Robert Aronowitz on Risky Medicine

EconTalk

Library of Economics and Liberty

Economics, Social Sciences, Society & Culture, Education, Science, Books, Philosophy, History, Ethics, Courses, Business, Interviews

4.7 • 4.4K Ratings

🗓️ 9 November 2015

⏱️ 71 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Should women get routine mammograms? Should men get regular PSA exams? Robert Aronowitz of the University of Pennsylvania and the author of Risky Medicine talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the increasing focus on risk reduction rather than health itself as a goal. Aronowitz discusses the social and political forces that push us toward more preventive testing even when those tests have not been shown to be effective. Aronowitz's perspective is a provocative look at the opportunity cost of risk-reduction.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Welcome to Econ Talk, part of the Library of Economics and Liberty.
0:09.2	I'm your host, Russ Roberts, of Stanford University's Hoover Institution.
0:13.7	Our website is econtalk.org, where you can subscribe, comment on this podcast, and find
0:18.7	links and other information related to today's conversation.
0:21.7	You'll also find our archives where you can listen to every episode we've ever done
0:25.8	going back to 2006.
0:28.3	Our email address is mailadycontalk.org.
0:30.6	We'd love to hear from you.
0:34.1	Before introducing today's guest, I want to alert listeners that there's a special
0:37.9	post script at the end of this week's episode where I reflect on some of the empirical
0:42.4	issues that came up during the conversation.
0:45.6	So after I thank my guest, please stay tuned for some thoughts on risk, health, and data
0:50.1	that are really important.
0:52.4	Today is October 22nd, 2015, and my guest is Robert Aronowitz.
0:57.3	He is a physician, the chair of the Department of History and Sociology of Science at the University
1:02.2	of Pennsylvania, and his latest book, Risky Medicine, Our Quest to Cure Fear and Uncertainty,
1:08.0	is the subject of today's episode.
1:09.7	Robert, welcome to Econ Talk.
1:11.2	Great to be here.
1:12.4	What is Risky Medicine?
1:14.0	Well, I mean the term to cover a few different things that I think characterize a lot of modern
1:20.4	medicine.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Library of Economics and Liberty, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Library of Economics and Liberty and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.