Howie and Harlan discuss health headlines including the ongoing cyclosporiasis outbreak; a recent FDA decision allowing pharmacies to compound certain peptides; and a concerning report from Medicare trustees on the program's financial future. They also dive into the health habits they're changing this year and a new feature from ChatGPT allowing users to connect medical records and health data to the platform.

Show Notes:

Healthy Habits

Health & Veritas: Ezekiel Emanuel

"What's Erythritol? And Is It Bad for You?"

NIH: Aging and Alcohol

"Low-plastic diet and urinary levels of plastic-associated phthalates and bisphenols: the randomized controlled PERTH Trial"

Health & Veritas: Eric Topol

Cyclosporiasis Outbreak

CDC: Surveillance of Cyclosporiasis

FDA: Investigation of 9-State Outbreak of Cyclospora Illnesses: Iceberg Lettuce (July 2026)

"Cyclospora Outbreak Linked to Iceberg Lettuce in 9 States"

National Foundation for Infectious Diseases: Norovirus

FDA: Cyclospora

CDC: Clinical Overview of Cyclosporiasis

CDC: About FoodNet

CDC: About PulseNet

FDA: FSMA Final Rule on Requirements for Additional Traceability Records for Certain Foods

Peptides and the FDA

Health & Veritas: Trust, Truth, and Moral Distress

"Peptides: What they are, potential benefits, and safety concerns"

"FDA committee votes to make peptides more widely available"

LinkedIn: Ezekiel Emanuel

The Future of Medicare

OASDI: Trustees Report Summary

U.S. Department of the Treasury: Social Security and Medicare Trustees Reports

H.R.1: An act to provide for reconciliation pursuant to title II of H. Con. Res. 14.

IRS: Inflation Reduction Act of 2022

ChatGPT Ventures into Health

"Launching Health in ChatGPT"

"OpenAI makes Health in ChatGPT widely available, moving deeper into consumer health"

"ChatGPT Led to a Man's Near-Fatal Health Crisis, Lawsuit Claims"

LinkedIn: David Rhew

A Record Measles Season

Health & Veritas: Measles Outbreaks, Preventative Cardiology, and Other News

CDC: Measles Cases and Outbreaks

"Measles Cases in the U.S. Are at a 35-Year High"

"What ProPublica Found in the Genetic Code of America's Measles Outbreaks"

Pan American Health Organization

Senator Bill Cassidy

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.

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Howie and Harlan are joined by Melanie Matheu, co-founder and chief scientific officer of Lyric Bio, who also shares evidence-based health and science information on TikTok as LaughterinLight PhD. They discuss developing new antibody therapies, building biotech companies, and communicating complex science to the public. Harlan warns that AI could drive up healthcare costs unless payment models change; Howie highlights encouraging declines in traffic deaths while noting the growing risks associated with e-bikes and e-scooters.

Show notes:

AI and Healthcare Costs

"What Is Fee for Service in Healthcare and How It Works"

"Payment for Clinical AI"

"CMS floats new Medicare payment category for AI diagnostic software: 6 notes"

Melanie Matheu

LaughterinLight PhD on TikTok

Lyric Bio

Hyper-IgM (HIgM) Syndromes

Polyclonal Antibodies (PAbs)

Autoimmune Diseases

Kawasaki disease

NIH: R01 research grants

Prellis Biologics

Cyclosporiasis

"FDA says false-positive lettuce test doesn't change Taylor Farms cyclospora probe"

WHO: Ebola virus disease outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

Dr. Zachary Rubin

From Bench to Bedside podcast

Zachary Rubin: All About Allergies: How to Live Well with Asthma, Food Allergies, Hay Fever and More

Road Safety

"The '100 Deadliest Days' Have Begun"

WHO: "Road deaths fall by 21% globally but stronger action is needed to save lives"

NHTSA: "Crash-Stats: Early Estimate of Motor Vehicle Traffic Fatalities and Fatality Rate in 2025"

Consumer Product Safety Commission: "Micromobility Products-Related Deaths Injuries and Hazard Patterns 2017-2024"

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 Shivan Mehta, associate chief innovation officer at the University of Pennsylvania Health System, to discuss how healthcare organizations can use behavioral science to remove barriers that keep patients from getting recommended care. Harlan warns that ill-defined rules governing scientific collaboration with China could chill medical research; Howie revisits the discovery of Legionnaires' disease 50 years ago as New York confronts a new outbreak.

