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@slerikson

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16.11.2024
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Latest posts by @slerikson

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First 6 Days of Iran War Cost U.S. $11.3 Billion, Pentagon Says

That's about half of what it cost for USAID for a whole year www.nytimes.com/live/2026/03...

12.03.2026 04:37 👍 1865 🔁 834 💬 59 📌 36

This guy thought he’d never have to answer for his actions. There’s a lot of that going around. We have to hold ALL of them accountable.

10.03.2026 16:20 👍 789 🔁 246 💬 46 📌 14

Seems like a thing more people should be mad about

02.03.2026 02:38 👍 1869 🔁 514 💬 52 📌 6
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The latest piece in the Science Politics #USAID anniversary series is out now! Susan Erikson discusses the private #finance approach to #globalhealth, noting the dystopian dangers of leaving #humanitarian aid up to wealthy #investors.

sciencepolitics.org/2026/01/22/t...

22.01.2026 15:54 👍 0 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
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Professor Wendy Hui Kyong Chun will deliver CDH Distinguished Lecture 2026 - CDH We are thrilled to announce that Professor Wendy Hui Kyong Chun, Simon Fraser University’s Canada 150 Research Chair in New Media in the School of Communication and Director of the Digital Democracies...

www.cdh.cam.ac.uk/about/news/d...

15.02.2026 16:29 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0

Case and I disagree on many things. But his NYTimes piece today is a great primer for understanding why the financialization of health and its supportive services is so absolutely dangerous for humans

07.02.2026 00:18 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
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Opinion | The Finance Industry Is a Grift. Let’s Start Treating It That Way.

“Financialization [is] the term for making financial markets and transactions ends unto themselves, disconnected from — and often at the expense of — the societal benefits that support human flourishing and are capitalism’s proper purpose.” www.nytimes.com/2026/02/06/o...

07.02.2026 00:16 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
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The USAID Cuts Make Room for Wealthy Investors to Bet on Global Health - Science Politics Speculative finance is supplanting conventional aid funding, enabling investors to determine the terms and conditions of new aid financing schemes.

On Jan 24, it will be a year since USAID was axed. Science Politics hosts a series of commentaries, including mine on what USAID's demise makes room FOR in US foreign policy. Hint: Speculative finance.

sciencepolitics.org/2026/01/22/t...

22.01.2026 18:20 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 1

And it’s to normalize/naturalize the military in our streets to facilitate what is coming. ICE out!

20.01.2026 14:23 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0

@adamconover.net I just watched a presentation and panel discussion with Susan Erikson, author of *Investable! When Pandemic Risk Meets Speculative Finance – A Cautionary Tale*.

PLEASE consider inviting her to be a guest on Factually!

30.10.2025 20:14 👍 1 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0

Good grief, his profound arrogance and displacement of what truly matters for humans to thrive and live lives of meaning and care!

04.12.2025 00:29 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0

"What happens when capital-market enthusiasm collides with real world economic priorities?"

The Risky Science Podcast does a deep dive on the volatility of risk finance and global health crises with FHS professor @slerikson.bsky.social, author of Investible!

pod.link/1825669405/e...

#SFU #SFUFHS

27.11.2025 23:35 👍 2 🔁 1 💬 1 📌 0
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Models, Priorities and Pandemic Finance Also, investors double down on private credit scrutiny and a new law looks to crack catastrophe model data.

Can innovative finance really can save global health?
Risky Science pod host, Chris Westfall, gave me the opportunity to argue otherwise! Listen to the podcast!
www.riskmarketnews.com/models-prior...

19.11.2025 18:00 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
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Beware the financialization of the global health industry Beware of financialization when it is code for “money making money on health,” S.L. Erikson warns.

We must not give up on publicly funding health and wellness at home and the world. Do not relinquish care to only profit-making and ROI schemes! My latest: www.statnews.com/2025/11/05/f...

05.11.2025 14:28 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
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The Business of Betting on Catastrophe World Bank pandemic bonds paid out only after death tolls passed a threshold. They’re part of a booming market where investors turn calamity into capital.

