There's A Plan To Drive Down Global Insulin Prices. Will It Work?

Short Wave

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🗓️ 10 February 2020

⏱️ 11 minutes

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Summary

Diabetes is a growing global problem, especially in low and middle income countries. Half of the 100 million in need of insulin lack reliable access. The World Health Organization wants to do something about it. Short Wave reporter Emily Kwong tells host Maddie Sofia about the WHO's pre-qualification program, a two-year plan to pave the way for more insulin manufacturers to enter the global market.

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to shortwave from NPR.
0:04.8	Hey, everybody.
0:06.4	I've got shortwave reporter Emily Cuong with me today.
0:08.8	Hey, Maddie.
0:09.8	Hey, you.
0:10.8	Today, we're going to talk about a disease that's touching the lives of more and more people
0:14.3	around the world.
0:15.3	Diabetes.
0:16.3	That's right.
0:17.3	Diabetes is super common in the United States, affecting nearly 10% of the population.
0:22.9	I saw it up close with my own grandfather.
0:24.8	I watched him, Prickus Finger, measure his blood sugar level.
0:29.3	But I didn't really grasp diabetes as a global issue until I met John Peter Molo.
0:34.9	I'm 29 years old and I live in Tanzania.
0:39.4	So John Peter is a lab technologist at a hospital in Tanzania, and he's been living with type
0:44.2	one diabetes since he was 15 years old.
0:46.8	Right.
0:47.8	So type one diabetes is when your body doesn't produce insulin at all.
0:51.6	And type two diabetes is when your body resists insulin or does it make enough of it?
0:56.2	Yes.
0:57.2	And it's really important for regulating blood sugar in the body.
1:00.7	And as a person with type one diabetes, John Peter relies on injections of insulin to
	...

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