Our California countdown is at T-6 days.
Meanwhile, yesterday I listened to the New England Journal of Medicine audio interview with Drs. Eric Rubin and Lindsay Baden, two of my attendings from my infectious diseases fellowship at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. The podcast was entitled “COVID as an Endemic Disease.”
One point of emphasis from Drs. Rubin and Baden was on COVID diagnostic tests and global scale-up – the variety of tests, their interpretation, and delayed diagnosis. This SARS Cov-2 diagnostics discussion reminded me of the situation with drug-resistant tuberculosis. In Mozambique in 2011, patients and health care workers were experiencing a delayed diagnosis (this occurs in Massachusetts as well – here is one of our papers describing a patient with Isoniazid-resistant tuberculosis).
Xpert and liquid culture (MGIT) for tuberculosis were seldom available in Mozambique a decade ago, and tuberculosis continued to spread. More tests were needed – but they had to be coordinated with the clinics and hospitals. Basic public health infrastructure requires substantial financial commitment. But it isn’t just about money.
Public health and health care leaders have to be collaborating across the globe, or the system will fall apart, as we have seen in COVID. I argue that America needs a single payer/ Medicare-for-all to control COVID and the next infectious threat. Do you agree?
Below, a video where I try to learn Stuff Smith’s version of the song, It’s Wonderful. Thanks for reading my blog entry! If you enjoyed this blog post, please feel free to leave a reply or share with others. And remember, my website is always free.
Philip A. Lederer 
agree
Thanks
On Sat, Feb 12, 2022 at 5:02 AM Health and Healing wrote:
> Philip Lederer MD posted: ” Our California countdown is at T-6 days. > Meanwhile, yesterday I listened to the New England Journal of Medicine > audio interview with Drs. Eric Rubin and Lindsay Baden, two of my > attendings from my infectious diseases fellowship at Brigham and Women’s ” >