Welcome to Public Health On Call, a podcast from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health,

where we bring evidence, experience, and perspective to make sense of today's leading health challenges.

If you have questions or ideas for us, please send an email to public health question at jh.h.edu.

That's public health question at jh.u.edu for future podcast episodes.

This is Lindsay Smith Rogers.

Today we hear from a physician on the front lines of respiratory virus season.

Dr. Wendy Greater Beck is an internist and pediatrician who has been trying to protect

children against RSV by prescribing a new immunization recently approved by the FDA.

She speaks with Dr. Josh Sharfstein about what's happened as her high hopes have collided with the reality of product shortages and other hurdles.

Let's listen.

Dr. Wendy Greater Beck, it is great to see you and to have you here with me on Public Health on call to talk about RSV and products to protect babies. How are you doing today?

I'm great. Thank you so much for having me, Josh.

So you are an internist and a pediatrician. Tell me a little bit about your practice.

So I see all ages. I work in an outpatient setting that's a part of the University of Maryland

medical system. I have patients that are just coming out of the hospital, newborns, a few days old, all the way up to patients that are 101.

That is pretty great. I remember that we learn together about all those ages in medical school,

but not everyone actually takes care of patients

from zero to 101 in practice. Well, it's really fun. So we're going to talk about RSV,

respiratory syncytial virus, and how it affects little babies, particularly. It also affects older

adults and potentially that 101-year-old patient of yours.

But really, we're going to talk about babies today.

Could you tell me a little bit about RSV disease in infants?

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