In early October, reports emerged that a researcher at the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Research Institute in Russia had died. Russian officials described the cause as pneumonia of unknown origin. Others raised the possibility of pneumonic plague after a lab accident, which remains unconfirmed.

Dr. Ashish Jha was one of the first US experts to call for answers. On Oct. 4, he posted that Russian authorities owe the world more transparency. Within two days, he had done more than a dozen interviews.

Booking producers choose guests they trust to be careful when facts are thin. Ashish is a former White House COVID-19 Response Coordinator, a former Dean of the Brown University School of Public Health, and a Senior Fellow at the Harvard Belfer Center. He has made decisions during a fast-moving outbreak and knows how to separate what’s confirmed from what isn’t. He’s also Co-Founder and CEO of BioRadar.

His coverage includes:

  1. The Boston Globe: In an opinion piece, he says the US should press Russia for specifics and fund detection that can flag pathogens nobody thought to test for. The Globe also reported on his call for transparency.
  2. The BMJ: He calls for independent verification of what happened and for international rules covering labs that work with dangerous pathogens.
  3. NBC News: Ashish told NBC that much more information and transparency were needed from Moscow. He also put the risk in context. Person-to-person spread of pneumonic plague is “very hard,” so the concern is what happened inside the lab, not a wider outbreak.
  4. CNN OutFront: On Oct 5, Ashish joined Erin Burnett to discuss the suspected pneumonic plague case.
  5. Fox News, America Reports: He discussed the questions around the death and Russia’s claims.
  6. CBS News: He joined to discuss the death and the quarantine in Russia.
  7. NPR’s Here & Now: He explained what is and isn’t known about the case.
  8. TIME: He’s quoted in TIME’s explainer on what worries public-health experts.

Also on air: ABC World News Tonight, NBC Nightly News, CNN’s The Lead with Jake Tapper, and NewsNation.