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CGD's weekly Global Prosperity Wonkcast, event videos, whiteboard talks, slides, and more.

Turning the Tide Through Better Prevention: Mead Over on the AIDS Transition

7/27/10

Mead OverEven as the cost of treating HIV/AIDS has fallen dramatically, the number of people newly infected has remained high. What can be done to reverse this trend and finally defeat this disease? This week on the Wonkcast, I’m joined by Mead Over, a senior fellow here at the Center for Global Development and perhaps the world’s leading expert on the economics of HIV/AIDS. He has recently published two major essays, which introduce the concept of the “AIDS transition”—the point in time where the number of people living with the disease begins to fall. He argues persuasively that to reach this point, international donors must greatly strengthen incentives for effective prevention.

How to Help the World’s Least Developed Countries: UNCTAD’s Deb Bhattacharya

7/20/10

Deb BhattacharyaThere are 49 countries in the world that the United Nations classifies as Least Developed Countries (LDCs). How does a country wind up on the list, and how is the international community working to help these countries develop? My guest this week is Debapriya Bhattacharya, currently a Special Advisor to the Secretary General of the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), focusing on issues related to Least Developed Countries.

Deb begins by explaining how the official Least Developed Country list is defined. There are three criteria for inclusion, he explains. Obviously, poverty, as measured in per capita income, is one of them. A second is what Deb calls “human assets,” expressed in education and health indicators. And the third is a measure of economic vulnerability to natural or manmade disasters."Haiti is a classic example of how vulnerable these economies are,” Deb explains. “You get hit not only by man-made disasters, but also by natural exogenous shocks."

Bringing Medicines to Market: Tom Bollyky on Clinical Trials for Neglected Diseases

7/13/10

Tom BollykyFueled by charitable giving, more and more medical research is focusing on treating and curing thus-far neglected diseases. Is the regulatory framework ready? My guest this week is Tom Bollyky, a visiting fellow here at the Center for Global Development. Tom is a lawyer by training, and is currently working on the important legal and regulatory issues surrounding clinical trials for medicines to treat neglected diseases.

For those unfamiliar with the scale of the problem, Tom gives a quick introduction to what neglected diseases are. Common diseases like malaria and tuberculosis and less common diseases like dengue fever and hookworm together afflict more than one billion people worldwide. Yet, because they’re not big problems in high income countries, very little research has gone towards finding cures for them.

Satish Chand on the Challenges of Small Island States

7/6/10

Especially during the hot summer months, some of us might daydream about packing up and relocating to a small tropical island somewhere in the Pacific. From a development perspective, however, small island states face unique challenges—most obviously from rising sea levels, but also from the economic dynamics created by their small size and isolation. My guest this week is Satish Chand, a visiting fellow here at the Center for Global Development and a native of Fiji. On this week’s Wonkcast, we discuss a range of issues that affect small island nations, as well as Satish’s research on the effects of migration on human capital in Fiji.

Surprisingly, Satish tells me that nations surrounded by ocean share many of the problems of small landlocked countries. “Being landlocked impedes trade and communication just as much as being out there in the ocean,” Satish explains. Small populations and limited available land also make it difficult for these states to take advantage of economies of scale in providing basic services to their citizens.

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