Howie and Harlan are joined by trauma surgeon Selwyn Rogers, who reflects on caring for victims of gun violence and speaking with families in their darkest moments—and explains why the problem must be understood as a shared societal responsibility. Harlan examines new evidence suggesting U.S. healthcare spending has grown more slowly than expected; Howie discusses a retracted Lancet article that highlights the risks of undisclosed conflicts of interest.

Show notes:

Healthcare Costs

"Has the United States Bent the Health Care Cost Curve?"

David M. Cutler

"Baumol's cost disease"

Harlan Krumholz: "Out‐of‐Pocket Annual Health Expenditures and Financial Toxicity From Healthcare Costs in Patients With Heart Failure in the United States"

Selwyn Rogers

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

Conflicts of Interest

"Retraction: Cosmetic talc powder"

"Historians Unearth a Conflict of Interest, Prompting a Retraction by The Lancet Journal"

Johns Manville Trust Fund and Lawsuits

Mark Lanier

Health & Veritas Episode 215: Arya Singh: Beyond Accessibility

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 College and Yale School of Public Health graduate Arya Singh, who reflects on growing up with spinal muscular atrophy, what it takes to build a full life with a disability, and how family support and institutional culture shape what inclusion looks like in practice. Harlan reports on the rapid rise of AI as a front door to health information; Howie responds to the withdrawal of a proposed federal ban on indoor tanning for minors.

Show notes:

AI Health Advice

Health & Veritas Episode 207: Robert Wachter: AI Is Already Remaking Healthcare

"OpenAI rolls out ChatGPT for Healthcare, a gen AI workspace for hospitals and clinics"

"Anthropic Launches AI Healthcare Tools As Competition With OpenAI Heats Up"

"Doctronic raises $40 million as race to apply AI in clinical care heats up"

"KFF Tracking Poll on Health Information and Trust: Use of AI For Health Information and Advice"

Arya Singh

Health & Veritas Episode 35: Dr. Amy Justice: Unlocking the Insights in Healthcare Data Howie reflects on Arya Singh's graduation from Yale.

Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA)

"At Yale, Arya Singh overcame her fears—and found a new side of herself"

"This Yale student won't let a rare genetic disease stand in her way"

"A Mother's Moonshot"A Stanford Business profile of Loren Eng, Singh's mother.

Arya Singh: "What it's like to have a rare disease—and how clinical trials changed my life"

"For Arya" A Forbes article on Singh's parents.

Video: Yale College 2022 Class Day Exercises Singh's speech to her classmates.

"3 Rings, 2 College Students and 1 Big Risk" A New York Times "Vows" column on Singh's wedding.

Arya Singh: Courageous Calla & The Clinical Trial

Arya Singh: "Beyond broken elevators"

Arya Singh: "Making It Work for Students in Wheelchairs to Leave Home: Experiences and Decision Making Regarding the Residential College Experience"

Tanning Beds

"FDA pulls proposed rule barring teens from using tanning beds"

FDA: General and Plastic Surgery Devices: Restricted Sale, Distribution, and Use of Sunlamp Products; Withdrawal of Proposed Rule

"Molecular effects of indoor tanning"

"Indoor Tanning and the Risk of Overall and Early-Onset Melanoma and Non-Melanoma Skin Cancer: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis"

"Indoor Tanning Legislation: Here's Where We Stand"

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 the end of flu season, vaccine effectiveness, and the challenge of rebuilding public confidence in immunization. Also: new cholesterol guidelines that push earlier treatment, measles outbreaks and the erosion of herd immunity, a court ruling pausing changes to vaccine guidelines, signs of stabilization at the NIH, new evidence on football and brain injury, and a MedPAC report suggesting Medicare Advantage plans are overpaid.

Show notes:

Looking Back at the Flu Season

CDC 2024–2025 Influenza Season Summary

CDC: Influenza-Associated Pediatric Deaths

CDC Weekly US Influenza Surveillance Report

CDC: Interim Estimates of 2025–26 Seasonal Influenza Vaccine Effectiveness

New Cholesterol Guidelines

2026 ACC/AHA/AACVPR/ABC/ACPM/ADA/AGS/APhA/ASPC/NLA/PCNA Guideline on the Management of Dyslipidemia

"ACC/American Heart Association Issue Updated Guideline for Managing Lipids, Cholesterol"

Lipoprotein (a): Levels & Testing

Apolipoprotein B (Apo B) Test

"Major changes to cardiovascular guidelines suggest taking statins as young as 30"

"Statins: How They Work & Side Effects"

American Heart Association PREVENT Online Calculator

Measles Update

CDC: Measles Cases and Outbreaks

U.S. Measles Tracker

South Carolina Department of Public Health: 2025 Measles Outbreak

Utah Department of Health and Human Services: Utah measles outbreak response

CDC Measles Vaccine Recommendations

What's Happening at the NIH?

