Take as Directed
Health, Fitness & Longevity
About
The CommonHealth is the podcast of the CSIS Bipartisan Alliance for Global Health Security . On The CommonHealth , hosts J. Stephen Morrison and Katherine Bliss delve deeply into the puzzle that connects pandemic preparedness and response, HIV/AIDS, routine immunization, and primary care, areas of huge import to human and national security. The CommonHealth replaces under a single podcast the Coronavirus Crisis Update, Pandemic Planet and AIDS Existential Moment. Produced by Marla Hiller.
Episodes
- Priya Basu, the Pandemic Fund: "Countries are not sitting on the fence. They are lining up."
Priya Basu, head of the Pandemic Fund (est. 2022, based at the World Bank), reflects on the Fund's origin and evolution. "It exists to solve problems no one else was solving." Its $1.4 B invested over three years in pandemic preparedness a…
- A Conversation with Dr. Sania Nishtar, CEO of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance | The Futures Summit
Gavi CEO Sania Nishtar sat down with Katherine E. Bliss , Director and Senior Fellow, Immunizations and Health Systems Resilience, to discuss the Alliance’s ambitious plan of work for the next five years; the ways in which Gavi is reformin…
- The Lenacapavir Partnership and the Evolution of U.S. Foreign Assistance | The Futures Summit
In September 2025, the U.S. Department of State, Gilead Sciences, and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria announced a novel partnership to procure and deliver lenacapavir—a groundbreaking twice-yearly injectable pre-exp…
- Dr. Eli Cahan: “Human beings are wired for stories.”
Dr. Eli Cahan explains how he evolved into both a neonatologist and an accomplished, intrepid journalist, inspired by the likes of Atul Gawande and shaped by experiences during the Covid-19 pandemic. It is a balancing act, rushing between…
- Dr. Benjamin Park, CDC: speed is of utmost importance
Dr. Benjamin Park is Director of the CDC Division of Global Health Protection that protects Americans against dangerous outbreaks by strengthening partner countries’ capabilities to detect and respond. A personal and early professional epi…
- Expanding Access to Immunizations in the Americas | The CommonHealth Live!
During this year’s Vaccination Week in the Americas, which runs from April 25 to May 2, countries across the hemisphere will celebrate the lives saved through immunization programs, carry out special campaigns to increase immunization cove…
- Dan Diamond, Washington Post: “A big hole that no one knows how to fill.”
Dan Diamond, Washington Post reporter on the White House and health care, shares his reflections on President Trump’s swirling passions to reshape Washington’s built environment, with intense controversy surrounding the ballroom. What’s dr…
- Sheryl Gay Stolberg, New York Times: Reflections on HHS Secretary RFK Jr’s tenure
Sheryl Gay Stolberg, New York Times, offers her reflections on HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr’s tenure over the past fifteen months. His vaccine agenda has always been an “outlier”—“an unpopular agenda”—yet it remains at the core of hi…
- The Resurgence of Measles in the United States | CommonHealth Live!
Since January 2025, the United States has confirmed more than 3,000 cases of measles across multiple states - with South Carolina reporting nearly 1000 cases in just the first two months of 2026. The economic costs of these outbreaks pose…
- Emily Gibbons, Gilead Sciences: the lenacapavir partnership
Gilead Sciences, the Trump administration, and the Global Fund have joined in partnership to bring lenacapavir, the new twice-yearly injectable prevention tool against HIV/AIDS, to two million persons at-risk in ten African countries in th…
- Book Event: Deployed by Kevin De Cock
This episode of The CommonHealth features a discussion of the recently published book, Deployed: A Physician on the Front Lines of Global Health , by Kevin M. De Cock. In Deployed, De Cock details an insider’s perspective confronting infec…
- Andi L. Fristedt, Parkinson’s Foundation: “The data (on paraquat) is clear.”
