32 min listen
Strange Fruit #139: Naveen Jain Wants to Develop an HIV Vaccine... and Give It Away
FromStrange Fruit
Strange Fruit #139: Naveen Jain Wants to Develop an HIV Vaccine... and Give It Away
FromStrange Fruit
ratings:
Length:
30 minutes
Released:
Sep 25, 2015
Format:
Podcast episode
Description
Naveen Jain is the co-founder and chief marketing officer of Immunity Project, a non-profit dedicated to developing an HIV vaccine and giving it away for free to anyone who needs it. Jain said it was his father’s illness that brought his attention to the flaws in the pharmaceutical industry. “As we were going through this process with him, and he was seeing countless doctors and specialists along the way,” Jain said. “It became very clear to me that the way we treat people in our society today — in terms of the pharmaceuticals and treatments that we provide for people — are not often actual solutions. Often times they’re Band-Aids. And I think that’s really screwed up.” Jain will be in Louisville this month for IdeaFestival, and he speaks to us this week about his work. We also meet Dr. John Hardin, of Western Kentucky University. Hardin was one of the co-editors of a recently released volume called The Kentucky African American Encyclopedia. Started in 2008 and published by the University Press of Kentucky, it features more than 1,000 entries from about 150 contributors, telling the story of black Kentuckians, from frontier days to the present. And in our Juicy Fruit segment, we talk about Viola Davis' amazing speech at the Emmy Awards, and all the groundbreaking black women of TV who were recognized for their work, at long last.
Released:
Sep 25, 2015
Format:
Podcast episode
Titles in the series (100)
Strange Fruit #40: Don Lemon Says Don't Litter!: While we spent the week celebrating Jai's birthday and recovering from [EOY](http://www.eoy.net/), CNN's Don Lemon was busy making people mad and [agreeing with Bill O'Reilly](http://www.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/bestoftv/2013/07/27/nr-lemon-no-talking-points.cnn.html). In our Juicy Fruit segment this week, we deconstruct his list of advice for black folks. The video is worth a watch, but if you're pressed for time, it boils down to pulling up your pants and not having babies out of wedlock. It was a disappointing reminder that just because someone's family doesn't make them immune to the lure of respectability politics. But as Doc said, he's certainly no [Boykin](http://keithboykin.com/) (and we did agree with him that littering is gross). Also this week we bring you part two of our chat with Louisville activist Carla Wallace, and author Chris Crass. Chris was in town recently to celebrate the release of his book, [Towards Collective by Strange Fruit