Wearables and Wellness Populism: How Smart Watches Got MAHA’d

Not long ago, smartwatches were basically tiny wrist TVs for your notifications. Now they’re tiny wrist judges.
They applaud you for closing rings, scold you for sitting, and occasionally congratulate you for surviving a stressful email.
And in the middle of America’s always-on health conversation, wearables have become something bigger than gadgets:
a symbolsometimes a weaponinside a rising style of “wellness populism.”

“Wellness populism” is what happens when health becomes a political mood board: distrust the experts, trust the vibes,
and let data points stand in for policy. Add a rallying sloganlike “MAHA” (“Make America Healthy Again”)and suddenly
your step count isn’t just a step count. It’s identity, morality, and a talking point.

This article breaks down how smartwatches (and their cousins: rings, bands, and glucose sensors) got swept into a
bigger culture war about personal responsibility, public health, and who gets to define “healthy.”
We’ll cover what wearables can genuinely do, what they absolutely can’t, and why “everyone should wear one”
is both an intriguing public-health idea and a potential mess.

What “Wellness Populism” Looks Like on a Wrist

Populism is a style of politics that frames society as “regular people” versus “elites.” Wellness populism applies that
framework to health: “Your body knows best,” “Big Pharma wants you sick,” “Doctors don’t listen,” “Food companies are
poisoning us,” and “You can biohack your way out of the system.”

In that story, wearables are perfect props. They feel scientific (numbers!), personal (your body!), and empowering
(you can change the numbers!). They also fit a moral narrative: if you can measure it, you can manage it; if you can
manage it, you should; and if you don’t… well, that’s where the judgment sneaks in.

The “your fault” trap (with better packaging)

A watch can motivate healthier routines, but it can also quietly promote a harsh idea: illness is mainly a failure of
discipline. That’s seductive because it’s simple. It’s also incomplete. Biology, disability, mental health, poverty,
food access, neighborhood safety, work schedules, and genetics don’t disappear just because your watch has a
“Stand” reminder.

How Smartwatches Went From Fitness Toy to National Talking Point

Wearables exploded because they did two things extremely well: they made health feel immediate, and they made it feel
game-like. Steps became points. Sleep became a score. Rest became “recovery.” And the moment health turns into a game,
people start asking a very American question: “Why isn’t everyone playing?”

That question got much louder in 2025, when the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) leadership publicly
floated a major push to encourage widespread wearable use, tying it to the “MAHA” agenda and describing a vision of
near-universal adoption within a few years. The pitch: real-time feedback could help people connect daily choices
(food, movement, sleep) to measurable signals (heart rate, glucose trends), potentially reducing chronic disease.

In other words: prevention, but with dashboards.

Why the idea appeals (even to people who don’t like each other)

• It sounds empowering: “You can see what works for your body.”
• It sounds cheaper than treatment: “Prevention beats prescriptions.”
• It scales: A campaign is faster than redesigning the food system.
• It feels nonpartisan: Walking more is not supposed to be controversial.

The catch is that wearables don’t live in a vacuum. Once they’re framed as a civic duty (“good citizens track their
metrics”), they inherit all the tensions of public health: privacy, equity, coercion, stigma, and the risk that a
flashy tool replaces boring-but-effective solutions (like safer streets, better school lunches, or preventive care access).

What Wearables Actually Measure Well (and What They Just Guess)

To understand the hype, you have to understand the hardware. Most wrist wearables combine:
accelerometers (movement), optical sensors (light-based pulse signals), temperature sensors, and sometimes electrical
sensors for ECG. That toolkit can be usefulif you treat it like a compass, not a courtroom verdict.

Where wearables shine

• Trends over time: Week-to-week patterns are often more useful than a single-day spike.
• Step counts and activity cues: Not perfect, but generally directionally helpful.
• Heart rate during steady activity: Often reasonably accurate for many users in many situations.
• Some rhythm features (for certain devices): Certain smartwatch ECG/rhythm tools have been evaluated and authorized for specific uses.

A real example: irregular rhythm notifications

One of the most famous wearable studiesrun at massive scaleevaluated how a smartwatch’s irregular pulse detection
could flag possible atrial fibrillation in real-world use. The key takeaway wasn’t “your watch replaces a cardiologist.”
It was: wearables can sometimes identify a signal worth following up, especially when paired with confirmatory testing.

