placebo
The different groups are roughly equal in demographics and health status
These studies can take years, and have a lot of regulation and oversight, before a final round of review by journals on whether or not to publish. Careful studies with careful review mean better results for patients.
BUT, EVIDENCE BASED MEDICINE (EBM) HAS ITS LIMITS
As trust in institutions has been eroded, MAHA uses the real and perceived weaknesses of this process to disillusion and discredit the entire medical field. It’s important to understand EBM’s limits, so here are a few honest critiques of EBM:
- It can take years to get accurate answers to urgent questions (hello, COVID?).
- It’s constantly evolving (did I mention COVID?). This is one of the issues that MAHA loves to overemphasize and misrepresent (“Does science really ‘know’ anything?”).
- Findings are more likely to be published and more quickly when they show an effect.
- With rare diseases, it’s hard to randomize patients or use placebos.
- Western medicine has historically snubbed or demonized other systems of healing. Now we are trying to study these same systems, but it’s often hard to do.
- Insurance companies use EBM as justification for what will or will not be covered.
This is hugely frustrating to patients and doctors, and is also a major, legitimate point of MAHA.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly to the MAHA movement, even using the best research, no treatment is 100% effective in every patient who receives it, in which case, a patient may look elsewhere. Not unlike government or corporate institutions, trust in the medical establishment is eroding due to scandals (real or perceived) like the opioid crisis, the COVID-19 response, insurance scams, and more. It’s understandable that the public has become increasingly skeptical.
THE ROLE OF INTUITION IN HEALTHCARE AND MAHA
EBM often ignores other types of health knowledge, including patient intuition. MAHA centers it. Intuition can be hard to quantify (obviously), but intuition can help us make better decisions (it is, after all, part of human evolution).
Donald Trump talks regularly about how he makes decisions from his gut. He is applauded for this – that he doesn’t overanalyze. He is seen by his supporters as a bold leader because of it. Similarly, in our last UNASB cohort, during Alex Clark’s interview with naturopathic medicine advocate Razi Berry, Clark asked, “Do you think that the mantra, ‘Trust your doctor’ is dangerous?” Berry answered, “Absolutely…When you have someone ‘Trust your doctor,’ then you’re saying, ‘Don’t listen to your gut. Don’t listen to your body.’ Because we all know when something’s off. We know before our doctors do…”
This celebration of intuition is part of how MAHA promotes individual autonomy. Listen to your gut, opt for “common sense” and “natural” solutions (wasn’t this the Left’s territory for years?). Take control of your health. Get more sunshine. Avoid food additives. Grind wheat for your own bread. From there, it’s not a big leap into avoiding other artificial products, like antidepressants and vaccines.
It makes sense to pay attention to your intuition, but when that leads you to dropping your health insurance (definitely avoiding government healthcare), and choosing private pay, they ignore that this is only accessible to those with enough resources and agency to pay for alternatives.
They also insert hefty doses of fear at the same time. This is powerful because fear and intuition can both be a gut feeling. And the more we are exposed to the risks and dangers of an option (real or imagined), the louder the fear will be. MAHA emphasizes stories of the medical establishment doing harm, as a way to sow fear and distrust (and oftentimes sell their own supplements or digital courses). Most importantly, however, their emphasis on intuition in health has merit, and creates an opportunity for connection.
SO WHAT CAN WE DO?
We can engage with MAHA supporters by 1) acknowledging the flaws in medical research, 2) getting curious about their intuition, their fears, and their experience, and 3) reflecting on and sharing our own intuition, fears and experiences.
What if, instead of shaming or blocking our friends and family who support MAHA, we met them with real curiosity? To do this, we need to regulate our own nervous systems first. If we are triggered and angry, we cannot engage, and we may exacerbate beliefs that the Left is, in its own way, closed-minded. We often have intense emotions driving us in our well-intentioned desire to change other peoples’ minds.
Our work with UNASB tells us to meet people in their emotion, their lived experience. Maybe we can explore their intuition too. The next time you hear someone talking about raw milk or sketchy vaccines or ivermectin for COVID, can you choose to engage with them as an intelligent, caring human, making what they believe is the best choice? Have they personally experienced harm with mainstream medical care? How does their intuition factor in? Did they read or hear something in the media? Is it tapping into a fear they have? Have you had your own questions about these things? Your own harmful experiences? Can you also explore any good feelings? Were there times when modern medicine did help them, or helped you?
Ask these questions. Listen to their answers. Share your own anecdotes to find common ground.
We are all trying to make sense of this world, our lives, and our purpose. Healthcare should be a unifying issue affecting everyone, lying at the crux of birth, pain, living and death. Finding ways to understand those who have embraced a non-traditional approach is an opportunity for the Left to learn and to expand. Let’s admit how much we don’t know and make space to explore the other ways we can know ourselves and each other.
 | A guest post by
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What a solid article that breaks down the decisions shaping our modern medical experience. Thank you for illuminating where valid concerns of MAHA are born. I came away truly feeling that people of all persuasions are just seeking a better way.