Dr. Mona speaks with Dr. Annie Andrews, a pediatrician, mother, and US Senate candidate in South Carolina, about the vital connection between child health, parenting, and national politics. They explore why healthcare issues cannot be separated from political action and why pediatricians and parents need to build real political power to protect children.

Key Takeaways

• Children Lack Political Power: Because kids cannot vote, donate to campaigns, or hire lobbyists, their needs are consistently deprioritized by elected officials unless adults actively build political power on their behalf.

• The Danger of Neutrality: Remaining apolitical or staying on the sidelines does not solve systemic issues like Medicaid cuts, high prescription costs, or underfunded public education.

• Beyond Basic Advocacy: While research identifies health problems and advocacy brings them to light, politics is what actually shifts power to implement long-term policy solutions.

• National Impact of Local & State Races: State-level policies directly affect child wellness, and supporting candidates who center family and child health shapes national legislative conversations.

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00;00;00;02 – 00;00;28;20

Dr. Mona

Welcome back to the show. It’s Doctor Mona and you’re listening to the follow up. Which is a series on the show where we revisit a past episode in less time than it takes you to sit through one more headline about Medicaid cuts and wonder who is actually fighting for kids in all of this. I am rerunning this one because we have a real chance right now for a pediatrician and mom to become the first pediatrician in the US Senate, and I do not want us to blow it.

 

00;00;28;23 – 00;00;58;21

Dr. Mona

This is not about me being a mom and her being a mom, or her being a pediatrician, and me being a pediatrician and calling it a day. It is about the overlap. I am referring an episode with Doctor Annie Andrews, pediatrician mom, and a US Senate hopeful in South Carolina. We get into why she made the leap from clinic to campaign, how policies like Medicaid cuts hit kids and families directly, and why she believes pediatricians and parents alike need to get louder and not quieter when it comes to advocating for children’s futures and politics.

 

00;00;58;24 – 00;01;24;12

Dr. Mona

Annie understands from the inside how family centric issues and child centric issues are exactly the same issue. Looked at different angles that overlap is exactly what our government has been missing. Health care is political, whether we like it or not. Kids cannot vote. They can’t support candidates that support their views, and they do not have a seat at the table, which means someone us has to advocate for them loudly or they get left behind.

 

00;01;24;14 – 00;01;47;26

Dr. Mona

Staying neutral might feel safer, but neutrality does not pay for insulin or fix a broken Medicaid system. I know most of you listening do not live in South Carolina, and it’s easy to think this does not affect you. But what happens in one state does not stay in one state. Candidates who understand what families are actually dealing with once they get support and get elected, help shape national conversations and national policy too.

 

00;01;47;28 – 00;02;08;05

Dr. Mona

So even if you do not vote for Doctor Andrews, this race is worth paying attention to. If you are in South Carolina, please make sure you are registered to vote for the November 3rd general election. The deadline is October 2nd in person. October 4th. Online email or fax, and October 5th by mail. Go download the full episode wherever you get your podcasts and make sure you share this one.

 

00;02;08;06 – 00;02;21;23

Dr. Mona

Sure sure sure sure sure. Tag me. PedsDocTalk the PedsDocTalk podcast, and Doctor Andrews at at Annie Andrews, MD. When you do.

 

00;02;21;25 – 00;02;43;09

Dr. Mona

We forget that all these issues don’t just start when people are 20 years old or, you know, adults like what are the health access? What is the safety access? We see that every day as pediatricians. How broken the system has become. And I think you’ve probably seen that throughout your career. Right. Like how it continues to become broken, especially in states that don’t prioritize this.

 

00;02;43;09 – 00;03;01;16

Dr. Mona

And that tends to be a lot of red states. I’m in Florida. I see a lot of kids left behind here. I used to grow up in California, which yes, it’s there to some degree, but it’s not to the degree that I’m seeing it in these states. And so I don’t know if you see that same sort of reality that you see that now this is becoming a very, very like red blue.

 

00;03;01;17 – 00;03;10;03

Dr. Mona

Where are the kids going to be left out in this situation? And how that makes you feel as a, as a mom and pediatrician, to see that these policies are really hurting kids.

