Public Health On Call

En nuestra segunda entrevista con miembros de Centro SOL, Mónica Guerrero Vázquez, directora ejecutiva y una graduada de la escuela de salud pública de Johns Hopkins y Dra. Kathleen Page directora y médico infectóloga del hospital de Johns Hopkins, hablan sobre el virus que sigue afectando al mundo, incluyendo las noticias más recientes y lo que podemos hacer ahora para protegernos.

Retractions of scientific papers happen for a number of reasons. The desperation driving COVID-19 research has brought this "nuclear option" of scientific correction to a much more public sphere. Dr. Ivan Oransky, who co-runs Retraction Watch, talks with Stephanie Desmon about what retractions typically mean—and don't mean—and how COVID-19 may incite an "existential crisis" in the scientific research community in the push to publish.

Can smartphones assist contact tracing, a public health tool critical to getting the pandemic under control? What's known as "digital contact tracing" has been utilized in other countries, but there are privacy, policy, and equity issues to be worked out before a US launch. Bioethicist Dr. Jeffrey Kahn talks with Stephanie Desmon about the potential and pitfalls of this technology.

Early in the US outbreak of COVID-19, New Orleans was struck hard. At one point, the city of about 400,000 people was seeing up to 450 cases diagnosed per day. Today, it has reduced cases 95% from that peak. Dr. Jennifer Avegno, director of the Health Department in New Orleans, said this is due in no small part to New Orleans's history of disaster and the infrastructure and partnerships that were put in place following Hurricane Katrina. Avegno talks with Dr. Josh Sharfstein about how New Orleans pulled out of the tailspin, what the city continues to do to keep cases down, and why protesting is an "essential" activity.

The protests following the homicide of George Floyd reflect serious questions about the legitimacy of the police. Law professor and philosopher Ekow Yankah talks with Dr. Josh Sharfstein about the nature of legitimacy and the longstanding double standard that has led the nation to a moment of reckoning on race. He explains, "We can no longer have an America where white problems are social problems and black problems are policing problems."

A special episode today as Dr. Josh Sharfstein discusses Albert Camus's The Plague with Dr. Mark Christian Thompson, chair of the English department at Johns Hopkins. The Plague, which was written in 1947, is immediately relevant to our experiences with COVID-19 and so much more. Thompson and Sharfstein discuss the book's relevance to current events including racial and social inequality. (Don't worry: You do not have to have read The Plague before listening to the podcast!)

The science behind loneliness shows that it's common and has significant impacts on physical, mental, and emotional health. The unusual and socially isolating circumstances of COVID-19 are exacerbating this issue and could lead to a "social recession." Former Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy talks with guest host Colleen Barry about how COVID-19 is affecting our social health, how to protect ourselves from the deleterious effects of technology, and what we can do to promote a "social revival" and connect in a time of distancing.

Leaders of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research Dr. Daniel Webster and Dr. Cass Crifasi have studied the relationships between communities and police forces for years. The researchers, with colleagues, recently released a new report looking at enforcement of gun laws in Baltimore. In the wake of the homicide of George Floyd and drawing on this report, Webster and Crifasi talk with Dr. Josh Sharfstein about the profound loss of trust between minority communities and the police and the role of greater transparency and accountability to move forward.

At first, it seemed that COVID-19 was sparing children from critical—and even mild—illness. Then, doctors began connecting a constellation of symptoms in sick children to what is now known as Multi-System Inflammatory Syndrome in Children, a rare and dangerous disease thought to be caused by an immune reaction to SARS-CoV-2. Dr. Lasya Gaur, a pediatric cardiologist at Johns Hopkins Hospital, talks with Stephanie Desmon about what we know and what we still need to learn about this disease, what parents should know, and what treatments have been helpful for children who become ill.

The Latinx immigrant community has been hit particularly hard by the COVID-19 pandemic for reasons that include housing, employment, transportation, and obstacles to receiving care. George Escobar, chief of programs and services at CASA, an immigrant advocacy organization in Maryland, talks with Dr. Josh Sharfstein about the policies that led to this population being particularly vulnerable to COVID-19, changes needed to ensure future health, and what CASA is doing to help during the pandemic.