Where wearables get wobbly

• Sleep staging: Useful for consistency (“Did I sleep enough?”) but not a replacement for clinical sleep testing.
• Stress and “readiness” scores: Often built from proxies like heart rate variability and temperaturehelpful, but not mind-reading.
• Calories burned: Commonly inaccurate enough to be misleading if you treat them as math homework.
• Blood oxygen: Can vary by device and conditions; accuracy concerns have pushed regulators to demand better testing for medical-use oximeters.
• Blood pressure claims: Regulators have warned consumers not to rely on unauthorized wearable features that claim to measure blood pressure.

The Glucose Gold Rush (and Why “Noninvasive” Is a Red Flag)

If steps were Wearables Era 1.0, glucose is the buzzy sequel. Continuous glucose monitors (CGMs) used to be mainly for
diabetes care. Then wellness influencers discovered them and said: “What if we all tracked glucose like it’s a stock chart?”

Regulators have taken two positions that can sound contradictory unless you read the fine print:

• OTC CGMs are real: The FDA has cleared over-the-counter CGM systems for adults in specific categories,
  including people with type 2 diabetes not using insulin and some adults who want to understand how diet/exercise may impact glucose.
• “Glucose-by-watch” is not: The FDA has explicitly warned against smartwatches and rings that claim to
  measure blood glucose without piercing the skin, because they are not authorized and could be dangerously inaccurate.

That distinction matters because wellness populism thrives on “secret tech they don’t want you to know about.”
In reality, measuring glucose reliably is hard. CGMs do it with sensors that actually interface with the body.
A watch that promises painless glucose from vibes and marketing copy is a classic “sounds amazing” trap.

When metabolic tracking helps

For some people, glucose trend feedback can make nutrition feel less abstract. It can help connect “I ate this” to
“I felt that,” especially when paired with professional guidance. But it can also push people toward obsessive monitoring,
over-restricting foods, or confusing normal fluctuations for emergencies.

If you’re using any metabolic wearable: focus on patterns, not panic. And if tracking starts driving anxiety, guilt,
or extreme behavior, that’s a sign to pause and talk to a trusted adult or clinician.

When Health Data Turns Into a Moral Scoreboard

Here’s where wearables get “MAHA’d”: the device becomes a symbol of being responsible, informed, and “awake” to the
forces supposedly making people sick. That’s not inherently badwanting healthier lives is a good thing.
The problem is when the symbolism crowds out nuance.

The three “MAHA” moves wearables make easy

1. Personalization becomes ideology: “My numbers prove my lifestyle is correct,” even when the metric is noisy.
2. Complex health becomes a single villain: Sugar, seed oils, “toxins,” or “Big Pharma,” instead of multifactor reality.
3. Public health becomes personal virtue: If you’re not improving, you must not be trying hard enough.

The irony is that the most science-friendly way to use wearables is the least populist: treat them as imperfect tools,
validate claims, accept uncertainty, and use them to support evidence-based habitsnot to replace medicine, public policy,
or compassion.

The Privacy Problem: Your Health Data Isn’t Always “HIPAA-Protected”

Many people assume health data is protected by HIPAA. But HIPAA generally applies to specific healthcare entities and
their business associatesnot automatically to your smartwatch company, fitness app, or wellness platform.
That creates a privacy gap: highly sensitive data (sleep, cycles, mood tags, location, heart patterns) can exist in a
consumer-tech ecosystem with different rules.

So what protects you?

• FTC enforcement and breach rules: The FTC’s Health Breach Notification Rule can require notices when certain
  health apps or related entities face breaches of identifiable health information.
• HHS guidance (context matters): HHS has warned that online tracking technologies can create privacy risks;
  when HIPAA doesn’t apply, other laws still might.
• State laws: States like Washington have passed consumer health data laws aimed at limiting collection and sale,
  including restrictions around sensitive locations and data uses.
• Proposed federal updates: In late 2025, a Senate bill (HIPRA) was introduced to extend stronger privacy and
  security obligations to more consumer health data handlers, including parts of the apps-and-wearables ecosystem.

This matters even more if wearables become “default” or “expected.” A voluntary gadget is one thing. A social normor
a policy-driven pushraises bigger questions: Who gets access to the data? Can it affect insurance or employment?
Will people be judged by metrics they can’t control?

Equity and Accuracy: Not Everyone Gets the Same “Truth” From a Sensor

Wearables don’t just measure bodies; they measure bodies through design choices and training data. That’s why accuracy,
bias, and access are not side issuesthey’re the entire plot.

Accuracy across skin tones

The FDA has pushed for improved testing and labeling for pulse oximeters for medical purposes, partly due to concerns that
performance can vary across skin pigmentation. Even when your smartwatch feature is “wellness,” it often uses similar
light-based methods, which makes the broader accuracy conversation relevant.

