"It just shows how difficult it is to be reactive with this virus. By the time you've detected something and understood the significance of it you're already several steps behind the virus." -Richard Lessells This is the second in our series on variants of concern. Our previous episode looked at the UK variant, and today we’re looking at the variant that emerged in South Africa: 501Y.V2. This variant is not only more transmissible, but has demonstrated the troubling ability to evade the body's i...
Feb 18, 2021•23 min•Season 1Ep. 62
"I had been assuming that my life and everyone else's life would get closer to normal in March. This [variant] has me worried that it won't be March, that we'll have a spring wave and I don't know how big that will be." -Trevor Bedford This winter a new, more contagious variant of SARS-CoV-2 arose in the United Kingdom: B.1.1.7. The CDC estimates that this will become the dominant strain of coronavirus in the United States by March. This is the first of several episodes on the science and policy...
Feb 11, 2021•20 min•Season 1Ep. 61
"When we interact with nature there are unpredictable and weird mechanisms by which pathogens might be able to move between the species." -Tony Goldberg There’s a lot we don’t know about the origin of the SARS-CoV-2 virus but there is a consensus that it came from animals. This is called zoonosis. HIV, Zika, and Ebola were all viruses in animals before jumping to humans. This is a serious problem. Most new or emerging infectious diseases are the result of zoonotic transmission and we’re seeing m...
Feb 04, 2021•26 min•Season 1Ep. 60
"This is not like a lot of the other disasters that people have studied. It looks a lot more like what you'd expect to see in people who have lived through a war. " -Roy Perlis This is the second in our two-part series about deaths of despair during the pandemic. We speak with experts and review the latest data on how the pandemic is affecting rates of depression, anxiety, and even suicide in the United States. We’ll look back at what was driving these deaths before the pandemic, how the pandemi...
Jan 28, 2021•24 min•Season 1Ep. 59
"When the pandemic hit, many of our recovery groups went online but that's really not the same. All that great work we had been building momentum towards came to a screeching halt." -Will Cooke Overdoses have spiked during the pandemic. One of the reasons is a breakdown in the community support so critical to keeping people off drugs. Social distancing measures and quarantine have created deadly complications for people recovering from addiction. In this episode we'll hear two stories, one from ...
Jan 21, 2021•22 min•Season 1Ep. 58
"It's my responsibility as an owner to figure out how to afford to pay everyone an ethical, fair, livable wage but we have to start from the premise of paying them an ethical, livable wage" -Pete Ternes We’re revisiting restaurants as part of our series on industries disrupted by the pandemic. In this episode we speak with restaurateurs and a labor activist about how the pandemic is reshaping how some think about tips and the minimum wage. We'll see why tipping so is problematic, why it's so har...
Jan 14, 2021•24 min•Season 1Ep. 57
Transcript "That's the challenge with infodemics: too much information and not knowing who to trust." - Claire Wardle Combating misinformation has become more important than ever during the pandemic. The novel coronavirus, social media, and a polarized political environment created something public health experts have dubbed an "infodemic" — a flood of misleading information and conspiracy theories about the coronavirus and the public response to it. In this episode of EPIDEMIC, we'll hear how m...
Jan 08, 2021•22 min•Season 1Ep. 56
Transcript "Masks are absolutely essential because you can't always control when someone gets too close to you. You can't control the ventilation in every room that you go into. The thing you control the most, that you have one hundred percent control over, is that mask." - Kimberly Prather As the death toll from COVID-19 surpassed 300,000 in the United States this week, wearing a mask has never been more important. In this episode, Kimberly Prather and Linsey Marr explain the latest science on ...
Dec 18, 2020•19 min•Season 1Ep. 55
Transcript "If you're going to be traveling, if you're going to be in a situation where you might be exposed to others or where you can protect others by quarantining yourself, right now is the time to do it and to do it carefully because this is when it can be especially effective" -Jeffrey Townsend Quarantines are an effective way to stop the spread of the coronavirus but they have been one of the most difficult and confusing parts of the pandemic. New research shows how people exposed to the ...
Dec 11, 2020•18 min•Season 1Ep. 54
Transcript "This, quite frankly, is our generation's Manhattan project" -Sree Chaguturu This has been a big week for vaccines. There are two vaccines under review by the FDA and the United Kingdom has become the first country to authorize Pfizer's mRNA vaccine. In this episode, we'll talk about the science behind mRNA vaccines, and discuss the physical and mental logistics needed to get these revolutionary vaccines to the public. This podcast was created by Just Human Productions . We're powered...
