S1E25 - Larry Brilliant - Life in the Time of COVID
At the time of this writing, the White House just announced its intent to end the COVID-19 pandemic “state-of-emergency” designation in the months ahead. Is this a political move or one informed by science? We met with Pandefense Advisory CEO, Larry Brilliant, to learn the latest of what we do and do not know about the real threats of COVID-19 and related outbreaks. What is the history of vaccines in general? What are the criticisms of the standard narrative about CV19? Did CV19 come from the Wuhan open air market or a bio-weapons laboratory? Is there a third credible possible origin of the pathogen itself? How much do we need to worry about the next pandemic? Do lockdowns make sense? In closing, we learned how an accidental hippy stumbled into eradicating smallpox, befriended Steve Jobs and pioneered social media itself to become, “the luckiest guy on earth.” Join us.
Larry Brilliant, MD, MPH
Founder and CEO of Pandefense Advisory, epidemiologist, philanthropist
Dr. Larry Brilliant is a physician and epidemiologist, CEO of Pandefense Advisory, senior counselor at the Skoll Foundation and a CNN Medical Analyst. Previously, he served on the board of the Skoll Foundation, was Chair of the Advisory Board of the NGO Ending Pandemics, the president and CEO of the Skoll Global Threats Fund, vice president of Google, and the founding executive director of Google.org. He co-founded the Seva Foundation, an NGO whose programs have given back sight to more than 5 million blind people in two dozen countries. In addition, he co-founded The Well, a progenitor of today's social media platforms. Earlier in his career, Dr. Brilliant was an associate professor of epidemiology and international health planning at the University of Michigan. Dr. Brilliant lived in India for nearly a decade where he was a key member of the successful WHO Smallpox Eradication Programme for SE Asia as well as the WHO Polio Eradication Programme. He was the founding chairman of the National Biosurveillance Advisory Subcommittee (NBAS), which was created by presidential directive of President George W. Bush, he was a member of the World Economic Forum's Agenda Council on Catastrophic Risk, and a "First Responder" for CDC's bio-terrorism response effort. Recent awards include the TED Prize, Time magazine's 100 Most Influential People, "International Public Health Hero," and four honorary doctorates. He has lectured at Oxford, Harvard, Berkeley and many other colleges, spoken at the Royal Society, the Pentagon, NIH, the United Nations, and some of the largest companies and nonprofits all over the world. He has written for Forbes, the Wall Street Journal, the Guardian, and other magazines and peer reviewed journals and was part of the Global Business Network where he learned scenario planning. Dr. Brilliant is the author of “Sometimes Brilliant,” a memoir about working to eradicate smallpox, and a guide to managing vaccination programs entitled “The Management of Smallpox Eradication.”
Expertise: Epidemiology, public health, virology and infectious diseases, diagnostics, public policy, national security, philanthropy
https://pandefense.com/larry-brilliant
Conversation recorded on January 26, 2023.