Health & Veritas

Howie and Harlan are joined by internist and author Robert Wachter to discuss his new book, which explores how AI is already changing day-to-day medical practice and argues that it can improve care, reduce burnout, and even help repair a broken healthcare system.
Show notes:
Robert Wachter: A Giant Leap: How AI Is Transforming Healthcare and What That Means for Our Future
Robert Wachter: The Digital Doctor: Hope, Hype, and Harm at the Dawn of Medicine's Computer Age
Robert Wachter: "Pattern Recognition"
"AI Prognosis: Readers' predictions for health AI in 2026. What's on your bingo card?"
Robert Wachter: "Will The AI Jobpocalypse Hit Healthcare?"
Video: Geoff Hinton on deep learning and radiology
"Call me Dr Ishmael: trends in electronic health record notes available at emergency department visits and admissions"
"OpenAI launches ChatGPT Health to connect user medical records, wellness apps"
"Utah launches first-in-the-nation trial that lets AI renew your prescription"
Robert Wachter: "Will AI Rescue Primary Care?"
"We found what you're asking ChatGPT about health. A doctor scored its answers."
Robert Wachter: "We Need Medical AI for Patients"
Robert Wachter: "Medicine's AI Knowledge War Heats Up" 
Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Medical Education: Proceedings and Recommendations
Robert Wachter: Deskilling and Healthcare AI"
"Are A.I. Tools Making Doctors Worse at Their Jobs?"
"The Robot Doctor Will See You Now"
Atul Gawande: "Personal Best"

In the Yale School of Management's MBA for Executives program, you'll get a full MBA education in 22 months while applying new skills to your organization in real time.
Yale's Executive Master of Public Health offers a rigorous public health education for working professionals, with the flexibility of evening online classes alongside three on-campus trainings.
Email Howie and Harlan comments or questions.

Howie and Harlan are joined by Mary-Ann Etiebet of the public health organization Vital Strategies to discuss how policy, prevention, and stronger public-health systems can reduce the global burden of cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and other preventable conditions. Harlan reports on the federal push toward fully autonomous clinical care for heart failure; Howie looks at proposed cuts to Medicare Advantage payments and what they mean for beneficiaries, plans, and taxpayers.
Show notes:
Autonomous Care
SAM.gov: Agentic AI-EnableD CardioVascular CAre TransfOrmation (ADVOCATE) Proposers' Day Special Notice 
"ARPA-H to revolutionize cardiovascular disease management with clinical agentic AI" 
ARPA-H: Agentic AI-Enabled Cardiovascular Care Transformation 
Mary-Ann Etiebet
Health & Veritas Episode 7: Dr. Mary-Ann Etiebet: Saving Mothers' Lives 
Vital Strategies 
WHO: Noncommunicable diseases
WHO: Global NCD Compact 2020–2030
"Health Taxes Are a Triple Win for African Countries—New Brief From Vital Strategies and Partners Provides Strategy"
Mary-Ann Etiebet: "Using Health Taxes to Promote Public Good" 
"'Historic Public Health Victory': Vital Strategies Applauds Brazil's Approval of Selective Tax on Tobacco, Soft Drinks, and Alcohol"
Vital Strategies: Partners
WHO: Civil registration and vital statistics 
HHS: United States Completes WHO Withdrawal
WHO statement on notification of withdrawal of the United States
Medicare Advantage
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services: "CMS Proposes 2027 Medicare Advantage and Part D Payment Policies to Improve Payment Accuracy and Sustainability"
"Medicare Advantage in 2025: Enrollment Update and Key Trends"
"Trump administration signals there's widespread desire to curb Medicare Advantage" 
"Medicare Rates Shock Sparks $100 Billion Selloff in Insurers"

In the Yale School of Management's MBA for Executives program, you'll get a full MBA education in 22 months while applying new skills to your organization in real time.
Yale's Executive Master of Public Health offers a rigorous public health education for working professionals, with the flexibility of evening online classes alongside three on-campus trainings.
Email Howie and Harlan comments or questions.

Howie and Harlan are joined by health policy writer Jonathan Cohn to discuss the RFK Jr. food agenda, the barriers to universal healthcare in the U.S., and working alongside former political adversaries at The Bulwark. Harlan reports on a lawsuit exposing gaps in the privacy of medical-records systems; Howie highlights new research suggesting that a sharp drop in opioid overdose deaths may be temporary.
Show notes:
Data Privacy
"Epic's lawsuit against Health Gorilla raises broader issues about the future of data sharing, industry executives say"
The Trusted Exchange Framework and Common Agreement
Jonathan Cohn
The Bulwark
The Bulwark: The Breakdown
Jonathan Cohn: "The Real Story Behind the Minnesota Welfare Fraud Scandal"
Jonathan Cohn: "How Somalis Became the New 'Welfare Queens'"
FDA: Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) Advertisements
FDA: Unique Device Identifiers
Jonathan Cohn: "Trump's Assault on Health Care, Seen from a Country That Does Health Care Better"
Jonathan Cohn: Sick: The Untold Story of America's Health Care Crisis—and the People Who Pay the Price
Jonathan Cohn: "Michelle Obama Will Be Accepting Your Apologies Now" 
"RFK Jr.'s new dietary guidelines go all in on meat and dairy" 
Opioid Deaths
CDC: Provisional Drug Overdose Death Counts 
"Did the illicit fentanyl trade experience a supply shock?"