"NIH will spend its full budget this year, agency director promises House appropriators"

"NIH chief calms nerves on grants, hiring"

"WATCH: Dr. Jay Bhattacharya testifies at NIH oversight hearing before House panel"

Harlan Krumholz: "Grant Applications With a Result-Based Orientation"

New Mexico's Measles Success

CDC: Measles Outbreak—New Mexico, 2025

Football, Brain Health, and the Biology of Repetitive Hits

"Cognitive and Neuropsychiatric Function in Former American Football Players"

"Inflammation, Limbic White Matter Microstructure, and Clinical Symptoms in Retired American Football Players With Repetitive Head Impacts"

ACIP Lawsuit

"Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP)"

"Judge blocks RFK Jr. advisers' vaccine changes"

"Federal judge stalls health secretary RFK Jr.'s overhaul of vaccine policy"

"Federal Judge Puts Brakes on RFK Jr's Vaccine Agenda"

Medicare Advantage Under the Microscope

MedPAC: March 2026 Report to the Congress: Medicare Payment Policy

"Congressional advisers call to rein in Medicare Advantage spending amid industry pressure"

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 Medicine surgical oncologist Kevin Billingsley, who discusses how robotics and advanced imaging are reshaping what it means to be a surgeon and offers guidance for those facing a cancer diagnosis. Harlan reports on a company testing AI-based prescription renewals and raises concerns about safety and oversight; Howie reflects on new survey data showing declining public trust in health institutions.

Show notes:

Unsupervised AI

Health & Veritas Episode 207: Robert Wachter: AI Is Already Remaking Healthcare

"Vinod Khosla: Machines will replace 80 percent of doctors"

Doctronic AI Regulatory Mitigation Agreement

"AI could soon renew prescriptions without clinician help. Should the FDA make sure it's safe?"

"Exclusive: Researchers trick a bot that prescribes meds"

"Don't trust this $4 solution for getting a prescription"

"CVS Health And Google Launch AI Business To 'Personalize Healthcare'"

Health & Veritas Episode 206: Mary-Ann Etiebet: Confronting Preventable Disease Harlan discusses ARPA-H.

Kevin Billingsley

Laparoscopy

Robotic Surgery

"History of robotic surgery: from AESOP and ZEUS to da Vinci"

"Personal Best" Atul Gawande compares surgeons to athletes.

"Future of Surgical Training Will Include Major Shift in Education Model"

"Will your next surgeon be a robot? Autonomy and AI in robotic surgery"

"Dying Words" Jerome Groopman on the relationship between oncologists and patients.

"Teamwork in Healthcare: Key Discoveries Enabling Safer, High-Quality Care"

Smoking and Cancer

Benefits of Physical Activity

Physical Activity and Cancer

Health & Veritas: Melinda Irwin: Can Nutrition and Exercise Improve Cancer Outcomes?

"What Alcohol Does to the Body"

Who do you trust?

"Stark Divide: Americans More Confident in Career Scientists at U.S. Health Agencies Than Leaders"

"Poll: Americans increasingly trust career scientists, not leaders, at CDC, NIH, and FDA"

Your Local Epidemiologist: "Top 5 questions about school vaccination requirements"

Health & Veritas Katelyn Jetelina: A Visit from Your Local Epidemiologist"

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 Medicine neurologist Kevin Sheth to discuss how collaboration helps drive breakthroughs in brain health, including advances in detecting stroke and other neurological diseases earlier and more precisely. Harlan reflects on lessons from his family's recent experience navigating the healthcare system; Howie examines the expanding marketplace for GLP-1 weight-loss drugs and the challenges of ensuring safe and appropriate use.

Show notes:

The Family Perspective

Cleveland Clinic: Percutaneous Coronary Intervention

"What's the Difference Between a CCU and an ICU?"

