I'm Dr. Michael Greger and this is Nutrition Facts. There's one thing we've been

thinking a lot about lately and that's how to stay healthy in the middle of a

global pandemic especially since we've learned that those with underlying

health problems like obesity, hypertension, diabetes, heart disease are more

likely to have serious complications if they can track to COVID-19. So what do we

do? We try to stay healthy with evidence-based nutrition. Today on the show we go

back in time more than a decade to revisit a very timely subject how to prevent

the emergence of pandemic viruses in the first place. I record this more than

decade ago when I was public health director at the HSUS in Washington DC.

The two greatest threats facing humanity according to the United Nations are

climate change and emerging infectious disease, particularly pandemic

influenza. The current focus of pandemic discussions and debate understandably

centers on what we in the public health community refer to as secondary

prevention mediating the impact of the next pandemic. In intervention,

analogous to mammography. mammograms don't prevent cancer but if caught

early enough for example we may be able to decrease morbidity and mortality in

the same with pandemic planning. But what of primary prevention the possibility of

preventing the emergence of pandemic viruses in the first place? Like cancer,

the root cause is likely multifactorial, difficult to tease out but a

question worth exploring nonetheless. And the question I'd like to address here

today. Let's go back a few years. 1981 here in the United States Ronald Reagan

takes the oath. MTV starts broadcasting Indiana Jones and Pac-Man Mania. It's

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