Andi L. Fristedt, former senior official at CDC, FDA and the Senate HELP Committee, heads up a newly established Washington, D.C. office of the Parkinson’s Foundation. The Foundation acts in close allegiance with Michael J. Fox and his fou…
- Keith Poulsen, Wisconsin Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory: “Emergency response is hard.”
Keith Poulsen, professor at the University of Wisconsin and director of the Wisconsin Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory, provides an update on the status of highly pathogenic avian influenza (H5N1), as pertains to dairy cattle, poultry, wil…
- Measles Outbreaks and Elimination in North America | The CommonHealth Live!
Over the past year, outbreaks of measles, a highly transmissible virus, have affected thousands of unvaccinated people across Canada, Mexico and the United States. With more than 5,000 cases and sustained transmission during 2025, Canada l…
- Jane Halton: the launch of CEPI 3.0
Jane Halton, chair of CEPI, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, walks us through CEPI's evolution since its founding in early 2017, and the launch on February 14, at the Munich Security Conference, of CEPI 3.0, fitted to t…
- John-Arne Røttingen, CEO, Wellcome Trust: “The system has changed—and changed forever.”
John-Arne Røttingen, CEO of Wellcome Trust, is a Norwegian leader whose expertise has a remarkable span, encompassing medicine, science, research, clinical trials, negotiations, diplomacy, philanthropy, financing of global health, and gove…
- Keith Humphreys, Stanford University: China’s supply shock of fentanyl and chemical precursors
Keith Humphreys, a leading expert on addiction psychiatry, based at Stanford University, unpacks his January article in Science examining the steep reduction in overdoses deaths—between May 2023 and the end of 2024—in the United States and…
- Amb. (ret) Karl Hofmann, Health X Partners: “Not everyone curtails their job in Paris.”
Amb. (ret) Karl Hofmann is CEO of the recently launched Health X Partners (HXP), a parent company under which Population Services International (PSI) and the Elizabeth Glazer Pediatric AID Foundation (EGPAF) now operate. He explains his pe…
- Dr. Chris Murray, IHME: The “Commission of Commissions.”
Dr. Chris Murray, IHME, co-chairs the Lancet Commission on 21 st Century Global Threats to Health, which will launch its report in February at the Munich Security Conference. It is the “Commission of Commissions,” a novel, highly ambitious…
- Prevention Intention: Wafaa El-Sadr on People and Persistence in HIV Research
In the second episode of the Prevention Intention mini-series, Katherine speaks with Wafaa El-Sadr, University Professor in Epidemiology at Columbia University and the director of ICAP. They discuss El-Sadr’s formative experience treating…
- Prevention Intention: Linda-Gail Bekker on HIV Prevention with Purpose
In the first episode of the Prevention Intention mini-series, a series featuring conversations with leading female HIV clinical researchers, Katherine speaks with Linda-Gail Bekker, a medical doctor and director of the Desmond Tutu HIV Cen…
- Erika Elvander, former U.S. Health Attache in Beijing: “It behooves us to find the common ground.”
Erika Elvander served her country as a federal career health diplomat for 27 years, including as the U.S. Health Attache in Beijing from the spring 2021 until the end of 2024. Her Asia passion ignited while a student in Hong Kong and trave…
- Marian Wentworth, MSH: "I have been working since I was 13."
Marian Wentworth, President & CEO, Management Sciences for Health (MSH), at age 13 started working in a local factory. Attended the famous Latin School in Chicago. Studied math at Harvard. Then joined Merck as it was "growing ferociously f…
- Rep. Adam Smith on Engaging China
Listen to the recent CSIS Bipartisan Alliance for Health Security discussion with Congressman Adam Smith (WA-09), Ranking Member of the House Armed Services Committee, on his experience leading a Congressional delegation to China in late S…
- Dr. Rick Brennan: “This is not good for the American soul.”