Show notes:

Restrictions on Collaboration

National Science Foundation "Prohibition on Collaborations with Restricted Entities"

"Fact of the Week: China Has Surpassed the US in the Number of Drug Clinical Trials, With 1,100 More Trials Listed"

Texas Executive Order GA-48 Governor Greg Abbott's executive order restricting travel to China and other countries.

Shivan Mehta

Shivan Mehta: "Texting in Health Care—Preserving Impact and Managing Influx"

Kevin Volpp, MD, PhD

"Randomized controlled trials – The what, when, how and why"

CDC: Screening for Colorectal Cancer

Cleveland Clinic: What is a Gastroenterologist?

Cologuard Plus Colon Cancer Screening Test

Mayo Clinic: Colonoscopy

"What to know about the new blood-based test for colorectal cancer"

Mayo Clinic: Fecal immunochemical test

Mayo Clinic: Colon polyps

Cleveland Clinic: Fecal Occult Blood Test

"Non-invasive blood and stool CRC screening tests: Available modalities and their clinical application"

"Race/Ethnicity and Adoption of a Population Health Management Approach to Colorectal Cancer Screening in a Community-Based Healthcare System"

Integrated Delivery System

Corinne M. Rhodes, MD, MPH

Legionnaires' Disease

CDC: Legionnaires' Disease

"New York Is Having a Legionnaires' Outbreak. Here's What to Know."

"Mayor Mamdani Takes Aggressive Action to Address Upper East Side Legionnaires' Disease Community Cluster"

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 Kate Heilpern, president of Yale New Haven Hospital, to discuss the hospital's 200-year history, the financial pressures facing health systems, and how Yale New Haven is balancing innovation with its mission to serve the local community. Harlan examines the growing burden of U.S. healthcare costs; Howie highlights encouraging trends in infant mortality, life expectancy, overdose deaths, and cancer survival.

Show notes:

Healthcare Costs

"National Health Expenditure Projections, 2025–34: Strong Utilization Growth Initially, Legislative Impacts Later"

"KFF Health Tracking Poll: Health Care Costs, Expiring ACA Tax Credits, and the 2026 Midterms"

"Americans See Health Care Costs, Deficit, Inflation as Big Problems Facing the Nation"

"How Much and Why ACA Marketplace Premiums Are Going Up in 2027"

"U.S. Health Care from a Global Perspective, 2026"

"The Cost of Health Insurance for a Family Jumps to $27,000"

Zack Cooper

"FDA approves Trutakna for IgA nephropathy"

Kate Heilpern

Yale New Haven Hospital: Vision, Mission, and Values

Yale New Haven Hospital: History and Heritage

"A Bicentennial Milestone: Yale New Haven Hospital Reflects on 200 Years of Care"

Megan L. Ranney

Azita Emami

CDC: Social Determinants of Health

Health & Veritas Episode 188: "Kate Heilpern: Jumping into the Deep End"

American Hospital Association: "Costs of Caring"

Adams Neurosciences Center

Positive Trends in Mortality

CDC: Infant Mortality Quarterly Provisional Estimates

"Life Expectancy in U.S. Hit Record High of 79 Years in 2024, CDC Says"

CDC: "Provisional Data: U.S. Death Rate Fell to a Record Low in 2025"

CDC: Provisional Drug Overdose Data

CDC: Maternal Mortality Rates in the United States, 2024

"American Cancer Society Releases Latest Cancer Statistics"

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 special episode, Howie and Harlan revisit their conversation with trauma surgeon Selwyn Rogers, whose book Healing the Gun Violence Epidemic: Ending Violence, Rebuilding Communities, and a Trauma Surgeon's Vision for Restoring Hope was published on July 7.

