Now a cholera epidemic was sweeping through Southeast Asia and south Asia in the early 1970s so I started medical school and I joined a laboratory to work on this.

If any country was a mine-shaft canary for the reintroduction of cholera it was Haiti - and we knew it. And in retrospect more should have been done to prepare for cholera... which can spread like wildfire in Haiti... This was a big rebuke to all of us working in public health and health care in Haiti.

The biggest public health challenge is rebuilding health systems. In other words if you look at cholera or maternal mortality or tuberculosis in Haiti they're major problems in Haiti but the biggest problem is rebuilding systems.