Atul Gawande on why we still need covid funding
Post Reports
The Washington Post
4.4 • 5.1K Ratings
🗓️ 9 May 2022
⏱️ 17 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Today on “Post Reports,” the head of global health at the U.S. Agency for International Development, Atul Gawande, on the state of the pandemic and why global vaccination efforts are at risk.
Read more:
Today on the show, we hear from national health reporter Dan Diamond about his interview with Atul Gawande, who leads global health at USAID and co-chairs the Biden administration’s covid-19 task force. He is also an endocrine surgeon, health-care researcher and writer.
Gawande explains his efforts as a Biden administration official to slow the pandemic through global vaccination — and how funding for those efforts are at risk.
“It isn't enough to just bring a bunch of vaccines on the tarmac and say, ‘Go,’” Gawande says. “We need to support their ability to maintain the cold chain, to have workers who can move out into the rural areas.” Gawande also talks about the state of public health abroad as the war in Ukraine continues.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Who are you and what do you do? |
| 0:04.0 | Hi. |
| 0:05.0 | Hello. |
| 0:06.0 | I'm a Toolwanda and I lead Global Health at the US Agency for International Development, |
| 0:11.5 | USAID. |
| 0:12.5 | The first time I ever heard of Toolwanda was when I heard a Toolwanda being interviewed |
| 0:19.8 | on NPR. |
| 0:20.8 | I was driving to take the Foreign Service exam, which is what I really thought I wanted |
| 0:25.2 | to do after college. |
| 0:26.2 | And I found it fascinating. |
| 0:27.5 | I just graduated college and I was already working in healthcare, but I saw it as just a |
| 0:32.6 | job that was holding time until I got in the Foreign Service. |
| 0:35.4 | But after that interview, I went and got to go on his book, Complications, his first |
| 0:39.3 | book, which was formative and how I thought about healthcare. |
| 0:44.1 | That's Dan Diamond and Long Story Short. |
| 0:46.6 | He did not end up going into the Foreign Service and now he's a healthcare journalist |
| 0:50.7 | for the post. |
| 0:52.4 | After there is some personal amusement to me that this doctor that I remember influencing |
| 0:58.4 | my interest in healthcare years ago is now someone I can sit across the table from and ask |
| 1:03.2 | hard questions to. |
| 1:05.6 | From the newsroom of the Washington Post, this is Post Reports. |
| 1:09.0 | I'm Martin Powers. |
... |
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