The CommonHealth

Providing services equitably requires global health practitioners to have detailed data on the populations they are trying to reach. This episode of Take as Directed, hosted by Senior Fellow Nellie Bristol, highlights new initiatives to collect and analyze sub-national data to give a clearer picture of children being missed. Nellie is joined by guests Laurie Werner, Global Director for the Better Immunization Data (BID) Initiative at PATH, and Jon Mosser, a Fellow in pediatric infectious diseases at Seattle Children’s Hospital and the University of Washington and Clinical Fellow with the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. They discuss new initiatives to map vaccine coverage, technical challenges to collecting data in resource poor settings, and the importance of spending development dollars on data collection and analysis.   Hosted by Nellie Bristol. Produced by Alex Bush. Edited by Ribka Gemilangsari.

The world of global health security has been amassed in headlines over the past few weeks—from the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo, to the elimination of the Global Health Security Directorate within the White House National Security Council staff. For this episode of Take as Directed, we feature three leading health security experts with substantial frontline experience who discuss the current state of preparedness around the world, gaps and priorities looking ahead, and how to maintain pandemic preparedness as a high-level political priority at times of peace. Beth Cameron, Vice President of Global Biological Policy and Programs at the Nuclear Threat Initiative, serves as our guest host for this discussion, alongside featured guests Amadou Sall, CEO of Pasteur Institute in Dakar, Senegal, and Andrew Kitua, Africa Regional Director of the USAID Preparedness and Response project.

Amidst a time of potentially historic talks between the U.S. and North Korea, we take an inside look at the health challenges that North Korea faces and the opportunities for progress that can be made through key diplomatic steps. For this discussion, we turn to Dr. Kee B. Park, Paul Farmer Global Surgery Scholar at Harvard Medical School and Director of North Korea Programs for the Korean American Medical Association. Dr. Park has just returned from another trip to North Korea and joins us to discuss his latest visit, the potential impacts of economic sanctions on humanitarian engagement, and the operating environment that influenced the Global Fund's decision to close its TB and malaria programs. We conclude by hearing about some exciting new initiatives Dr. Park is pursuing to strengthen U.S.-North Korea collaboration in the health sector and his optimism looking forward. Dr. Park is also one of many co-authors on our recent commentary “The Gathering Health Storm Inside North Korea.” Hosted by Steve Morrison. Produced by Alex Bush. Edited by Ribka Gemilangsari.

Christopher Murray, director of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), is a pioneer in the world of global burden of disease measurement. In April, IHME released their annual report on global health financing and two accompanying articles in The Lancet. Chris joins us for today’s episode to discuss the future of financing the global HIV/AIDS pandemic and the efforts to move towards universal health coverage around the world.   Hosted by Steve Morrison. Produced by Alex Bush. Edited by Ribka Gemilangsari.

Despite substantial progress made in expanding access to HIV/AIDS treatment and prevention options, a vaccine for HIV—even an imperfect one—is likely needed to put a durable end to the epidemic. In this episode of Take as Directed, Dr. Mark Feinberg, President and CEO of the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) discusses the landscape of HIV vaccine development and why he thinks a vaccine remains a necessary pursuit. Dr. Feinberg also discusses the facilitating role that IAVI plays in the HIV vaccine development process. Hosted by Sara Allinder. Produced by Alex Bush. Edited by Ribka Gemilangsari.