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Welcome to Insider
- Healthcare CEOs tell us how the pandemic has changed the business world;
- Sen. Amy Klobuchar's new book on antitrust is a warning for Big Pharma;
- The CDC is easing mask-wearing guidance for vaccinated people.
If you're new to this
After the pandemic, what's next?
How much permanent change will the pandemic leave on the business world? About a year ago, Insider's newsroom asked more than 200 CEOs for their initial thoughts.
Now, we've connected again with several dozen C-suite execs, including some big names in the healthcare space: Anthem's Gail Boudreaux, Google Health's Dr. Karen DeSalvo, and Pfizer's Albert Bourla among others.
These are the people steering healthcare's future, and we got them to share their thoughts on the future of work-from-home, the industry's diversity and equity challenges, and lessons learned from the past year. (You can also check out the answers of some non-healthcare CEOs at places like Dropbox, Ogilvy, and Hooters.)
Check out their answers here.
And that wasn't Insider's only newsroom-wide CEO-based project to roll out this week. I profiled Pfizer's Bourla and the journey that has been the pharma giant's COVID-19 vaccine program for Insider's inaugural list of most transformative CEOs.
Bourla is hoping to usher in a new era at
"We saw what we can do if we put focus, if we cut bureaucracy, if we trust scientists," Bourla told me. "That's something that needs to be repeated not only in COVID."
Here's the full project, including the CEOs of GM, Adobe, and Nvidia>>
The most transformative CEOs of 2021
Takeaways from Sen. Amy Klobuchar's new book on antitrust
Insider Book Club, anyone? Senior healthcare reporter Allison DeAngelis synthesized Sen. Amy Klobuchar's 624-page book on antitrust into three digestible takeaways.
One clear conclusion is top lawmakers are looking closer and closer at the
Healthcare fellow Patricia Kelly Yeo also has a new book on her radar in Dr. Jen Gunter's "The Menopause Manifesto," set to come out next month.
Her advice on approaching menopause is the timeless, simple stuff: quit smoking, exercise, and eat healthy.
It's not a book club if everyone isn't reading.
If you missed it, I pulled out a few key takeaways from Walter Isaacson's best-selling biography of Jennifer Doudna and the burgeoning field of gene-editing.
What else should be on our nightstands? Send me recommendations at adunn@insider.com - healthcare-related or not.
I'm now finishing up New York Times science writer Carl Zimmer's new book on a basic yet profound question: What is life? In touring labs making organoids and discussing viruses that invade bacteria, Zimmer shows how blurry the line can be. Hence the title: Life's Edge.
Check out Klobuchar's perspective on monopolies here>>
3 takeaways from a top Democratic senator's new book on monopolies that should have Big Pharma worried
The CDC eases mask-wearing guidance for the fully vaccinated
The pandemic is headed in different directions in different parts of the world.
Here in the US, things are looking up, as they have for a few weeks. 55% of adults in the US have gotten at least one shot. And the CDC recently outlined the impact that getting immunized can have on everyone's lives, including less mask-wearing outdoors.
CDC: Fully vaccinated people can go maskless outside to exercise, dine, or socialize
In fact, things have gotten so cheery that there's a whole movement brewing around this summer in the US. The "sextech" market has never been hotter, according to startup founders and investors who spoke with Insider's Melia Russell and April Joyner.
It's the free market's natural reaction to calls for a "Hot Vax Summer," I suppose.
That's all great news, I guess, for America. But these domestic discussions - of shedding masks and awaiting the summer fun - are particularly jarring when considering the direness of the crisis in places like India and Brazil.
The US said it will help India out, donating vaccines, drugs, and protective gear. Still, the devastation is deeply underway, with records being routinely broken for new infections and deaths.
India's vulnerabilities also shed light on other countries that could be at risk of COVID-19 spikes, writes Aria Bendix, Insider's senior science reporter. The story reads as the latest plea for all of us to keep a bit of humility and diligence in the face of this pandemic.
Read the full story>>
The 4 factors that have fueled India's harrowing coronavirus surge
Finally, here's what else is happening in healthcare this week:
- Shelby Livingston has the latest on how insurance giants like UnitedHealth, Humana, Cigna, and Anthem are doing much more than insurance now.
- Megan Hernbroth and Dakin Campbell share the pitch deck used by a new health startup, The Public Health Company, that's trying to better track viruses.
- Megan also has the inside story on Mirvie, a biotech developing a blood test that could predict pregnancy complications in expectant mothers.
- Andrew