Healthy Communities Online

Ben Jealous, the former NAACP president, is taking charge as the new executive director of the Sierra Club. It’s America’s largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization with nearly 4 million members and supporters. With a strategy focused on equity and activism, Jealous and the Sierra Club are committed to retiring coal plants, preventing new fossil fuel plants from being built, and working to stop the expansion of fracked gas. Jealous joins hosts Mark Masselli and Margaret Flinter to talk…

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FDA vaccine advisor Dr. Paul Offit’s recent article in JAMA Pediatrics looks at the millions of 5- to 11-year-old children who received the COVID vaccine. His in-depth research review found that the mRNA vaccine was effective at preventing COVID, symptomatic infection, hospitalization, and multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children. The vaccine was also safe; myocarditis occurred in very rare cases. Dr. Offit joins hosts Mark Masselli and Margaret Flinter to discuss his findings and why he supports the end of the…

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Dr. Louis Sullivan’s leadership and advocacy for equity in the health professions have taken him from the classroom to the seats of power in Washington. He reflects on his own journey and the challenges that still exist in training people of color to become doctors and for other medical roles. Dr. Sullivan believes, “It’s a combination of a lack of adequate preparation, lack of financial resources, and also a lack of role models.” He shares his inspiring story from the…

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A top World Health Organization public health official is adding nuance to the agency’s call for more transparency from China, which is coping with a crippling COVID-19 outbreak since it ended its zero-COVID policy last month. Maria Van Kerkhove, Ph.D., WHO Technical Lead for COVID-19 Response, tells “Conversations on Health Care” that “We really need better understanding on the burden and the hospitalizations and we need more information on the sequences…they have detected known sub-variances…but we need those sequences to…

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Dr. Richard Besser, who once led the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, doesn’t believe the recently enacted U.S. COVID testing requirement for anyone arriving from China will have much of an impact. Besser, who is currently president and CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, says he feels such actions are often “more for show than truly for controlling a public health threat” and recalls that 14 years ago possible border closings during the H1N1 outbreak were seen as…

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The health care public policy debates that swirled in 2022 will continue to make news in 2023. These issues ranged from the Dobbs abortion decision to the outcome of the midterm elections. Many of the nation’s leading experts joined “Conversations on Health Care” during the past 12 months to share their perspectives. Join hosts Mark Masselli and Margaret Flinter as we look back at the year that was in health care policy.