Dec 04, 2020•24 min•Season 1Ep. 53
Transcript "I was watching the nurses and the doctors and everyone in the healthcare industry just going through this trauma... It was just like people needed help and I had a chance to help." -Jon Gunnell Thanksgiving is right around the corner but new daily cases of coronavirus are worse than ever. In this episode, we'll hear some tips for how to stay safe this holiday season. We'll also hear the story of a nurse who decided to move across the country to help New York City in the early days of...
Nov 20, 2020•24 min•Season 1Ep. 52
Transcript "Food is not going to solve the world's problems because food is itself a part of the problem, but food is an opportunity to begin thinking about it." - Tunde Wey When airlines and other big industries were getting federal aid at the start of the pandemic, chef and artist Tunde Wey argued that the restaurant industry — his own industry — wasn’t worth saving. In this episode, we’ll hear what Tunde thinks is so wrong about how restaurants operate, what the pandemic has done to the indus...
Nov 13, 2020•25 min•Season 1Ep. 51
Transcript "There's this toxic cocktail of low endowment per student, high tuition, low experience, low certification... Those universities could be out of business in a year." - Scott Galloway Coronavirus concerns forced many universities to close their campuses this fall. The mix of fewer students on campus, canceled athletics, and online courses is threatening the viability of many traditional colleges and universities. But the pandemic is also creating opportunities to re-imagine what higher...
Nov 06, 2020•22 min•Season 1Ep. 50
Transcript "We have this long history of seeking personal and individual solutions to public problems and I think the zombie films highlight that." - Robert Wonser From Night of the Living Dead , to 28 Days Later , and World War Z , pandemics have always been at the heart of zombie movies. In this Halloween edition of Epidemic, we find out what these films get right and wrong about the current coronavirus pandemic, what they can teach us about epidemiology, and how fans of horror movies are expe...
Oct 30, 2020•23 min•Season 1Ep. 49
Transcript "I would put this in very plain English: The way to protect the vulnerable is to have fewer infections, not more infections." - Dr. Tom Frieden Talk of achieving herd immunity without a vaccine is back in the news, despite the consensus among public health experts that this approach would cost hundreds of thousands of American lives. Former CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden talks about his recent op-ed against this approach and the "one-two punch" to get the pandemic under control. Then, e...
Oct 23, 2020•26 min•Season 1Ep. 48
Transcript “What could be more political [than] the determination of whether the president can fulfill the powers and duties of his office.” —Prof. George Annas Earlier this month, President Trump announced that he was COVID-positive and was hospitalized for treatment. Since then, a flurry of questions has been raised about his health, and his ability to lead moving forward. Though COVID is new, this is not the first time a president has been seriously ill while serving in office. On today’s epi...
Oct 16, 2020•24 min•Season 1Ep. 47
Transcript "Healthcare is political. There's a difference between politics and partisanship. Thinking about healthcare as not being political I think is where many doctors and unfortunately our healthcare system stand to lose the most." —Dr. Alister Martin COVID has made voting a public health issue this year. In this episode, we'll hear how nursing-home workers, doctors, and entrepreneurs are working to get out the vote in the middle of a pandemic. This podcast was created by Just Human Product...
Oct 09, 2020•23 min•Season 1Ep. 46
Transcript “It's not like the straight trajectory towards recovery… It very feels very much like a one step forward, two steps back. People referred to it as the Corona coaster, because you don't know where it's going to take you next” —Diana Berrent COVID “long-haulers” are people who have extended experiences with COVID symptoms that never let up, or keep recurring. The virus is so new that we do not have a clear picture of what each person’s experience with the disease will be like. In today’...
Oct 02, 2020•25 min•Season 1Ep. 45
Transcript “Public health is one of the few agencies locally that you can guarantee is apolitical. They just care about protecting the health of the community. … But these measures and these tactics by health officers are seen as political and an attempt to limit people's rights.” —Lori Freeman, CEO of the National Association of County and City Health Officials Public health experts have faced strong backlash for supporting decisions to close businesses and to enforce lockdowns and social dista...
Sep 25, 2020•23 min•Season 1Ep. 44
Transcript “I think it's a fascinating microcosm of the situation we’re in as a country. I do think the plan has also may be shown a way that the pandemic needs to be attacked on a larger scale, which is what can be done when testing is plentiful and accessible; what can be done when people are taking mask-wearing seriously; what can be done when people are social distancing, seriously, what can we do when people are quarantining seriously?” —Rohan Nadkarni What would mass testing for COVID look...
