Who are you?
YLE community, I need your help!
What. A. Year.
We have been through a lot together over the last few months, people. When I started this newsletter six years ago, I thought I’d be doing it for six weeks. Max. But more than 875 posts and 150M reads later, we’re still here, learning together.
As we kick off a new year, I have an incredible team of people working with me. We’re bringing evidence-based, local health information to New York and California. We’re helping repair connections between communities and institutions. And I’m still writing this newsletter for you.
Every year I ask the YLE community to help me do that better by asking: “Who are you?” Your survey answers have been instrumental to understanding who I’m talking to, how you’re using YLE, and how we can continue to evolve in this ever-changing landscape. Please take a few minutes to take this year’s survey.
Why it matters
Almost a year ago, more than 27,000 people took the survey, and those responses helped shape the newsletter. We kept providing you with information on infectious diseases. We introduced our “Behind the Curtain” feature for paid subscribers, with more detailed looks at the research and online trends we’re seeing. We provided more downloadable resources—an FAQ about routine vaccinations, guides on how to engage with your lawmakers, and a white-label fluoride fact sheet—and began covering topics you asked for, including menopause and nutrition. (More to come!)
I didn’t share results from our 2025 survey earlier, so I’m including them below. I hope this inspires you to become part of the YLE feedback loop and take this year’s survey.
What we learned last year
Last year, readers from more than 81 countries took our survey, with most people in North America and Australia. (This is down from 2024, when the reach was 97 countries, and the year before with a reach of 104 countries.)
Many of you are trusted messengers; more than half of you said you share YLE information not only with your family, but also with your colleagues, patients, and community members. Thank you for helping make YLE a node in the vast grassroots information diffusion ecosystem. It is an incredible honor.
The largest group of survey takers were in the 45-64 years age range. (Under 45? We want more of your voices in this survey! Take it here.)
As usual, 2025 survey takers were a highly educated bunch! More than 92% of you had completed some college, and 64% had a master’s or doctoral degree. This is more diverse than in 2024—when 99% had college or postgraduate degrees. (In the U.S., roughly 14% of people have a masters or doctoral degree.)
YLE strives to engage with a politically diverse audience, as true impact comes from breaking echo chambers. Last year, our average reader continued to lean liberal on political and social issues, and 2025 was a hard year to address this challenge. I want to hear from more of you who lean more conservative in this year’s survey.
Infectious disease continued to be the main thing you were interested in—but there was strong (and growing) interest in public health communication and misinformation (69%). You also said you were interested in news analysis (59%), and climate and environment-related (59%) health topics. We tried to cover more of those topics.
The youngest members of our community were especially interested in communication/misinformation, and expressed greater interest in seeing coverage of the opioid epidemic and reproductive health.
Parents were notably more interested in mental health, opioids, gun violence, and reproductive health.
As we continue to grow, one of my challenges is balancing the diverse interests and needs of this community.
Bottom line
Thanks for being with me for all these years! It’s been a hell of a ride, and I don’t expect to be stopping it anytime soon. Help me make sure we’re meeting you where you are, with the health information you want.
Love,
Katelyn
Your Local Epidemiologist (YLE) is founded and operated by Dr. Katelyn Jetelina, MPH PhD—an epidemiologist, wife, and mom of two little girls. YLE reaches more than 425,000 people in over 132 countries with one goal: “Translate” the ever-evolving public health science so that people will be well-equipped to make evidence-based decisions. This newsletter is free to everyone, thanks to the generous support of fellow YLE community members. To support the effort, subscribe or upgrade below:
Thank you for all that you do.
Thank you for taking the time to do a survey in addition to all you do to keep us updated.