Health Services

Public Health Grand Rounds at the Aspen Institute presents Dr. Mandy Cohen, Director for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), as she maps out her vision for the future of the CDC and how she plans to integrate and build on best practices.

As the nation’s top doctor, US Surgeon General Vivek Murthy helps to advance the health and well-being of all Americans. He has described the growing youth mental health crisis in America as the “defining public health crisis of our time” and warned that social media carries a “profound risk of harm to the mental health of children and adolescents.” Murthy has also highlighted the employers’ role in supporting mental health for their workers and called attention to health worker burnout. In the recent Surgeon General’s Advisory on the Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation in America, he highlighted the vital need to heal from the pandemic through community and connection.

Twenty years ago, under the administration of George W. Bush, the US government established the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). With allocations exceeding $110 billion, it represents the largest investment ever made by any nation in a single disease. The resulting package of testing, prevention, and treatment is credited with saving more than 25 million lives. Learn how PEPFAR happened, and why continued commitment is vital, from two men who made the initiative possible—long-time NIAID head Tony Fauci, who conceptualized the strategy, and Bill Frist, former US Senate majority leader (R-TN), who helped move authorizing legislation through Congress.

Medicare covers 65 million people, pays out $829 billion in annual benefits, and accounts for 21% of total national health spending. An aging population, increasing costs, and coverage expansions all raise questions about the long-term financing of this hugely popular national insurance program. The availability of sophisticated home-based medical interventions, a new law lowering the price of insulin and other essential drugs, and the growth of Medicare Advantage add to the agency’s administrative and policy responsibilities. In a live “In the Bubble” podcast, Meena Seshamani, director of the Center for Medicare, talks strategy with Andy Slavitt.

Few health and social welfare policy issues escape the oversight of the US Department of Health and Human Services, second in size only to the Department of Defense. Prescription drug costs, access to reproductive health services, national and domestic public health threats like COVID-19, and the epidemic of loneliness are all within its purview. As it implements the health provisions of the historic Inflation Reduction Act, the department is also confronting the nation’s mental health crisis and tackling health disparities. Hear directly from HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra about what it is like to lead at this crucial moment.

When he was sworn in as 25th commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration in February 2022, Robert Califf knew the assignment would be intense because he had held the post before. With its oversight of more than $2.7 trillion in medical products, food, and tobacco—one-fifth of the nation’s economy—the FDA is always under pressure. Today, artificial intelligence, breakthrough pharmaceuticals, misinformation, vaping, the nicotine content of cigarettes, and critical drug shortages, including a scarcity of life-extending chemotherapies, are only a sampling of the issues that demand strategic decision-making and knowledge at the frontiers of science from the FDA.

With an annual budget of $1.65 trillion, the vast US Department of Health and Human Services oversees Medicare, Medicaid, the National Institutes of Health, the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and much else. Three Secretaries, past and present from both sides of the aisle, share their experiences about leading the agency and exchange ideas about making tough decisions, setting priorities, and dealing with Congress, the White House, and the American public—all while promoting scientific research, providing access to health insurance, addressing public health emergencies, funding programs to combat poverty and hunger, and creating workforce training opportunities. Spoiler alert: Navigating all that isn’t easy!

This unique half-day program explored the burgeoning field of women’s health – where we have been, where we need to go, the policies that will help get us there, and what the American public thinks about it all. Join experts from both government and the private sector for special presentations and moderated conversations with Andrea Mitchell of NBC News and Jackie Judd, former correspondent with ABC News and the PBS NewsHour.

Two former US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretaries, Alex Azar and Donna Shalala, talk about their proudest achievements, the hardest decisions they had to make, how they oversee a $1.8 trillion budget, and the advice they have for their successors. Learn what it’s like to be in the hot seat every day, grappling with Medicaid expansion, disease outbreaks, health at the border, Congressional pressure, food safety, medical research priorities, and children’s wellbeing—sometimes all at once.

Almost 110 billion pounds of food, roughly 40% of the nation’s total food supply, go to waste in the United States every year, yet more than 38 million Americans lack reliable access to affordable, nutritious meals. LaToya Meaders, co-founder and CEO of Collective Fare and Collective Food Works, and Matt Jozwiak, founder and CEO of Rethink Food, talk about how to create a win-win-win that bridges the gap between waste and hunger while supporting struggling local restaurants that are often community mainstays. Corby Kummer, executive director of the Aspen Institute’s Food and Society Program, moderates the conversation.

Two decades after the Institute of Medicine called out structural racism in its landmark study Unequal Treatment, the devastating toll remains apparent in the uneven risks associated with COVID, diabetes, asthma, cancer, stroke, and pregnancy. Pain medicines are still prescribed more reluctantly to Black patients and their heart attacks are treated less aggressively. Linda Villarosa, contributing writer to the New York Times Magazine, Paula Johnson, president of Wellesley College, and Carolina Reyes, maternal-fetal medicine specialist at UC Davis School of Medicine, discuss the opportunities to reckon with the harms of what has been called “medical apartheid.” Nicholas St. Fleur, STAT reporter and host of the “Color Code” podcast, moderates the conversation.

Through Medicare, Medicaid, the Children’s Insurance Program, and the Center for Consumer Information and Insurance Oversight, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) provides or oversees health coverage for more than 150 million people across the country. With $1.5 trillion in annual healthcare spending, CMS plays a key role in shaping the direction of the US healthcare system, while serving as the primary source of coverage for the elderly, people with disabilities, low-income populations, and those needing long-term care. How is CMS building health equity into its programs and the healthcare system more broadly? Are public health insurance programs sustainable? Should they be expanded?

When Rochelle Walensky was appointed director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in December 2020, the pandemic had commandeered much of the agency’s attention. But its many other responsibilities never went on holiday. Even as the world’s premier public health agency developed guidance for COVID-19 testing, masking, quarantines, and vaccination, it remained engaged in tobacco control, injury and disease surveillance, environmental health, and much more. Recognizing the need to modernize, the agency is now taking a hard look at how best to overhaul its systems and structures. To talk about what future holds for the CDC, Walensky is interviewed by Jon LaPook, chief medical correspondent for CBS News.