We are in the middle of a very politicized situation. So when you try to get a public health message out, unfortunately, it becomes so

political that there are those who are in favor of what you want to do from a public health

standpoint and those who oppose it to the point of

omas as if you were doing something to hurt them you've got to try to

understand them and not just criticize them because if you criticize them and put them down you

will never ever win them over. They will continually be pushing back against

you. against you're listening to

Epidemic the podcast about the public health and social impacts of the

coronavirus. We're back from our summer break and we have a special guest to welcome you all back to the show.

The one and only, Dr. Tony Fauchy.

We spoke with Dr. Fauchy on Wednesday, September 9th about his role as the nation's chief science

communicator.

We'll hear his take on the latest COVID vaccine news, how he tries to reach people who don't

always believe the science, and we'll hear why Mario Puzo's novel, The Godfather, is one of Dr. Fauchy's favorite books of philosophy.

So let's get to our conversation with Dr. Tony Fauchy, it's so great to have you join us on the epidemic podcast. So the hot science topic of the moment

is vaccines and the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine

trial that was put on hold while they investigate a potential adverse event.

And it's been confirmed that that study participant did indeed receive the experimental vaccine, not the placebo placebo and that she experienced an adverse

event called transverse myelitis.

So for our audience, transverse myelitis is inflammation of the spinal cord. How concerning is this pause in the is is the success of the checks and balances of doing a phased trial.

I mean the whole purpose of going from phase one to phase two to phase three

we have a lot of people in a trial is to determine

...