Late last year, the CSIS Commission on Strengthening America's Health Security released its final report on ending the cycle of crisis and complacency in U.S. global health security. This miniseries of Take as Directed will delve into the detail of some of the Commission's recommendations. In this first episode of the miniseries, Steve talks with Dr. Richard Hatchett, CEO of Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI). CEPI is a new model of partnership to finance and co-ordinate the development of technologies against high priority public health threats and emerging infectious diseases with pandemic or epidemic potential. Richard and Steve discuss the report's recommendation to systematically confront two urgent technology challenges: the need for new vaccines and therapeutics; and the public health communications crisis.

This episode examines the changing nature of war and conflict and why gender-based violence (GBV) has become a central feature in crises around the world. GHPC Senior Associate Janet Fleischman sits down with Melissa Dalton, senior fellow and deputy director of the CSIS International Security Program and Director of the Cooperative Defense Project (CDP); and Fatima Imam, executive director of Rehabilitation, Empowerment, and Better Health Initiative and Network of Civil Society Organizations in Nigeria. They discuss how GBV impacts women and girls in crises, focused especially on the Middle East and northern Nigeria, and how these ubiquitous and traumatizing realities undermine global health security and community resilience. This conversation is linked to a new CSIS report, How Can We Better Reach Women and Girls in Crises? and an October 31 conference on U.S. Action for Women’s and Girls’ Health Security, both under the auspices of the CSIS Commission on Strengthening America’s Health Security.

In this episode of Take as Directed, Nellie Bristol speaks with Dr. John Vertefeuille. Dr Vertefeuille is currently the polio eradication branch chief at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). His long career at the CDC has included stints in Haiti, Tanzania and Nigeria. Nellie and Dr. Vertefeuille discuss why there has been an increase in vaccine-derived polio since 2016, how it differs from wild poliovirus, and how the CDC plans to contain and prevent future outbreaks.

On September 27th, the CSIS Global Health Policy Center hosted a conference focused on Securing Healthy Populations in a New Era of Global Immunization. The program highlighted the progress that has been made in expanding access to immunization, but emphasized the need for a new push to increase global coverage from 85 to 100 percent. On this episode of Take as Directed, Senior Fellow Katherine Bliss walks through some of the conference panelists’ most striking comments and highlights the challenges of equity, trust, delivery, and insecurity that global immunization programs face as they develop new strategies for the next decade.