Kevin Sheth

Alva Health

Mayo Clinic: Stroke

Video: Kevin Sheth at the Yale Innovation Summit

Sandra Saldana, PhD, MBA

"Buddy System"

NIH: Multiple Principal Investigators

"Assessing the Decade of the Brain"

"Cerebrospinal fluid and plasma biomarkers in Alzheimer disease"

Kevin Sheth: "Burden of Ischemic and Hemorrhagic Stroke Across the US From 1990 to 2019"

Endovascular Thrombectomy (EVT)

Ischemic vs Hemorrhagic Stroke

"What is cognitive reserve?"

Cheaper Obesity Drugs

"Will Novo Nordisk's slashing of obesity drug prices save patients' money? It depends"

"Novo Nordisk to halve US list price of Wegovy from 2027"

"Walgreens Virtual Healthcare Adds Weight Management Services to Support Patients on Their Weight Loss Journey"

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 economist Janet Currie to discuss how early-life investments in health, education, and environmental protection shape children's lifelong well-being and economic opportunity. Harlan highlights a new Medicare payment model that would reward measurable improvements in chronic disease outcomes; Howie reflects on the spread of medical misinformation and a new effort to push back.

Show notes:

The ACCESS Payment Model

CMS: ACCESS (Advancing Chronic Care with Effective, Scalable Solutions) Model

"ACCESS: What this new payment model means for physicians and patients"

"FDA Launches TEMPO: A First-of-Its-Kind Digital Health Pilot to Expand Access to Chronic Disease Technologies"

Janet Currie

"Welcoming Janet Currie: A Pioneer in the Economics of Children and Families Joins Yale"

Janet Currie: "Collective Bargaining in the Public Sector: The Effect of Legal Structure on Dispute Costs and Wages"

Janet Currie: "Child health as human capital"

Janet Currie: "Killing Me Softly: The Fetal Origins Hypothesis"

"Medicaid and Children's Health: 5 Issues to Watch Amid Recent Federal Changes"

Janet Currie: "Medicaid: What Does It Do, and Can We Do It Better?"

Janet Currie: "Does Head Start Make a Difference?"

Janet Currie: "Longer Term Effects of Head Start"

Janet Currie: "Lead and Juvenile Delinquency: New Evidence from Linked Birth, School, and Juvenile Detention Records"

Head Start Impact Study (HSIS) Series

Janet Currie: "Saving Babies: The Efficacy and Cost of Recent Changes in the Medicaid Eligibility of Pregnant Women"

Janet Currie: "Doctor Decision Making and Patient Outcomes"

Janet Currie's American Economic Association Presidential Address: "Investing in Children to Address the Child Mental Health Crisis"

"Addressing Common Misconceptions About the Child Mental Health Crisis"

Janet Currie: "To What Extent are Trends in Teen Mental Health Driven by Changes in Reporting?"

Janet Currie: "Rules versus Discretion: Treatment of Mental Illness in US Adolescents"

Misinformation

Mayo Clinic: Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS): Symptoms and causes

"Inside RFK Jr.'s push against the flu vaccine that he links to his voice condition"

Health & Veritas Episode 197: Peter Hotez: Mapping the Anti-Science Machine

"It's time for a new era of advocacy for physicians"

"Childhood Vaccination Rates Have Dropped Again, C.D.C. Data Shows"

"Take It From a Scientist. Facts Matter, and They Don't Care How You Feel."

"A small study on Covid vaccine safety sparks an online tempest"

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

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 Evangelos Oikonomou, a cardiologist and data scientist at the Yale School of Medicine, to discuss how AI can extract overlooked signs of heart disease from routine ECGs, imaging studies, and electronic health records—and how to deploy these AI tools responsibly at scale. Harlan explains whether a widely covered study suggesting that coffee may lower the risk of dementia should change your daily brew; Howie grapples with the ethical questions surrounding a proposed hepatitis B vaccine trial in Guinea-Bissau.

Show notes:

Coffee and Dementia

"Coffee and Tea Intake, Dementia Risk, and Cognitive Function"

"Coffee linked to slower brain ageing in study of 130,000 people"

"2 to 3 Cups of Coffee a Day May Reduce Dementia Risk. But Not if It's Decaf."

Evangelos Oikonomou

"What Is Opportunistic Screening in Healthcare?"