 

00;03;10;06 – 00;03;33;21

Dr. Annie Andrews

It’s heartbreaking and it’s deeply frustrating. But yes, we are we are we are data driven professionals and there are answers to these solutions. But there are politics, bad politics standing in the way of our elected officials passing the policies that we know will benefit America’s children. So you’re right, there is a discrepancy between how kids in red states are doing and how kids in blue states are doing.

 

00;03;33;27 – 00;04;01;29

Dr. Annie Andrews

But here in America in 2025, what I fear is the country is going to turn into one big red state where kids are getting left behind. And the reason why children are getting left behind is quite simple. It’s because children are not inherently a politically powerful constituency. Children don’t vote. Children don’t donate to candidates, children don’t support political action committees, and therefore they are left behind.

 

00;04;02;00 – 00;04;28;06

Dr. Annie Andrews

They are at the bottom of the priority pile in every nearly every member of Congress desk, because they are not inherently politically powerful, unlike Americans over the age of 65 who are an incredibly powerful political constituency. So it is incumbent upon those of us who care about America’s children to build political power on their behalf. Running for office is one way to do that, to draw attention to these issues.

 

00;04;28;06 – 00;04;50;23

Dr. Annie Andrews

That’s why I was so pleased my campaign video went so viral, because I want more eyes and ears on the words that are coming out of my mouth, because I am so deeply passionate about building a political movement that centers America’s children, that I want everyone who cares about America’s kids to understand that this is one of the key reasons our kids are being left behind, because we’re not engaging in politics on their behalf.

 

00;04;50;25 – 00;05;07;00

Dr. Mona

Yeah. And I mean, we know that so many of the policies just don’t care about children and families, right? We go into paid leave. We go into the whole Medicaid crisis, which we’ll be talking about now, and how that’s going to negatively impact so many, and how I’m already seeing the impacts as a Florida pediatrician that accepts a lot of Medicaid patients.

 

00;05;07;07 – 00;05;27;06

Dr. Mona

And you said health care shouldn’t be political, but in America it has been. And many doctors are taught to stay neutral. But you’ve also made the case that neutrality can be harmful. So what would you say to other health care professionals who are hesitant to speak out, or to that person listening and saying, why are we talking about politics when this should be about parenting or our children?

 

00;05;27;09 – 00;05;55;19

Dr. Annie Andrews

So you can’t fight bad politics by staying apolitical? Yeah, and honestly, I wish I could just have stayed with my full time career of being a pediatric hospitalist. But what I saw every day drove me to find solutions. And the solutions are political. And that is just the reality. And because of this unwritten curricula we experience in medical school and in our residency training, that we must stay apolitical, that we must stay neutral.

 

00;05;55;25 – 00;06;20;03

Dr. Annie Andrews

We have given up our seat at the table. We have abdicated our responsibility, and there is no greater concern that I have than pediatricians who are sitting outside of politics, because, you know, there’s other physicians who do a pretty good job advocating for their professions anesthesiology, orthopedic surgeons, radiologists. They all are engaged in politics through their organizations, political action committees.

 

00;06;20;06 – 00;06;44;02

Dr. Annie Andrews

But pediatricians have given up a seat at that table because pediatricians are the only medical profession that hasn’t built a political action committee. And we just have to get over ourselves because we are doing our patients and families a disservice by failing to engage in enacting the policy solutions that will benefit them. And I talk about this all the time when I travel around the country to talk to future pediatricians.

 

00;06;44;10 – 00;07;09;21

Dr. Annie Andrews

We all understand what research is. Research is finding the answer to a problem. Policy is putting that answer into a systemic solution. Advocacy is going up to the elected officials trying to convince the people in power to care about your problem, and to care about your proposed solution. But if we stop there, if we stop at advocacy and we don’t do politics, we’re missing the whole game because politics is changing.

 

00;07;09;21 – 00;07;37;00

Dr. Annie Andrews

Who has the power? And think about how powerful that can be. If we change who is in these seats of power. If we start electing people who wake up every day and have children as their priority. How much easier it would be to pass something like an expanded and permanent child tax credit to pass something like, you know, expanded Medicaid, Medicaid throughout this country to lower the cost of prescription drugs, to fully fund our public education system, to get act urgently on climate change.

