EP.863: Coronavirus Crisis- Italian Doctor on The Problem with Current Testing Methods

On this episode of Going Underground, we speak to Dr. Silvia Bignamini, the Health Director of San Francesco Hospital in Bergamo Italy. She discusses some of the difficulties medical services are facing in local communities due to the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, the shortage of PPE (personal protective equipment) in hospitals all over the world, the main forms of transmission of the Coronavirus, important steps to suppress infection, the problems with the current available testing methods, her experience of becoming infected with COVID-19 and more! Next, we speak to Professor Guy Standing, the former economic adviser to John McDonnell of the Labour Party and author of ‘Battling 8 Giants: Basic Income Now’ about the Coronavirus economic crisis. He discusses his opinion on the government’s plan to pay 80% of workers’ wages and why he believes it won’t work, why universal basic income is the only way to save millions from homelessness and solve the lack of demand for basic goods, why Universal Credit will ultimately fail in alleviating the economic crisis caused by COVID-19, the current problems of neoliberal capitalism growing bigger due to the crisis, the ‘precariat’ growing due to Coronavirus and more! Finally, we speak to Dr. Helen Yaffe, author of ‘We Are Cuba! How A Revolutionary People Have Survived in a Post-Soviet World’. She discusses Cuba’s international medical effort against Coronavirus, from sending doctors to many countries abroad, to its drugs for COVID-19 treatment and vaccine development, the history of Cuba’s ‘Army of White Coats’ and medical internationalism, why the United States and Western powers view Cuba as a threat, Cuba’s Interferon Alpha-2b drug which could aid the fight against Coronavirus, the US blockade of Cuba, allegations of Cuba being a dictatorship and more!