Intersecting Pandemics: Adrian Thomas of J&J on Tuberculosis (TB) & Covid-19

To mark World TB Day, Katherine E. Bliss and J. Stephen Morrison speak with Adrian Thomas, TB expert and leader of global strategy at Johnson & Johnson Global Health. Every year, TB kills an estimated 1.4 million people and infects another 10 million people, with about 400,000 of those cases resistant to two or more drugs. Covid-19 has disrupted health systems and displaced funding and frontline staff away from TB, which models estimate will cause an additional million cases per year over the next five years. In this episode, we talk to Adrian about the grave impact the pandemic is having on global TB efforts, how to build local health security capacities that control TB and respond to future outbreaks, how international scientific partnerships speed up R&D and create platforms with broad applications, and the recent emergency use authorization by the FDA of J&J’s Covid-19 vaccine.

Adrian Thomas is Vice President for Strategy and External Affairs at Johnson & Johnson Global Health. The views expressed in the podcast are personal and not those of his employer.