 

00;07;37;00 – 00;07;45;22

Dr. Annie Andrews

All of these things that are affecting America’s children. We have policy solutions. But if we don’t engage in politics, we’re never going to get to where we need to be.

 

00;07;45;25 – 00;08;01;21

Dr. Mona

I love it. I mean, we could just end it right there. No, Emily, like this is exactly it, and I it I actually started my advocacy desire in the pandemic. Right. That’s when I started my platform and the advocacy had to be around vaccines and public health. Right. That was what was really prominent at that point. And it was hard.

 

00;08;01;21 – 00;08;19;04

Dr. Mona

And, you know, my message to a lot of people who are fearful of it is like, you are fighting for values here. So this isn’t about to be honest, this isn’t about red blue person person. It’s about what value system is this person bringing and to be to not make, to not make certain policies in a reality is a problem.

 

00;08;19;04 – 00;08;36;15

Dr. Mona

You know? I mean, we have to care about the kids. We have to care about all access to all children. And then obviously you talked about gun safety and cost of medicine, all of that impacts lives. And why don’t we care about that? Like I, I’m shocked when people are like, yeah, I don’t want to get involved or I’m just like, and there’s so many different ways to do it.

 

00;08;36;15 – 00;08;56;16

Dr. Mona

You don’t have to be on stages and running for office like you are, but you can be voicing and getting into local grassroots organizations and really fighting for those kids, which I’m trying to do a lot of. And I’m so inspired by you because I don’t know if I would ever run for office. People are always telling me to do it, but seeing you is inspiring.

 

00;08;56;16 – 00;09;15;25

Dr. Mona

Like I, I’m inspired to continue to advocate when I see fellow pediatricians, fellow moms, fellow, you know, health care professionals do that. And that is a ripple effect that I agree that we can’t stay out on the sidelines and just say, well, changes will happen if they happen. They’re not. And it’s getting worse in my opinion. And I think you feel the same.

 

00;09;15;27 – 00;09;34;16

Dr. Annie Andrews

It absolutely is getting worse. And it isn’t about red or blue. I think people like me now and assume I’ve just been this like hardcore Democrat my entire life. I was actually pretty apolitical because I had the privilege to be apolitical in my 20s. And then when I became a mom and saw the world around me, that gave me the courage to engage.

 

00;09;34;23 – 00;09;53;01

Dr. Annie Andrews

And then I looked at our two political parties. And there is one, excuse me, there’s one that is very clearly fighting for America’s children and one that is not that is not my fault. I did not write the Republican Party’s policy platform. If both parties had different approaches to fighting for America’s children, I would love to have two choices.

 

00;09;53;01 – 00;10;21;18

Dr. Annie Andrews

But the fact of the matter is, in 2025, in the United States of America, there is one political party that prioritizes America’s children and one that is actively working to make their lives worse by taking away the Snap benefit program, by essentially gutting our nation’s Medicaid program, which is the largest insurer for children in this country. So, yes, it does feel a little bit unsavory for those of us who are health care professionals to really engage in politics in this manner.

 

00;10;21;22 – 00;10;38;26

Dr. Annie Andrews

But we have no choice this moment is so incredibly urgent and, as you said, grows more urgent by the day. So I see my politics just like I see my practice of medicine when I walk into a patient’s room. It’s not about red or blue. It’s about assessing the problem, making a diagnosis and coming up with a solution.

 

00;10;39;01 – 00;10;53;13

Dr. Annie Andrews

The same thing is when I’m talking to voters in South Carolina, I walk in, I listen first. I’ve together develop a solution to their problems, and then I work to enact that solution.

 

00;10;53;15 – 00;11;14;27

Dr. Mona

And that’s your follow up. Just a small dose of the real, relatable and eye opening conversations we love to have here. If you smiled, nodded, or had an moment, go ahead and download, follow and share this episode with a friend. Let’s grow this village together for more everyday parenting wins and real talk. Hang out with us on Instagram at the PedsDocTalk podcast.

 

00;11;15;04 – 00;11;30;16

Dr. Mona

Want more? Dive into the full episode and more at PedsDocTalk.com. Because parenting is better with support. And remember, consistency is key. Humor is medicine and follow ups are everything. I’m doctor Mona. See you next time for your next dose.