President donald trump may have placed the blame for the current pandemic on communist china by coining it the chinese virus but evolutionary epidemiologist and author of big farms make big suggests that its actually capitalist greed that catalyzes deadly viruses he joins me now via skype from st paul in minnesota rob welcome to going underground just tell me starting off about how not just big films make big flu but your previous work near liberal eveleigh suggests that capitalism fostered coronavirus one of the things that we get so programmed and is the specifics of each of these viruses in terms of their clinical ors and thereby reality and thats all very important but what weve done is weve lost the context in which a series of new pathogens have heard the 20 percent and each one of those is tied into use changes or station thats being driven by local capital. And now you dont biased because you had coronavirus you wrote these books before you go to but you contract a drone a virus what is the health care in the United States being like remembering of course of the United States has plenty of money when it wants to spend money well its Health Care United States is just another form of making profit so if you dont have the money then you dont get the Health Care Even though not under obamacare you have 28000000 people who are are on harvard 24000000 more are under insured its not the basis for responding to a Global Pandemic the viruses certainly didnt get the business memo that they were supposed to cooperate with the profit system well they may have killed it may have killed a 100000 or more americans but youre alive. I am gratefully but not by dint of the American Medical System in essence was frozen out of my Doctors Office and had to be diagnosed on lying by a Nurse Practitioner who neither saw either error or me and so to be sure that this is not a background effect of neo liberal politics only response to coronavirus youre saying we need radical invasive change thats not. The lock downs that we experience in nato nations youre talking about its something else. Absolutely i think one of the things we do is we get so focused on the emergency responses where which are absolutely necessary including the lockdowns including whatever vaccines were able to develop though im not too hopeful about that but the problem is our focus on the emergency aspect of it we moved us from a understanding or exploring the more structural issues that are driving the emergence of one deadly pathogen after another some point were going to have to come face to face and understand that our very mode of civilization is now driving the emergence of these deadly pathogens and we have to do foundationally break with that mode and develop a much more integrated relationship with earth and ologies and i want to explore some of those has its in a moment but youre claiming that political power shapes both the Infectious Diseases and the sciences that study the diseases. Thats right one of the things that scientists its an amazing thing im a scientist myself an evolutionary biologist but one unfortunately history of science is very much into graded with the merchants and history of capitalism in such a way that. Science has been used as a means of de coding nature but only in the context of whether or not to help somebody a profit at some point when were confronted with problems that dont bend in that direction science has difficulty grasping unpacking those phenomena and so we find ourselves and i think the pandemic the exact thing sample of this we found ourselves when confronted with problems that dont bend easily to a modification then we are in essence unable to respond in a way that deals with the problem so what are we supposed to take from say the british Prime Minister martha jones when he repeated the end his ministers repeatedly say we are following the science hes actually following a politicized new liberal version of suns which is not the evidence mazed Scientific Method at all. Well thats right well science and capitalism have a way of pointing to each other for rationalizing their takes on things and so we have a situation where many scientists hired by the state or by companies are in essence putting models out that in essence so obviously we see donald trump often flanked by Multinational Pharmaceutical Company and c. E. O. s of Big Companies but you in your book big firms make big flu you ironically do support donald trump in saying its the chinese flu of the womb flu because at the beginning in the book you say the w. H. O. Was wrong not to talk about the origin of influence in other pandemics. Well certainly the chinese do bear some responsibility for the emergence of multiple strains of influenza. These occur in a virus is but china isnt the only epicenter for diseases we have for instance its 5 into the influenza avian flu and so they emerge here in the United States we have swine flu h one n one that actually did go pandemic in 2009 that emerged from outside mexico city we have ebola emerged out of west africa primarily out of and out of the neoliberal interventions that are all over the forestation and the spillover of the polar strains so certainly the china and. China does bear some responsibility but this is a global problem is see if i put on a have a c. E. O. Of a big Agribusiness Company ok i might blame the Mining Companies for deforestation which as you show in the book is so intimately related with the spread of epidemics but id say your book talks about big flume is this corona of ours is supposed to come from a small from maybe a wildlife market is completely different to agribusiness. Well i would say mining does have something to do with this. As well as logging in. And in addition to your business but as far as coronavirus goes its a little bit more complex