Evangelos Oikonomou: "Artificial intelligence in medical imaging: A radiomic guide to precision phenotyping of cardiovascular disease"

Evangelos Oikonomou: "Non-invasive detection of coronary inflammation using computed tomography and prediction of residual cardiovascular risk (the CRISP CT study): a post-hoc analysis of prospective outcome data"

Evangelos Oikonomou: "Artificial intelligence-guided detection of under-recognised cardiomyopathies on point-of-care cardiac ultrasonography: a multicentre study"

"Fellow Focus in Four: Evangelos Oikonomou, MD, DPhil, Cardiovascular Medicine"

Health & Veritas Episode 80: Josh Geballe: Turning Yale Innovation into Startups

Evangelos Oikonomou: "TARGET-AI: A Foundational Approach for the Targeted Deployment of Artificial Intelligence Electrocardiography in the Electronic Health Record"

"Using AI to Guide AI"

"Are A.I. Tools Making Doctors Worse at Their Jobs?"

"The Robot Doctor Will See You Now"

Health & Veritas Episode 207: Robert Wachter: AI Is Already Remaking Healthcare

"A large language model for complex cardiology care"

Vaccine Trial Ethics

WHO: Statement on the planned hepatitis B birth dose vaccine trial in Guinea-Bissau

"Planned US-funded baby vaccine trial in Guinea-Bissau blasted by WHO"

"Guinea-Bissau suspends US-funded vaccine trial as African scientists question its motives"

"Guinea-Bissau Installs Military Ruler After Claims of a 'Fabricated' Coup"

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 geneticist and endocrinologist Joel Hirschhorn to discuss how thousands of genetic variants collectively shape disease and traits like height and obesity. Harlan reviews new research on diet soda and dementia; Howie surveys recent market swings, including the rise of Solace Health and the decline of Hims & Hers.

Show notes:

Diet Soda and Dementia

"Soda consumption and risk of dementia: The Northern Manhattan study"

"Why One Cardiologist Has Drunk His Last Diet Soda"

Joel Hirschhorn

National Human Genome Research Institute: Mendelian Inheritance

MedlinePlus: FGFR3 gene

Cleveland Clinic: Achondroplasia

National Human Genome Research: Polygenic Trait

Hirschhorn Lab

"A saturated map of common genetic variants associated with human height"

"What are single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs)?"

ScienceDirect: Genetic Variant

Joel Hirschhorn: "Genome-Wide Association Study of Quantitative Kidney Function in 52,531 Individuals with Diabetes Identifies Five Diabetes-Specific Loci"

Joel Hirschhorn: "Polygenic prediction of body mass index and obesity through the life course and across ancestries"

"Obesity Prediction Could Be Guided by Genetic Risk Scores"

"Genome-wide association study shows BCL11A associated with persistent fetal hemoglobin and amelioration of the phenotype of β-thalassemia"

Society for Science: Noam Elkies

MIT: Eric S. Lander

Ups and Downs

"Understanding Creative Destruction: Driving Innovation and Economic Change"

"Solace Health raises $130M series C for advocacy platform"

"Molina Healthcare's stocks fall as company plans exit from Medicare Advantage"

"Centene swings to loss but predicts stabilization in 2026"

"UnitedHealth limps into 2026 with a smaller business and fresh challenges"

"Hims & Hers Falls 14% After Pulling Copycat Wegovy Pill—Novo Nordisk Up 8%"

"Compounding and the FDA: Questions and Answers"

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 an escalating measles outbreak in the U.S. and a project piloted by Yale School of Medicine professor Erica Spatz to deliver preventative care in barbershops and beauty salons. Also examined: flu season, nipah virus, and the perils of focusing on healthcare business models.

Show notes:

Measles

CDC: Measles Outbreak Associated with an Infectious Traveler—Colorado, May–June 2025

CDC: Measles Cases and Outbreaks

Snohomish County Health Department: Snohomish County Confirms Three New Measles Cases

"Measles in an ICE facility is a public health failure"

Value-Based Care

"Value-Based Care: What It Is, and Why It's Needed"

"Supporting Value-Based Health Care—Aligning Financial and Legal Accountability"

American Hospital Association: 3 Ways AI Can Improve Revenue-Cycle Management

Preventative Cardiology

Yale School of Medicine: Erica Spatz, MD, MHS

Pressure Check

Marketplace Health Insurance

Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services: Marketplace 2026 Open Enrollment Period Report: National Snapshot

Respiratory Illness

CDC: Weekly US Influenza Surveillance Report: Key Updates for Week 3, ending January 24, 2026

"After 3-week decline, flu cases rise across the US; RSV, COVID activity high in certain states"

Nipah Virus

CDC: About Nipah Virus

WHO: Nipah virus infection—India

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 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.