The Issue at Hand
More than ten million people are infected with Tuberculosis worldwide every year – and the most tragic part is that there is a cure, yet it is still the world’s deadliest disease and almost two million people die of Tuberculosis (TB) every year.
Now, many of you likely know who John Green is. The world-renowned author of titles such as The Fault in Our Stars and Paper Towns, John Green has a huge impact on the world. But his impact reaches beyond his books. John Green is also famous for his YouTube channel, vlogbrothers, which he co-runs with his brother, Hank Green. The two brothers are not afraid to speak up for what they believe in – the brothers have addressed more social and historical issues than one can count. Their most recent (specifically John Green’s) campaigns are the #timeforfive and #PatientsNotPatents campaigns.
It All Began in July
These campaigns began back in July of this year when John Green decided to face yet another issue – the TB epidemic. He knew that he could not “accept a world where we know how to cure Tuberculosis but deny millions of people access to that cure.” In July, John Green, along with his social media fanbase, started the #PatientsNotPatents campaign to encourage Johnson & Johnson (J&J) to allow the sale of generic bedaquiline. Bedaquiline is a TB drug that has the potential to help treat lots of patients with TB that is antibiotic resistant. This drug has been patented by J&J for a very long time, which has allowed for the company to set the price to whatever they want and limit the range that the drug can reach. John Green and his fans (along with TB organizations such as Stop TB Partnership and TB-survivors Phumeza Tisile and Nandita Venkatesanwere) successful with this first campaign. Now, a significant amount of low and mid income countries have more access to bedaquiline than ever before.
Continuation of the Campaign
In mid-September, John Green and his fans took on a new challenge: Danaher. Danaher is not only international and the owner of many other companies (providing great wealth), but most importantly, it is the inventor of the The GeneXpert Machine. This machine is currently among the most effective machines for diagnosis of many diseases (COVID, HIV) and, most notably, TB. It is able to not only diagnose TB, but it is also able to diagnose drug-resistance in TB. The machine itself is not too costly – but the issue is in the cost of the test cartridges. A cartridge is required for every test and costs $10 for TB tests and $15 for drug-resistant TB. Note, the two cost the same amount to manufacture. Also, Doctors Without Borders have proven that Danaher is entirely able to lower the price for both cartridges to $5 (or even lower!) which would provide many countries with lower income the ability to access this life-saving technology.
John Green posted a video onto YouTube that called on his fans to urge Danaher to finally lower these prices (something that is long, long overdue). John Green urged his fans to politely call Danaher’s number and email their sustainability email address to call for the prices to be lowered. He also requested that his followers post on social media with the #timeforfive and #peopleoverprofits hashtags. Many followers have been very creative in this aspect and have been making memes to further support the campaign.
The Good News
After all of this work from John Green, various TB organizations, and John Green’s humongous fanbase, there is good news! Danaher has agreed to lower the price of their TB tests! “This isn’t the 50% reduction we hoped for, but Danaher is also committing to zero profit in their distribution of standard TB tests to impoverished communities,” tweets John Green. Danaher has made no commitments of lowering the prices for the drug-resistant TB tests. However, the lowered prices of the TB tests will be life-changing for hundreds, potentially thousands of people. We can all hope that Danaher will be able to lower the production costs of the cartridges (which would mean the price could go down for users!) We can all also commend the commitment – both of the TB organizations such as TB organizations such as Stop TB Partnership and TB-survivors Phumeza Tisile and Nandita Venkatesanwere and of John Green and his fans.
Dragons, remember that you can make a difference and you can create change. What do you want to do? What do you want to change in this world?
Go. Do it.
Cites
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSC06P9A5W4
https://www.goodgoodgood.co/articles/john-green-danaher-tuberculosis
https://www.goodgoodgood.co/articles/john-green-danaher-tuberculosis-good-news
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yiflu3nL7Zw
