This episode of Honestly with Bari Weiss is presented by POM Wonderful.
In 2025 it seems like there are two types of people. There are those who are insanely diligent about health—the people who learn everything there is to know about ingredients and food labels, the people who run every beauty or cleaning product through the EWG Working Group (a database where you can check for the presence of alleged toxins in household ingredients). We all know a few of these people.
And then there are the rest of us: the people who go about their daily lives trying to do the best they can when it comes to health.
The problem is—as hard as most try—the world around us is laden with processed foods and chemicals. Their exact impact on the body is under intense debate. But there’s no question that America is facing a crisis of chronic illness. You don’t have to be a scientist or a doctor to see that.
There are countless experts out there—and I’m using the term expert loosely—with advice about what you should eat or shouldn’t. This advice, however, is often geared toward people who have more time and resources. So today I have someone who can thread the needle and give us practical health advice.
Dr. Mark Hyman is one of America’s most famous physicians. He has written 15 books, and he hosts a hit podcast called The Dr. Hyman Show. He is also an entrepreneur, and his new company, Function Health, is focused on empowering people to understand what is going on in their bodies through lab testing.
Hyman’s fundamental insight is that rather than treating the sickness—which is the way Western medicine has typically been practiced—we should look at the root cause and focus on preventative care. To do that, he says we need to go upstream—to look at the way our food is farmed, processed, and how we approach the grocery store. He calls it “functional medicine.”
Today on Honestly, I ask him how we got so sick and how to eat better. I ask about sleep, stress management, environmental toxins, community, and loneliness. Whether the solution is at the individualized level or at the policy level—and if policy change is even possible. And most importantly, I ask how we can all live better.
Click below to listen to our conversation, or scroll down for an edited transcript.
