Hello and welcome to the Ostrome Update COVID-19, a podcast on the COVID-19 pandemic with

Dr. Michael Ostrome.

Dr. Ostrome is an internationally recognized medical detective and director of the Center

for Infectious Disease Research and Policy, or CITRAP, at the University of Minnesota.

In this podcast, Dr. Ostrome will draw on more than 45 years of experience investigating

infectious disease outbreaks to provide straight talk on the COVID-19 pandemic.

I'm Chris Dahl, reporter for CITRAP News, and I'm your host for these conversations.

Welcome back everyone to another episode of the Ostrome Update Podcast.

It was just around three years ago that Americans were just starting to see the first signs

of how COVID-19 would turn our lives upside down.

On March 13, 2020, the Trump administration declared a nationwide emergency, an issue

to travel ban on non-US citizens traveling from Europe.

On March 15, the New York City Public School System shut down.

On March 19, California Governor Gavin Newsom issued a stay-at-home order for state residents.

Those days, and the pervasive fear and uncertainty that we were living with, are in the past.

But COVID-19 is still with us, and we continue to feel its impact.

And we're still grappling with what we've learned from this experience and how those

lessons might help us in future pandemics.

That will be the focus of this March 23rd episode of the Ostrome Update Podcast.

We'll also provide an update on the current COVID trends here in the US and around the

world, examine the newest revelations and data on the possible source of the pandemic,

discuss the latest developments in the controversy over the Cochrane review on masking, and answer

...