Tradeoffs

The episode on USAID cuts is superb. Every American with a heart should listen to this first-hand explanation of how the cuts are impacting global health now, with implications for future US health. In surgery, a scalpel is more useful than a buzzsaw.

I love the health policy “sensemaking” by way of stories! Very timely discussions. Very authentic stories. And not afraid to touch on the controversial aspects of health policy. One of my fave podcasts of all time!

I went back and actually re-reviewed the New England Journal paper. If you see the population that they enrolled using the lottery, this was a healthy population to start with. They did not have hypertension, and they had no diabetes. It would’ve been very unlikely that Medicaid would’ve made them healthier. Also note they were only 10% African-Americans. This is a bio study from a relatively healthy. Population and should not be used to judge whether Medicaid makes people healthy or not. I would’ve appreciated if the podcast had pointed this out. There was still time to rescue yourself.Please amend.

The host is good and the conversations are thought provoking but they are not interested in representing different sides on healthcare issues. They clearly are committed to the liberal/democratic side and not interested in representing alternate viewpoints. They followed an episode on transgendered care which only represented an expert who is pro gender affirming care with an episode with Obama’s former HHS secretary who was highly critical of the new Trump appointees without any pushback. As we learned from the COVID debacle, it is importantly to have journalistic integrity and pushback rather than claiming to own “science.”