Dr. Rick Brennan, an acclaimed Australian humanitarian leader who led WHO and NGO crisis response in multiple conflicts over several decades, walks us through his personal story. He then unpacks the scale and gravity of what is now unfoldi…
- Fair Doses: An Insider's Story of the Pandemic and the Global Fight for Vaccine Equity
Listen to the recent CSIS Bipartisan Alliance for Global Health Security book launch of Fair Doses: An Insider’s Story of the Pandemic and the Global Fight for Vaccine Equity by Seth Berkley. As the gravity and magnitude of the Covid-19 pa…
- Keizo Takemi, recent Japan Minister of Health, Labour and Welfare: "I am quite lucky."
Keizo Takemi, recent Japan Minister of Health, Labour and Welfare (September 2023-October 2024), shares his personal story that took him to Taiwan, CNN/Japan, the Diet, Harvard, back to the Diet, and recently into the cabinet of then Prime…
- Dr. Debra Houry, former Chief Medical Officer and Dep. Director, CDC: “He’s becoming dangerous to the health of our nation.”
Dr. Debra Houry joined the podcast, following her resignation from CDC on August 25, upon the firing of CDC Director Susan Monarez, and shortly after her September 17 testimony before the Senate HELP Committee. What does she make of Presid…
- Peter Piot, LSHTM: “A brilliant coalition” essential to success
The renowned global health leader, Peter Piot, LSHTM, opens this conversation with reflections on what drove the historic global health successes, including “a brilliant coalition” and U.S. bipartisan leadership grounded in statecraft and…
- The Big One: How We Must Prepare for Future Deadly Pandemics
Listen to the recent CSIS Bipartisan Alliance for Health Security book launch of The Big One: How We Must Prepare for Future Deadly Pandemics . As bad as Covid-19 was, the next pandemic could be worse. While the world learns to live with C…
- Dr. Celine Gounder, KFF Health News: "Silence was paralysis"
Dr. Celine Gounder, Editor-at-Large, KFF Health News, explains how the U.S. vaccine enterprise could be damaged so swiftly by the Trump administration, with so little apparent resistance: it was a "shock and awe" blitz, while hesitation an…
- CommonHealth Live! with PAHO’s Dr. Jarbas Barbosa
In the fifteenth episode of the Common Health Live!, Katherine E. Bliss talks with Dr. Jarbas Barbosa, Director of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), about challenges related to health security in the Americas, the importance of…
- Dr. Andriy Klepikov, Alliance for Public Health (Ukraine): "We are still standing."
Dr. Andriy Klepikov, the founder and executive director of the Alliance for Public Health (Ukraine), reflects on the Alliance's remarkable evolution over the past 25 years into a major Ukrainian—and regional—non-governmental force in HIV,…
- Dr. Heidi Larson, LSHTM: “People are struggling to make sense of it.”
Dr. Heidi Larson, the acclaimed expert on vaccine confidence at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine – and CSIS Senior Associate – speaks to how the external world is reacting to the changes in the United States in vaccine po…
- The CommonHealth Live! on Financing Global Health in 2025
In this episode of The CommonHealth Live!, Dr. Christopher J.L. Murray, Director of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) and Stephanie Psaki, CSIS Global Health Policy Center Senior Adviser, will discuss IHME’s new report…
- Dr. Ken Staley, Palantir: “We have a lot of cool stuff on the horizon.”
Dr. Ken Staley, Palantir, has served in health security positions in the George W. Bush and first Trump administrations, with time in-between in private sector biopharma. Palantir was founded after the 9/11 Commission to bring together dat…
- Dr. Ifedayo Adetifa, FIND (Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics): “What we are lacking is the investments to move the needle.”
Dr. Ifedayo Adetifa is a pediatrician and tuberculosis expert who led the Nigerian Centre for Disease Control during the Covid-19 pandemic. A year ago, he became the CEO of FIND, the global alliance for diagnostics, a product development p…
- Michael Osterholm, Univ. Minnesota CIDRAP: the Vaccine Integrity Project
Michael Osterholm, on July 21, spoke with us on the Vaccine Integrity Project that he is spearheading in response to vaccine-related actions taken by the second Trump administration. “We are in totally unprecedented times.” He explores the…
- Richard Hatchett, CEPI: “Access does not just happen.”
