Tom Frieden

But

She was cursed that nobody believed her when she prophesied those future tragedies, and so they all came to pass.

And that's been what we've been like in public health and actually as individuals also.

And breaking the Cassandra curse is part of the formula.

It is really an approach that's been proven that has saved millions, actually literally hundreds of millions of lives, and can save hundreds of millions more.

And it's really relevant for individual health as well.

And the approach, the formula is see Cassandra.

believe, create.

Three phases.

And the Cassandra curse is really part of the C phase.

We have to see the invisible threats that are coming at us that are going to kill us.

We also have to see the toxins that we can't see in our environment that may be poisoning us.

And we also have to see the trends of...

You know, like Ebola, when I was running CDC, Ebola was exploding in West Africa.

We couldn't get anyone to pay attention.

And then a modeler, Martin Meltzer, showed this exponential increase, and then people got it.

So you have to see trends.

You have to see whether programs are succeeding or failing.

And one thing I'm sure we'll talk about in a bit is you have to see the path to progress, the technically rigorous path.

But you also have to see why we're blind.