Ben Plumley & Emily Bass on PEPFAR, UNAIDS, Russian Microbes, and More

A Shot in the Arm PodcastOct 26 · 50 min

Episode Description

Ben Plumley and Emily Bass are back, as if huddled together in a virtual conference hotel espresso bar, drinking a cocktail, snacking on peanuts, and making sense of the latest global health news that’s broken, breaking or nobody’s bothering with but they should.

This week’s topics:

• Why is Emily Substacking about the post DOGE US President’s Plan for AIDS Relief and why the truth not the spin matters

• The recent Substack from Angela Rasmussen on what the forgotten week-old pneumonia-like infection (that killed a lab technician in Siberia) tells us about how predictable Russia’s reticence with global health authorities continues to be. As worrying, how the disruption caused by the evisceration of the US’ CDC makes pandemic preparedness significantly harder

• The UNAIDS board meeting happening in Geneva about its future; and

• An outstanding piece of journalism in the New York Times by Stephanie Nolen on possible funding opportunities for global health from the new generation of tech billionaires (and not THAT trillionaire)

Things we talk about:

https://substack.com/@emilysbass?r=5kw5og&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=stories&shareImageVariant=light

https://substack.com/@rasmussenretorts?r=5kw5og&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=stories&shareImageVariant=blur

https://benplumley.substack.com/p/a-sunrise-for-unaids?r=5kw5og&utm_medium=ios

People we talk about:

https://www.ninaschwalbe.info/

00:00 Welcome and Introductions

01:09 Why This Substack Exists

05:04 America First Strategy Reality Check

07:13 Where The Money Really Goes

09:11 What’s The Payback

12:19 Transactional Aid Debate