Webinar: How Do We Balance Human Lives vs. Economic Revival in the Age of Covid-19?

The economy is plummeting, and U.S. unemployment claims have surpassed 33 million since March. As Covid-19 continues to claim lives and destroy economies without a foreseeable end, it raises an important question: How does society balance the need for social distancing and health precautions to save lives, while also protecting civil liberties and the economy? A thoughtful discussion of this dilemma might assign a value to the lives that could be saved and compare it to the financial and other costs of an earlier or delayed reopening of the economy. This webinar presented evidence from economists, epidemiologists and other scientists on the most crucial cost-benefit analysis of our time.

This event was sponsored by the Center for Health and Biosciences. Follow @BakerCHB on Twitter and join the conversation online with #BakerHealth.

For more information, see Hagop Kantarjian's slides.

Agenda

1:30 p.m. — Presentation
2:00 p.m. — Q&A

Featured Speaker

Hagop M. Kantarjian, M.D., is a nonresident fellow in health policy. He serves as a professor and chair of the Department of Leukemia at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, where he is also the Kelcie Margaret Kana Research Chair and associate vice president for global academic programs. As a clinical-translational researcher, Kantarjian has contributed to significant improvements in the treatment of various leukemias, including the development and testing of first- and second-generation BCR-ABL inhibitors in chronic myeloid leukemia, combination therapies for acute lymphocytic leukemia, and several new treatments for acute myeloid leukemia and myelodysplastic syndrome. He serves on the board of directors for the American Society for Clinical Oncology. Kantarjian received the Joseph H. Burchenal Memorial Award for Outstanding Achievement in Clinical Cancer Research from the American Association for Cancer Research and the John Mendelsohn Lifetime Scientific Achievement Award from MD Anderson Cancer Center, as well as numerous other honors and awards. He has authored or co-authored more than 1,000 peer-reviewed medical publications. Kantarjian earned his bachelor’s and medical degrees from the American University of Beirut and completed a fellowship at MD Anderson Cancer Center.