Urban Forests And Climate Change, HIV Treatment Progress. September 4, 2020, Part 1

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🗓️ 4 September 2020

⏱️ 47 minutes

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Summary

New York City’s skyline is dominated by tall skyscrapers—but there’s a surprising amount of forest in the city known as a concrete jungle. Tree canopy actually covers about 20% of the city. In fact, woodlands are one of the few natural resources the city has. Reporter Clarisa Diaz, in collaboration with John Upton from Climate Central, shares how the city’s green spaces, both large and small, are needed to create an urban forest ecosystem in the face of climate change. Plus, forester David Nowak talks about the science behind planting an urban forest, and how to determine the value of a tree. Plus, while all eyes are currently on the COVID-19 pandemic, the coronavirus isn’t the only disease circulating the world. Lockdowns have hindered access to medical care, and supply chains for both tests and medications have been disrupted. With countries allocating limited public health resources to battle COVID-19, longstanding public health threats like tuberculosis, malaria, and HIV/AIDS may be at risk of resurging. However, there is also hopeful news for communities facing HIV/AIDS. Last week, a study published in the journal Nature examined 64 unusual people who seem to be able to naturally keep HIV at bay. Researchers investigated what makes these so-called ‘elite controllers’ able to manage their infections. They now think powerful T cells—a type of white blood cell which helps regulate the immune system—may hold a clue to these cases. Furthermore, earlier in the summer, a trial of a long-lasting injectable drug to prevent HIV infection was found to be at least as protective as the existing “pre-exposure prophylaxis,” or PrEP drug, which must be taken daily. Health and science reporters Apoorva Mandavilli of the New York Times and Jon Cohen of Science join Ira to discuss recent HIV/AIDS developments, and to reflect on 40 years of AIDS research.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is Science Friday. I'm Ira Flato. Contradicting multiple expert opinions about when a COVID-19 vaccine should be available,
0:08.2	the CDC told states they should be prepared to distribute a vaccine by the politically advantageous date of November 1, two days before the elections.
0:24.4	When a COVID-19 vaccine finally becomes available,
0:30.9	who should get it first? Researchers are starting to think ahead because, well, they don't have an easy answer. For example, this week, two groups released proposals, one prioritized first responders and health care workers.
0:39.1	The other said giving it to people with known comorbidities was the most ethical option.
0:45.6	Here to give us a rundown on those proposals and other science stories of the week is Amy Nordrim,
0:51.0	editor for MIT Technology Review. Welcome back, Amy. Thank you, Ira. So experts don't
0:57.2	expect a coronavirus vaccine anytime in the near future, but people are starting to plan ahead
1:03.0	for how one will get distributed when it does become available. Amy, can you give us a rough
1:08.4	outline of the two plans proposed this week? Yeah, certainly. I mean,
1:12.0	it's a very important question, and the two groups that put their proposals out this week are
1:17.0	thinking about that question very differently. So one proposal came from the National Academies of
1:22.2	Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. It laid out a four-phased approach with medical workers being the first to get the
1:28.1	vaccine, as well as elderly people living in nursing homes and those with pre-existing conditions
1:33.4	who might be at higher risk. And then later on in phase two, that would include groups of people
1:38.5	like teachers, people living in prisons, people living in homeless shelters. And then later in the
1:43.6	week, a group of
1:44.3	medical ethicists, 19 from around the world, put out a different three-phase model and a paper
1:49.7	in science. They said a vaccine shouldn't necessarily go to health care workers and the elderly
1:54.2	in certain countries first, but it should be distributed globally based primarily on how many
1:59.4	premature deaths it would avoid. So they wanted to look
2:02.1	at the total population around the world and get the vaccine to those people at highest risk of
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