Show notes:

Selwyn Rogers: Healing the Gun Violence Epidemic: Ending Violence, Rebuilding Communities, and a Trauma Surgeon's Vision for Restoring Hope

Albert Ko

"Selwyn Rogers named associate editor of prestigious New England Journal of Medicine"

Selwyn Rogers: "Hope—Beyond Firearm Trauma"

Selwyn Rogers: "Structural Racism and Firearm Injury: Operationalizing Health Equity in Trauma Care"

Brain Death: What it is, Stages & Criteria

New York Times Live Updates: Supreme Court Birthright Citizenship Case

Annual Gun Violence Data 2023

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 Jessica Federer, managing director of the Women's Health Fund and a member of the Yale Institutional Review Board, to discuss how investors can help address the dearth of research on medical problems facing women and why she's optimistic about the future of women's health. Harlan explains how caps on indirect costs affect institutional staffing and research agendas; Howie reports on a lawsuit filed by 26 states against the Trump administration over bureaucratic hurdles to accessing Medicaid coverage.

Show notes:

Indirect research costs

Yale Research Support: Facilities and Administrative (F&A) Costs

Yale University: Colleges and Universities Rate Agreement

"NIH Indirect Costs Policy for Research Grants: Recent Developments"

Jessica Federer

Yale School of Public Health

Megan L. Ranney, Dean of the Yale School of Public Health

Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality

The Women's Health Fund

Yale School of Medicine: Basmah Safdar

Health & Veritas: Basmah Safdar

Women's Health Research at Yale

"Women's Health Research at Yale and SWHR's Symposium Highlights the Power of Collaboration to Advance Women's Health Research"

"CARE for women: Investing in care delivery to improve women's lives and livelihoods"

LinkedIn: Jessica J. Federer

Health & Veritas: Live at the Yale Innovation Summit 2026

"What Is a General Partner in Venture Capital (VC)?"

"April Koh (Co-Founder & CEO, Spring Health) Featured on Cover of TIME"

"Closing the Gap: How Yale Is Advancing Women's Health Research"

Medicaid work requirement

"States Sue CMS Over Medicaid Work Requirements Rule, Citing Departure from Earlier Guidance on Medical Frailty"

Massachusetts v. Oz [pp. 208-231]

Health & Veritas: Ryan Schwarz

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 Yale School of Public Health biostatistician Bhramar Mukherjee to discuss how statisticians help researchers turn observations into evidence. Harlan examines a new study linking updated COVID vaccination to lower cardiovascular risk and explains why a headline-grabbing result may not settle the question; Howie discusses new Medicaid work requirements and the danger that administrative hurdles could cost vulnerable patients their coverage.

Show notes:

The COVID-19 Vaccine and Cardiovascular Health

"2024-2025 COVID-19 Vaccine and Major Adverse Cardiovascular Events Among US Veterans"

"Target Trial Emulation—A Unifying Approach for Causal Inference From Observational Data | Research, Methods, Statistics"

"Risk Reduction: Absolute vs. Relative Explained"

Bhramar Mukherjee

"Ten Core Concepts for Ensuring Data Equity in Public Health"

Bhramar Mukherjee: "Privacy-enhancing sequential learning under heterogeneous selection bias in multi-site electronic health records data"

Michigan Genomics Initiative

NIH: All of Us Research Program

Megan Ranney, Dean of the Yale School of Public Health

Big Data Summer Immersion at Yale

"The big data paradox and significance"

'What Is Variance in Statistics? Definition, Formula, and Example"

Medicaid work requirements

Center for Health Care Strategies: Summary of Federal Medicaid Work Requirements

"CMS Requires More Restrictive Definition of Medical Frailty in New Medicaid Work

Requirements Rule"

Cleveland Clinic: Frailty

"Coverage losses, substantial confusion in Arkansas following implementation of Medicaid work requirements"

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 Ingrid Katz, director of the Yale Institute for Global Health, to discuss why HIV continues to spread despite the existence of cheap and effective treatment, what AIDS activism can teach us about tackling chronic diseases like hypertension, and what outbreaks like Ebola reveal about the consequences of fragile health systems. Harlan reports on a breach of UK Biobank data and what it means for the future of open science; Howie highlights two recent papers illustrating the importance of vitamin C and the danger of treating it as a cure-all.

