27. What Can Bin Laden Teach Us About Medicine?

Freakonomics, M.D.

Freakonomics Radio + Stitcher

Society & Culture, Science

4.8 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 4 March 2022

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

When trust in doctors or the healthcare system is lost, it’s really hard to get back. Bapu Jena explores the ripple effects of a C.I.A. operation to catch Osama bin Laden on medical distrust in Pakistan — and its parallels to distrust in the U.S.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Remember this?
0:04.7	Good evening.
0:05.7	Tonight, I can report to the American people and to the world that the United States has
0:11.1	conducted an operation that killed Osama bin Laden, the leader of Al Qaeda.
0:16.9	That was President Barack Obama in May 2011.
0:20.6	You probably know this story well.
0:22.4	For almost a decade, Osama bin Laden had eluded U.S. military forces.
0:27.8	And finally, in 2010, there was a lead.
0:30.1	It was far from certain, and it took many months to run this thread to ground.
0:36.1	The lead was that bin Laden was hiding out in Pakistan.
0:39.5	And after many months working to confirm his exact location, a specialized force raided
0:45.2	the compound, the rest was history.
0:48.8	Justice has been done.
0:51.0	So that's the story.
0:53.0	The raid was a heroic feat.
0:54.8	It was even quickly made into a Hollywood blockbuster, Zero Dark 30.
0:59.1	But do you really know the efforts the U.S. went to to try to find Osama bin Laden?
1:05.4	From the Freakonomics Radio Network, this is Freakonomics MD.
1:08.7	I'm Bob Bujeno, a medical doctor and an economist.
1:12.6	Each episode, I dissect an interesting question at the sweet spot between health and economics.
1:18.5	Today on the show, the mission to find, capture, and kill Osama bin Laden had an unintended
1:24.8	consequence for the health of the people of Pakistan.
	...

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