but as. A culture large agriculture intensive operations push their way deeper into the 4 its it forces small holders to relocate and that also plunges into the local forests increasing the interfaces between small holders and wild animals their host for many of the new pathogen the other thing to understand is that the wild food trade where everyones pointing fingers that its not this kind of totally differentiated operation from big ag increasingly capital is flooding into the wild food sector and becoming more intense of it in such a way that more traditional large agriculture its beginning to be modeled by the more wild food sector and so as both those types of arming into the forests you havent a increasing interface with the wild animals and increasing spillover of these new pathogens so how are these interconnections exacerbated by something unprecedented in human civilization the ability to travel the us distances quickly were only just putting a quarantine here it britains amp whats what would you said to morris jones and about the fact that our Immediate Response here in britain was not to shut down the airports i think in the us you had ample its open to. Thats right well. The Global Travel network is. The most integrated network weve seen and Human History someone can go from one side of the world to the other and. And a half day or so so its. Any pathogen they might be caried can move that way and thats the thing thats so shocking its the speed at which new pathogens might spill over from the deepest forest and make a way to a regional capital and then onto a plane and to the other side of the world in short time and were you know we despite the fact that weve left airports open we should have known that that was probably going to be the speed at which corona virus was going to make its way in the other direction from asia to the United States and get direction to europe. Because of the kind of insidious nature of the. Pathogen and its clinical course we just chose not to act and and here in the United States some of the studies have shown that the cove in 1000 was circulating in Washington State for 6 weeks before it was ultimately did detected as to be circulating among among people here well the numbers of dead are truly breathtaking in your country oversee more than 100000 as to the origin you theorize that the pathogen may have existed already and is deforestation that exposed it and allowed to escape. Well theres been a lot of work since sarahs one that showed that there are multiple strains of coronaviruses in bat species across central and Southern China and they have been spilling over into local populations both human and animal. For since then if you keep rolling the dice at some point one of them makes its way across. Into some combinations of animals both wild animals and livestock and ultimately into the humans typically the labor that taking care of the livestock and then subsequently on its way to a local city most of those stars dont make it to human to human but if you want so while we do have one and in all likelihood sars one and starts to will be followed by a sars 3 and you really think of the logic of new liberalism is that Companies Involved in deforestation and so forth a 1000000000 dead is fine with them so focused on their own process to profits. Well i mean its really easy you just blame the virus or you blame the chinese or you blame smallholders for cutting into the forest. There is this point its theyve got these Rapid Response teams Crisis Management packages and go out and all these outbreaks and make sure you continue to externalize the costs of intensive production so that everyone carries the cost and everyone carries the blame if you were to fold and the cost back onto the Company Balance sheets of your business would be and as we know it. Stop you there more from us all the big firms make big flu after this break plus we asked the director general of Nigeria Center for Disease Control dr hecht with a country ravaged by previous epidemics let alone i. M. F. Structural adjustment programs appears to have dealt with coronavirus so much better than britain or the usa political coming over but to going on the ground. President Vladimir Putin in his own words tells us how he understands history and the Current International system also why everybody terribly hates john bolton as he laughs all the way to the bank. The simple things workshops and. Public spaces where else with learning disabilities can indeed join with creative activities like graphics sewing ceramics. And joinery. Just. Do shit whats the deal with what. You know what justice what did you give one case a couple of them because. The underlying idea of the. Chopras account which they feel thrilled to find. 2 things. At the. Welcome back im still with rome wallace author of big farms make big flu the w. H. O. Arguably has never been more in the headlines you give a very nuanced account in your latest book china has just given 2000000000 dollars donald trump appears to be withdrawing cooperation with do you think make him off the w. H. O. Well you know historically speaking these times of crises do have a way of killing off International Organizations we think of the league of nations world war one so many of these organizations are very particular and very conscious of the possibility that their fates are in the hands of not only outbreak but the nation states on which they depend for their finances and legitimacy in my view of there should be a w. H. O. But we think theyre in the middle of being caught in something of a crossfire between time in the United States and my view the United States says some of the World Systems there is support it is on the far end of the end of that cycle of the cumulation capital being turned into money in other words. American based