World Bank pandemic bonds only paid out after death tolls passed a threshold. They’re part of a booming market where investors turn calamity into capital.

Susan Erikson explores the murky, ever-growing world of betting on catastrophe:

23.06.2025 15:33 👍 12 🔁 5 💬 0 📌 1
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Framed as humanitarian innovation, insurance-linked securities allow investors to bet on everything from hurricanes to pandemics. Our essay of the week unpacks how speculative finance turns catastrophe into a tradable asset.

By Susan Erikson in @mitpress.bsky.social

buff.ly/EXs3DZK

02.07.2025 11:02 👍 11 🔁 6 💬 0 📌 2
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Jacobin LogoJacobin IconA/V IconSearch IconLogin IconJSearch IconJJacobin Logo Articles from .

Jacobin has a fiery issue on SPECULATION, which includes a review of my book, Investable! When Pandemic Risk Meets Speculative Finance
jacobin.com/issue/specul...
jacobin.com/2025/06/maki...
@sfu-fhs.bsky.social @sfufass.bsky.social @mitpress.bsky.social

25.06.2025 16:33 👍 5 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 1
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Opinion | The Waste Musk Created

Life-saving drugs going to waste in Sierra Leone because the US stopped distribution for treatment. Just. Stopped.

Cruel.

www.nytimes.com/2025/06/21/o...

21.06.2025 15:34 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0

My friend @slerikson.bsky.social‬ amazing book, a multi-sited ethnography of so-called pandemic bonds --from international investor meetings to Sierra Leonean health centers -- is finally out!

27.05.2025 04:35 👍 0 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
Book cover titled "Investable! When Pandemic Risk Meets Speculative Finance: A Cautionary Tale" by Susan Erikson, featuring an abstract illustration of a figure walking on colorful landscape.

Book cover titled "Investable! When Pandemic Risk Meets Speculative Finance: A Cautionary Tale" by Susan Erikson, featuring an abstract illustration of a figure walking on colorful landscape.

"Investable!" is a critical and sobering look at how international bankers and investors turn pandemics into investment opportunities and what we stand to lose when we rely on "innovative finance": mitpress.mit.edu/978026254935...

20.05.2025 17:19 👍 1 🔁 1 💬 1 📌 1
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Investable! by Susan Erikson: 9780262549356 | PenguinRandomHouse.com: Books A critical and sobering look at how international bankers and investors turn pandemics into investment opportunities, and what we stand to lose when we rely on “innovative finance.” In a world...

Investable! is out today! Thrilled and grateful!

www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/757475...

20.05.2025 14:41 👍 3 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
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Trump’s nominee to run the DFC, wants to redirect USAID’s budget to Wall Street. What will this mean for global health?

In the most recent blog post, first published by the McLeod Group, Susan Erikson (@slerikson.bsky.social) reflects on the financialization of aid.

www.sum.uio.no/english/rese...

18.03.2025 10:04 👍 5 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0
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Doge’s ‘villain’ fantasy is wrong about public service Most choose to do it because the job matters

DOGE has so much to learn about government! on.ft.com/3R8b3ai

13.03.2025 14:19 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
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Shifting Aid Money to Wall Street: The Financialization of Aid is Underway - The McLeod Group McLeod Group guest blog by S.L. Erikson, March 12, 2025 Aid can’t be run like a private equity or hedge fund. And yet, Benjamin Black, Donald Trump’s nominee to run the US International Development Fi...

Wall Street likely to benefit from USAID shuttering. More about it in my McLeod piece www.mcleodgroup.ca/2025/03/shif...

12.03.2025 15:39 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Investable!: When Pandemic Risk Meets Speculative Finance--A Cautionary Tale A critical and sobering look at how international bankers and investors turn pandemics into investment opportunities, and what we stand to lose when we rely on “innovative finance.”In a world increasi...

Can't wait for this amazing work by my friend Susan Erikson to be out in the world! mitpressbookstore.mit.edu/book/9780262...

23.01.2025 21:48 👍 3 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0