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‘This Is Not a Public Health Crisis — It’s a Political Crisis’
A conversation with Stanford epidemiologist Dr. Steven Goodman
Back in March, when the Covid-19 outbreak was in its early days, I asked my brother Steve to join me on the public affairs radio show that I host, The Vermont Conversation, to talk about what we could expect with this new virus. Unlike me, he is an expert. Steve Goodman, MD, PhD, is an associate dean at Stanford Medical School, where he is also a professor of epidemiology and population health and medicine. I wondered aloud whether closing schools was an overreaction. He quickly set me straight.
“This is an impending catastrophe,” he presciently said. “We have a tsunami that is rolling in. The depth of the ocean at our feet at the beachhead is only a few inches right now, but it’s rolling in.” We spoke again in late April about the dangers of reopening.
Today, with 140,000 Americans dead and millions infected, I decided to seek out Steve’s epidemiological perspective on where we are and what lies ahead. You can listen to our live radio conversation here. This transcript has been edited for length and clarity.
Elemental: Vice President Mike Pence recently declared, “We slowed the spread. We flattened the curve. We saved lives.” How do you assess where we’re at…
