Hey there, this is part two of a two-part story, and although I think it is great on its own,

I also think you're going to enjoy it a lot more if you listen to the first part.

I'm just saying, okay, here's what we left off last time.

The writer John Green, author of the mega-seller, the vault in our stars, and unbeknownst

to a whole lot of people, an absolute legend on YouTube, which will become a big part

of the story before we're done, was feeling something like despair about drug prices, especially

the price of a particular drug, one that is needed to treat tuberculosis in other countries,

a drug that's literally life and death for millions of people made by and priced out of

reach by Johnson and Johnson.

John Green knew eight out of nine people who need this drug.

Don't get it.

This is all I was thinking about.

How did we end up in a world where the world's deadliest infectious diseases largely ignored

in the richest parts of the world?

But I felt powerless before it.

Because the drug was under patent protection.

So Johnson and Johnson had a legal monopoly and they could set the price.

Even so, John Green knew there were people trying to find a way.

And I would look at these activists and I would say, this is amazing what they're doing.

This is incredible.

I don't understand how they have the energy to fight these fights where the chance of

winning is so, so, so slim.

...