Sep 18, 2020•21 min•Season 1Ep. 43
Transcript “Right now … we are in the middle of it, [a] very politicized situation… a lot of divisiveness in our country. 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 almost as if you were doing something to hurt them.” —Dr. Anthony Fauci Dr. Anthony Fauci — Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious D...
Sep 11, 2020•21 min•Season 1Ep. 42
Transcript “If we want to bring students back to college, we have to redefine what college is for the short term… and so we need to think about it with more innovation and depth of thought if we would if we were just applying crisis management models.” —Eleanor Daugherty, Associate Vice President for Student Affairs and Dean of Students at the University of Connecticut The college experience will look very different for many students gearing up to re-enter schools in the fall. How can colleges p...
Aug 04, 2020•23 min•Season 1Ep. 41
Transcript “The goal is not to reopen schools; it’s to keep schools open. And if we reopen too fast, just as we reopened States too fast, you saw what happened. States had to shut down and schools would have to shut down. And that for me would be just a travesty. You re-traumatize children and further endanger… their parents and teachers and bus drivers and custodians.” - Arne Duncan, former US Secretary of Education Normally at this time of year, students would be gearing up for the back-to-sch...
Jul 31, 2020•23 min•Season 1Ep. 40
Transcript “Now that we see them, my hope is that our field of vision about who is working, and just how valuable they are, continues to widen. And that is it's not only about awareness and clapping for them at seven o'clock at night, but we're actively taking action and demanding that they be protected. Demanding that they be compensated. Demanding that they are able to keep their themselves and their families safe, crisis, or no crisis. “ - Ai-jen Poo, Director of the National Domestic Workers...
Jul 28, 2020•23 min•Season 1Ep. 39
Transcript “I literally love my job… and being able to wake up and the end of the day and also say … I possibly helped save a life.” — Kimberly Jocelyn Contact tracers like Kimberly are an integral part of New York City’s plan to reopen safely. If someone tests positive for COVID, contact tracers make it possible to determine which network of people may have been exposed to the virus. But, contact tracers are also tasked with the delicate job of informing someone of their possible exposure. On t...
Jul 24, 2020•22 min•Season 1Ep. 38
Transcript “I don't have any plans on returning in the immediate future. I don't want history to record that COVID grew in America because of irresponsible religious groups… I want to make sure that we are good stewards of health and responsibility.” - Dr. Jamal Bryant COVID has closed down many religious spaces, profoundly impacting faith communities. Many rituals have been disrupted, and social distancing guidelines are preventing people from gathering. In today’s episode, we hear from Rabbi E...
Jul 21, 2020•27 min•Season 1Ep. 37
Transcript “Loneliness is something we hear a lot from individuals in our community. It's a time of physical distancing. And at first, this was really articulated as social distancing. And I think that's a problem. Yes, we are physically disconnected, but that doesn't mean that we're socially disconnected.” — Lucy Flamm Since COVID swept through the world, shelter in place and social distancing measures have kept us physically apart from our friends, families, and communities. Loneliness and iso...
Jul 17, 2020•20 min•Season 1Ep. 36
Transcript "...the pandemic has simply highlighted for some people that hypocrisy, where politicians use so-called medical reasons, protecting women's health, as an excuse for what are really political goals, which is to end access to safe and legal abortion writ large." -Cecile Richards The COVID-19 pandemic has had profound effects on women's’ access to abortion services and reproductive health. In some states, abortion was categorized as elective surgery, and procedures were suspended. In tod...
Jul 14, 2020•21 min•Season 1Ep. 35
Transcript “They say, you need to keep a minimum of six feet distance between people, but we're usually within 10 inches of our clients for the entire time that they are in the salon. The biggest risk is when you're in extended or prolonged, rather contact with somebody and the CDC defines that as more than 15 minutes. I don't know if you've ever had a haircut that took less than 15 minutes, but generally speaking, we cannot social distance from our clients.” - Nicola Corl With the economy re-op...
Jul 10, 2020•22 min•Season 1Ep. 34
Transcript “An immunity passport system would create a two-tier system because it would divide all of us into those who are immune to COVID-19 and those who are not. And the people who are immune will get all of the benefits and privileges that come with that while everybody else who's not immune will be in a second class status.” - Esha Bhandari How do we balance the reopening of the economy with public health and safety? Some have proposed an “immune passport” system, where those with proven C...
Jul 07, 2020•22 min•Season 1Ep. 33