Show notes:

The UK Biobank Data Breach

UK Biobank

NIH: All of Us Research Program

"UK Biobank health data listed for sale in China, government confirms"

"UK Biobank: Confidential patient health details still online three months after leaks, BMJ finds"

Ingrid Katz

HIV

PEPFAR

The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria

Differentiated Service Delivery

Hypertension

"Prevalence, Awareness, and Treatment of Hypertension in 37 African Countries: Trends From 2003 to 2022"

Noncommunicable Diseases (NCDs)

Treatment Action Campaign

"Health & Veritas Episode 224: Nicholas Christakis: The Science of Human Connection"

CDC: Ebola Outbreak: Current Situation

South African president Thabo Mbeki

"More than Two Decades Since the Abuja Declaration: A Way Forward for Ending AIDS as a Public Health Threat by 2030"

Vitamin C

Linus Pauling

"High-Dose Intravenous Vitamin C and Mortality and Organ Dysfunction in Severe Burn Injury: The VICTORY Randomized Clinical Trial"

"High-Dose Vitamin C in Burns: Time to Stop"

"A 7-Year-Old Girl with Limping and Leg Pain"

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 discuss healthcare headlines including proposed changes to federal research funding, an outbreak of New World screwworm in Texas cattle, and the debate over free expression after researchers were removed from the American Diabetes Association meeting for distributing an editorial critical of federal science policies. They also examine the future of generic GLP-1 drugs, a new Medicare model for heart failure care, and a court ruling with implications for international physicians practicing in the United States.

Show notes:

Research Grants

NIH: NOT-OD-25-132: Supporting Fairness and Originality in NIH Research Applications

Akiko Iwasaki

Health & Veritas Episode 192: Akiko Iwasaki: What Have We Learned About Long COVID?

Stuart Buck

"White House proposes new rules giving political appointees final approval on research grants"

U.S. Constitution: Article II

Skinny Labeling and the Supreme Court

"Supreme Court Upholds Preventive Services Requirement Under ACA"

"Supreme Court Rejects Colorado Law Banning 'Conversion Therapy' for L.G.B.T.Q. Minors"

Hikma Pharmaceuticals USA Inc. v. Amarin Pharma, Inc. (24-889)

"Hikma v. Amarin: Supreme Court Weighs Future of 'Skinny Labeling'"

Value-Based Care

CMS: Value-Based Care

CMS: Hospital Readmission Reduction

New World Screwworm

CDC: New World Screwworm

USDA: New World Screwworm Economic Impact Report

USDA: Eradicating New World Screwworm with Sterile Insect Technique

American Diabetes Association Meeting

"Join the ADA in New Orleans for the 2026 Scientific Sessions"

NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya

Diabetes Care: "Misguided Brushes of a Pen Continue to Dismantle and Destroy Biomedical Research in the United States: We Can No Longer Afford Complacency and Fear. We Must All Act Now!"

"Diabetes researchers ousted from conference after criticizing Trump"

H-1B Visas

Presidential Proclamation on Restriction on Entry of Certain Nonimmigrant Workers

"Federal judge blocks Trump's $100,000 H-1B visa fee"

"Health Care Professionals Sponsored for H-1B Visas in the US"

Exchange Visitors and the J-1 Classification

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 Mark Siegel, director of Yale's internal medicine residency program, to discuss his approach to mentoring young physicians and building a medical community grounded in purpose and compassion. Harlan examines a breakthrough targeted therapy that could reshape the treatment of pancreatic cancer and other hard-to-treat cancers; Howie tracks the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and argues that policy decisions are hampering the global response.

Show notes:

A Cancer Breakthrough

Pancreatic cancer: Symptoms and causes

"Daraxonrasib or Chemotherapy in Previously Treated Metastatic Pancreatic Cancer"

"Multi-Selective RAS(ON) Inhibitor Nearly Doubles Survival Time in People With Metastatic Pancreatic Cancer"

"KRAS mutation: from undruggable to druggable in cancer"

Mark Siegel

Mark Siegel: Program Director Notes

Mark Siegel on Substack

Academic medicine

Signaling system

Mark Siegel: "What I've Learned in 63 Years"

Yale School of Medicine: Residency & Fellowship Programs

Mark Siegel: "A Sudden Loss Of Vision"

Health & Veritas Episode 224: Nicholas Christakis: The Science of Human Connection

Ebola

WHO: Bundibugyo virus disease outbreak, Democratic Republic of the Congo

WHO: Ebola, The Democratic Republic of the Congo, 2026

WHO: Alert and Response

"'We are catching up'—WHO chief on DR Congo's Ebola fight"

"Uganda Closes Border With Congo as Ebola Fears Rise"

"Kenyan Court Deals New Blow to Plans for U.S. Ebola Unit"

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.