About Voices of Public Health
Our biannual newsletter, Voices of Public Health, updates members of our community on our vibrant and growing department of undergraduate and graduate students and interdisciplinary faculty. With each issue, we will bring you research, insights, and accomplishments of UC Merced Public Health and our partners. Our goal is to promote well-being for populations by advancing an equitable society, ensuring safe environmental conditions, and uplifting the voice and power of communities.
Read about:
Current Issue
A Message from Our Community
As a proud UC Merced Alumna and Merced resident, I am honored to be able to address the Public Health community. Thank you for the work you do every day to make our Merced County and the San Joaquin Valley healthier and more connected. Public health only succeeds when it is a shared effort between residents, health care providers, schools, community-based organizations, and local leaders, who all see wellbeing as a collective responsibility.
My approach to leadership is grounded in three core principles: transparency in communication, inclusivity in decision-making, and responsiveness to the needs of our community. I believe that the strongest departments are those where everyone feels welcome and that their contribution matters—from our newest students to our most senior faculty, from our staff to our community partners.
Over the last decade plus serving the community in the Public Health Department, I have learned how much of health is shaped long before someone walks into a clinic. Moving into the role of Public Health Director after COVID-19, one priority stands out for me: rebuilding trust in health information. People are navigating a constant stream of advice, warnings, misinformation, and opinions. Trust in systems is at an all-time low, and the ways we have historically shared information no longer works. Our job is not just to provide facts, but to show up consistently, transparently, and in partnership with the communities we serve – often, listening more than speaking.
In the Valley, trusted messengers and prevention are even more crucial due to our systemic lack of health care access. This includes not just insurance access, but practical access: hours that work for working families, services located near transit, and materials written in clear language. With Medi-Cal cuts looming, this will become even more important.
Over the next year, my goal is simple: make prevention easier than crisis response. Success will look like more partnerships, grounded in community, and the deliberate and integral work of rebuilding trust. The road ahead is precarious, and the only way we will successfully navigate it is together.
My invitation to you is to join in by sharing accurate information, checking in on a friend, bridging a gap with someone with a different perspective, partnering with a local health effort — even once. Public health is not a department; it is a community habit we build together, across boundaries that historically divide us.
- Kristynn Sullivan, PhD, Director, Merced County Department of Public Health