capitalists are in essence cashing out and so what was previously post world war 2 an exercise of political power making sure the capitalist system worked including cleaning up pandemics of capitalist own making a round the world thats why c. D. C. Here was such an important part of responding to outbreaks worldwide well thats been rolled back in essence in a matter of months which is. Quite extraordinary the United States is basically in essence washed its hands of its responsibilities to run the overall system of capitalism including beating up at them its so i know on the other hand sees it seizing the opportunity its on its front end of it cycle of accumulation its turning money into capital and its interested in building empire and Building Infrastructure including Public Health infrastructure which will allow it to accumulate capital as the as the new imperial power on the block as it were whether or not successful on that however its up in the air we are in deep Environmental Crisis and so were arriving at that stage where earth and not support these kinds of cycles of accumulation is the london host of the Global Alliance of vaccines and immunization Boris Johnson gave a speech there bill gates gave a speech there we had the boss of it and goes. On the program and then she said that its no problem that these weston responses are linked to big from being to foundations like the Gates Foundation and that actually far from what youre saying these as we would call it as many would call it new liberal capitalists and philanthropists are doing their best to save millions of lives far from ignoring the risks of pandemics because of what they do for any individual. Philanthropists they might be indeed encouraged by good feelings and good intentions to actually use their money to help save people at the structural level however once we are in a position to ask those from who they develop or they got their money by virtue in essence engaging in some of the practices that. Are promoting the emergence of these. Package and in the 1st place i mean if youre depending on those people to intervene in a way to keep those package and from merging then were in some trouble because theres a flick of interest in there on the one hand they are in favor of the of the practices that lead to the emergence of these diseases even on the other hand theyre trying to use some of that money to intervening i dont think philanthropy apple isnt is a means by which were going to fundamentally change the way of living and life in our relationship with the earth and an ecology that that we can stop these pathogens from emerging in the 1st place if were in the business of just cleaning up after one pandemic after another then and indeed i think we are in some trouble its highly unlikely that additional pathogens will be emerging were not going to have the 100 year delay that we have from 1901. And less we make some foundational shifts in the very mode of civilisation that the were operating under were going to be exposed to new pathogens in the future plainly just to one irony arguably some of those companies obviously helping in the contract ing of one of your biggest taxpayer funded industries the military what do you make of the fact that after Edward Snowden who sought refuge in moscow after revealing mass surveillance how that massive valence the telephone calls not being able to be used for track and trace for a pandemic threatening us all well i would not sure if i agree with that i think many countries that been using that in. The news for better and for worse but not the n. S. A. Cia program that was real a snowden is that being used to save american lives i dont think it is i mean certainly not in terms of being deployed to help with endemic stuff i mean i dont i dont. I think there are we would even consider the american response as anything organized at the National National level there isnt a National Program for a response to coronavirus here its all been to fall down to the local and state levels in fact the federal government set off a. Black Market Competition between states for better waiters i would say i wouldnt quite classify it the u. S. Responses being. Even at the level basic. You know there is no tracing other and some a little bit at the local level so if the n. S. A. Is involved in doing anything about coronaviruses we certainly dont know it or wallace thank you. Nigeria has been called upon any capital of the world ravaged by i. M. F. Restructuring programs and epidemics 40 percent of its population of nearly 200000000 people live below the breadline and yet coronavirus deaths are exponentially worse in britain and the usa than in the u. K. So former west african colony joining me is the man leading the fight against coven 1000 there the director general of Nigerias Center for Disease Control chick with he joins me via skype from nigerias capital abuja thank you so much for coming on the show so we may have had about 60000 excess deaths here in britain with a population of 67000000 how come nigeria apparently has recorded less than fewer than 4500 deaths or so with 200000000 people i think 2 things i think it is very early to reach any conclusion. That burden both of fiction disease and death because you know those are time aspects. Transmission and also. Well but its what out across the code across the world but there are also many thinks the you know whenever you virus is introduced into a population does that interaction between the virus the population of environment and you know that the debts have said need to do it that count 3 kids go unique to nigeria the proportion of that he didnt go up in south africa 4 india do i got so that definite is something happening on the continent i dont know if so far thats limited the broader no bets that were see you say its too