In the Yale School of Management's MBA for Executives program, you'll get a full MBA education in 22 months while applying new skills to your organization in real time.
Yale's Executive Master of Public Health offers a rigorous public health education for working professionals, with the flexibility of evening online classes alongside three on-campus trainings.
Email Howie and Harlan comments or questions.

Howie and Harlan are joined by health law and policy expert Sara Rosenbaum to discuss how incremental reform expanded healthcare access—and the urgent work now underway to prevent those gains from being undone. Harlan explores how AI is quietly filling gaps in the healthcare system; Howie highlights a milestone in the prevention of mother-to-child HIV transmission.
Show notes:
AI as a Healthcare Tool
OpenAI: "AI as a Healthcare Ally"
"Cost Leads Americans' Top-of-Mind Healthcare Concerns"
"Physician sentiments around the use of AI in health care: motivations, opportunities, risks, and use cases"
OpenAI: Introducing ChatGPT Health
Sara Rosenbaum
"The Policy Entrepreneur"
KFF: Children's Health Insurance Timeline
Sara Rosenbaum: "A 'Shift in Kind': A Medicaid Work Requirement Would Radically Change Health Policy"
Sara Rosenbaum: "Implementing Medicaid Work Reporting Requirements: Defining A 'Serious Or Complex Medical Condition'"
Sara Rosenbaum: "Who's Affected by Medicaid Work Requirements? It's Not Who You Think"
"South Carolina reports 124 new measles cases as outbreak grows"
"Medical Groups Will Try to Block Childhood Vaccine Recommendations"
CDC: About the Vaccines for Children (VFC) Program
Sara Rosenbaum: "A Twenty-First Century Vaccines For Children Program"
Sara Rosenbaum: "Nearly 5.6 Million Community Health Center Patients Could Lose Medicaid Coverage Under New Work Requirements, with Revenue Losses Up to $32 Billion"
Sara Rosenbaum: "How Medicaid Built Community Health Centers and Health Centers Returned The Favor"
KFF: 5 Key Facts About Medicaid and Provider Taxes
"How New Limits on State Provider Taxes Will Affect Medicaid Funding"
Preventing Mother-to-Child Infection
"WHO validates Brazil for eliminating mother-to-child transmission of HIV"
Health & Veritas Episode 178: Sarah DeSilvey: Creating Space for Healing
"Why Syphilis Cases in Newborns Are Rising Even as STIs Decline"

In the Yale School of Management's MBA for Executives program, you'll get a full MBA education in 22 months while applying new skills to your organization in real time.
Yale's Executive Master of Public Health offers a rigorous public health education for working professionals, with the flexibility of evening online classes alongside three on-campus trainings.
Email Howie and Harlan comments or questions.

In this bonus episode, Howie and Harlan are joined by Ania Jastreboff, a Yale School of Medicine endocrinologist and an expert on the science of obesity. They discuss her new book, co-authored with Oprah Winfrey, which reframes obesity as a treatable disease rooted in biology—not a failure of willpower.
Show notes:
Ania Jastreboff and Oprah Winfrey: Enough: Your Health, Your Weight, and What It's Like To Be Free
Yale Obesity Research Center (Y-Weight)
The Oprah Podcast: "Oprah and Yale Researcher Break Down How Weight Loss Drugs Affect the Brain"
The Oprah Podcast: "Oprah and Dr. Ania Jastreboff on How People Treat You Differently After Weight Loss"
Ania Jastreboff: "Tirzepatide for Obesity Treatment and Diabetes Prevention"
Ania Jastreboff: "Once-Monthly Maridebart Cafraglutide for the Treatment of Obesity — A Phase 2 Trial"
Mayo Clinic: Semaglutide (oral route)
Eli Lilly: What to know about orforglipron: An investigational oral GLP-1
"CagriSema for Weight Loss: Study Results, Availability, and How Other GLP-1s Compare"
Eli Lilly: What to know about eloralintide: An investigational amylin receptor agonist injection
Cleveland Clinic: "Should You Microdose GLP-1 Drugs?"

In the Yale School of Management's MBA for Executives program, you'll get a full MBA education in 22 months while applying new skills to your organization in real time.
Yale's Executive Master of Public Health offers a rigorous public health education for working professionals, with the flexibility of evening online classes alongside three on-campus trainings.
Email Howie and Harlan comments or questions.