Access is not automatic

Wearables cost money, require smartphones, require charging, and require time to interpret.
If a national narrative says “just wear a device,” it can easily ignore the people who can’t afford one, can’t safely
exercise outside, or can’t take time off work to act on what the device shows.
Health equity isn’t a setting you toggle on in the companion app.

Organizations like the American Heart Association have emphasized that digital health tools can help behavior change and
engagementbut access barriers can also widen disparities if they’re not addressed directly.

How to Use Wearables Without Getting “MAHA’d”

You don’t need to throw your smartwatch into a lake. (Although your lake might appreciate the extra minerals.)
You just need guardrailsespecially if wearables are being marketed as a cure-all.

Practical guardrails that keep wearables useful

• Use trends, not single numbers: Compare weeks, not moments.
• Pick one goal at a time: Steps or sleep consistency or training loaddon’t turn your body into a spreadsheet war.
• Separate “wellness features” from “medical features”: Know what’s cleared/authorized and what’s a guess.
• Don’t DIY diagnosis: A device can suggest “check this,” not “you have this.”
• Protect your privacy: Review permissions, limit sharing, and be cautious with apps that monetize data.
• Watch your mindset: If tracking increases anxiety, guilt, or obsessive behavior, step back and talk to someone you trust.

A simple reality check

Public health improves with systems: safer neighborhoods, affordable preventive care, evidence-based nutrition policies,
and protections that make healthy choices easier. Wearables can support individuals, but they don’t replace systems.
When a movement suggests the oppositewhen it implies that a watch can substitute for policyyou’re watching wellness
populism in action.

Conclusion: A Wrist Computer Can’t Be a Country’s Health Plan

Wearables are neither miracle cures nor useless toys. They’re toolsoften helpful, sometimes misleading, and always shaped
by the story we tell about them.

“MAHA’d” wearables are wearables used as ideology: numbers as virtue, tracking as citizenship, and personal dashboards as
substitutes for public solutions. The better path is less dramatic (sorry, internet) and more effective: use wearables to
support habits that are already backed by evidencelike moving more, sleeping consistently, and following up on legitimate
medical concernswhile staying skeptical of overconfident claims and protecting your data.

If America gets healthier, it won’t be because everyone got the same gadget. It’ll be because the country made healthy
living easier, safer, and more affordableand then wearables helped people stay on track inside that better environment.

Field Notes: 5 Real-World Wearable Experiences (and What They Teach Us)

1) The “I Finally Started Walking” Story. A common win looks like this: someone buys a smartwatch for notifications,
accidentally discovers step goals, and starts taking evening walks to close the ring. The change is small but stickyten minutes
becomes twenty, then a weekend hike becomes normal. The lesson: wearables work best when they nudge an already doable behavior.
They don’t need to be dramatic. They just need to be consistent.

2) The “Data Spiral” Story. Another very real experience is the opposite: a person starts tracking sleep,
sees a “bad” score, worries about it, sleeps worse, and then watches the score drop again. Or they watch calories burned and
feel guilty when the number doesn’t “earn” dinner. The lesson: metrics can become emotional triggers. When the device makes you
feel monitored instead of supported, it’s time to turn off a feature, hide a metric, or take a break.

3) The “My Watch Saved Me a Doctor Visit… and Also Caused Three” Story. Some users report getting an irregular rhythm
notification, checking with a clinician, and catching an issue early. Others get an alert that ends up being nothing serious
but it still leads to appointments, tests, and stress. The lesson: wearables can be a valuable early signal, but they’re not
designed to provide certainty. They’re designed to say, “This might be worth checking.”

4) The “CGM Made Food Make Sense” Story. In metabolic wellness circles, some people use CGMs to learn what meals keep them
steady versus what leads to a big spike and crash feeling. Done carefully, this can guide more balanced mealsmore fiber,
more protein, fewer ultra-processed snacks. Done obsessively, it can turn eating into a test you can fail. The lesson:
glucose is information, not a morality score. Your goal is sustainable habits, not perfect graphs.

5) The “Privacy Anxiety” Story. As wearables got more popular, people started asking: who else sees this data?
Users talk about feeling weird when an app requests location, contacts, microphone access, and a full biography of their sleep.
The lesson: the wellness populism pitch often says “trust the data,” but the adult version of that sentence is “trust the data,
then protect it.” If wearables become part of national health messaging, privacy can’t be an afterthoughtit has to be part of the deal.