Beth Cameron, Senior Advisor and Professor of the Practice at the Brown University Pandemic Center and a Senior Adviser and non-resident fellow at CSIS, hosts this inspiring July 14 conversation with Richard Hatchett, the CEO of CEPI, the…
- Joe Grogan: “The societal divisions that Covid opened were terrifying.”
Joe Grogan, former senior official of the George W. Bush administration and the first Trump administration, operates an active consultancy, hosts a podcast, writes commentaries for USC Schaeffer Center, and is an active member of the CSIS…
- Fabrizio Carboni, International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC): "I had to face what it meant to be on a battlefield."
Fabrizio Carboni, head of the ICRC delegation to the US and Canada, speaks to his vast experience in the wars of the past two decades, including the profound impact of 9/11 (2001) in integrating humanitarian action into battlefield strateg…
- Takeaways from Gavi Replenishment | The CommonHealth Live!
In the thirteenth episode of The CommonHealth Live!, Katherine E. Bliss and J. Stephen Morrison discuss the outcomes of the June 25 Health and Prosperity through Immunization Global Summit, co-hosted in Brussels by Gavi, the Vaccine Allian…
- Sheryl Gay Stolberg, NYT health policy correspondent: HHS Secretary Kennedy may run for President in 2028
Sheryl Gay Stolberg, NYT, delves into what direction HHS Secretary Kennedy is taking US policy. He operates along two divergent strands – vaccines and the Make American Healthy Again (MAHA) agenda. “Kennedy is by nature a skeptic” and has…
- Helen Branswell, Stat News infectious diseases and global health reporter: “Is the solution making it harder for individuals to get vaccines?”
For Helen Branswell, the celebrated Stat News reporter, the SARS outbreak of 2003, while she was based in Toronto, was a thunderclap moment. Jump forward 22 years: Secretary Kennedy on May 28, posted a one-minute video on X announcing he i…
- Dr. Kate O’Brien, WHO: “The success of vaccines is that, basically, nothing happens.”
In this episode, Dr. Kate O’Brien, Director of the Department of Immunization, Vaccines, and Biologicals at the World Health Organization (WHO) shares her perspective on the state of global immunization programs halfway through Immunizatio…
- Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO: “We would welcome a dialogue with the (Trump) administration.”
“I studied hard. Hated the lab, loved the field.” Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, Acting Director, WHO Department of Epidemic and Pandemic Threat Management, reveals her early, personal passions as a student of epidemiology. After a stint as a you…
- Dr. Margaret (Peggy) Hamburg, former FDA Commissioner: “I hope we can come together around shared goals.”
Dr. Margaret (Peggy) Hamburg, former FDA Commissioner, describes the profound impact the HIV epidemic has had on her personally and in terms of her career choices. She discovered in her six years as FDA Commissioner how vitally important F…
- Dr. Jennifer Kates, KFF: “Congress is fed up with blank check forever.”
Dr. Jennifer Kates, SVP and Director, Global Health and HIV Policy Program, KFF, provides a tour d’horizon of how global health and health security look at day #98 of the Trump revolution. “The DOGE factor was not on my bingo card,” as it…
- Measles Outbreaks in 2025 with Dr. Adam Ratner and Dr. Ephrem T. Lemango | The CommonHealth Live!
In the twelfth episode of The CommonHealth Live! which falls during World Immunization Week, Katherine E. Bliss talks with Dr. Adam Ratner, a member of the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Infectious Diseases and author of Boost…
- CommonHealth Live! with Republic of Indonesia Minister of Health Budi Gunadi Sadikin
In the eleventh episode of The CommonHealth Live! Katherine E. Bliss talks with the Republic of Indonesia’s Minister of Health, H.E. Budi Gunadi Sadikin, about Indonesia’s experience expanding routine immunization coverage and prioritizing…