early why didnt you stop all Contact Tracing systems in nigeria like we did here on the 12th of march. Have you no Contact Tracing is very much out of our response its part of the d. N. A. Do you know of any Public Health response to our Infectious Disease outbreak and although we did hear though thats not a whole lot go up i could really speak about the response of the u. K. I could only speak about that if nigeria had you know we were struggling to weed out resource constraints its a big complex country Large Population and doctors really why would lock down spend it not to to enable their response but theres no other tool that we have now other than you know Contact Tracing and really the hot work that we do in response to infection these outbreaks that is not so youll see but. Fortunately were public by the governor of that so weve really got out so street into this capacity to carry out this type of work across the country you see here in britain the media routinely says that the low death counts from the global south merely show that they may be lying about the statistics the Chinese Communist party invited you to woo hand what do you find there because china is always being accused of falsifying coronavirus statistics i understand you never went to the actual woo han lab or wildlife market that i did good at that lot but what my impression was that china is really under tight we went very bad by the time we went. Through a very but youre ready to declare it is done you know to implement shutdown successfully you have to have as much determination on resources to carry out you know truly a deployment of food resources bedsteads and Everything Else it takes to keep the population alive at active despite being shut out and you were doing got this is that i mean you ready immediately you know we were going to struggle with Something Like this you know probably across the rest of the words. That was immediately not the policy for me and i would have led to results of the 1st bishop but the police had to prepare for a response or maybe the bits i meant to get the impact of this what you know the reality to be honest this is a top iris the toughest ive ever seen in my lifetime i think the stories of the most successful countries will go up at all this side of the end of the year where you stand by your Contact Tracing which as i say the British Government said had to be destroyed that system in much theyve now reintroduced to quarantine which is only just begun in the past few days or so months after the pandemic was detected here in britain why did you decide to quarantine the u. K. Registered aircraft britain would never quarantine a nigerian aircraft you know i think were used to a world where most of that narrative has been effected to gird from the global south to the global notes but the reality is that most of the infections in nigeria keep it from europe mostly from the u. K. Im not the only buy you get sick of this bit of nigeria its coming back kind of trouble but it is to locations but ultimately so it was you know done as a Public Health measure all to basically you know the better that we have so many contradictions west struggling with this decision because egypt up has a big Economic Impact ive got to put a big impact especially docket that also cost lives about the end of the day if you remember that you bought outbreak you west africa what people would die from the consequences of the outbreak that struck the barracks itself so we have to be very careful in judging that taking the big picture its a concentration you mention the Economic Impact money is seemingly no object here where we are paying 80 percent of wages maybe a greater proportion of this population here in britain its state funded the same there in nigeria because. I understand the i. M. F. Ok 3 and a half 1000000000. 00 for coronavirus some suspicions about where all that money is going some labs have not opened 1. 00 what is that the rule of the i. M. F. In this and im going to ask why dont does it going on strike that understand p. P. Was better in nigeria than he has some reports suggest yeah 6 i think it is its impossible to really compare the economic realities im definitely ackermann economic might to respond to an outbreak like this but to the you cant idea were really out there freds level its an opportunity to do all of that so yes government has really tried to reprivatize its free not share resources for the response that sometimes theyre out to burrow its not that all the resources especially start with which is in my control of the national Public Health piece to wait brought up in front of the Puppetry Committee responsible for sharing appropriate to expect the job will be put into very carefully the challenges that were stuck there probably very dopey terms about the Public Health infrastructure we dont have to build back better for the future one thing is for sure is that there will be more debits in the future one thing you for sure all the countries i think that each other much of ever because of trouble because of trade and we must Work Together to find solutions if not could bring us together because i would rule long tab exists that its probably more dependent about what he did to collaborate that area that we never could operate that sufficient director general thank you thank you very much thats in the show we were back on wednesday 3 s of the day the World Health Organization claimed yemen had a bombing by british made warplanes and weapons had over 200000 cases of cholera i dont know what your hands joining on the ground and your sound but its time to turn face. 6. Months. For an extra fee to make. Just a. Park which killed 3 an. Asylum seeker also ahead. One person is killed in a saturday night shooting in. Protest. From. Supporters rally behind. Released from cost