What happens when a newborn does not receive enough oxygen and blood flow around birth, putting the brain at risk of serious injury? Cooling can help slow the damage, but it does not directly treat the underlying causes.

Dr. Howard Berman, CEO of ReAlta Life Sciences, joins Solomon Wilcots to discuss hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy, or HIE, a severe neonatal condition that can lead to brain injury, disability, cerebral palsy, and death. While therapeutic hypothermia can help slow inflammation, there are currently no approved drug therapies that directly address the biological drivers of HIE.

Howard explains how ReAlta’s investigational therapy, pegtarazimod, is designed to target multiple components of the inflammatory response. He also discusses the company’s Phase 2 STAR trial, which is evaluating pegtarazimod in combination with therapeutic hypothermia and using MRI to measure changes in brain injury.

For anyone interested in the science, leadership, and urgency behind the race to protect newborns with HIE, this episode offers a close look at what may come next.

Biotechnology has helped transform what is possible in medicine, turning once-fatal diseases into manageable conditions and opening the door to treatments that would have seemed impossible a generation ago. But as science advances, the systems that support innovation are under pressure, from public trust and policy decisions to capital formation, regulation, and confidence in scientific institutions.

In this episode of Russo Edge, Dr. Jeremy Levin, co-founder and executive chairman of Ovid Therapeutics, former CEO of Teva, former chair of BIO, and a longtime biopharma leader whose career has included senior roles at Bristol Myers Squibb and Novartis, joins host Solomon Wilcots for a conversation on why biotech should be viewed as one of America’s most important strategic assets.

The conversation also explores the difference between biotech innovators and larger pharmaceutical companies, the complexity of drug pricing, the role of middlemen in the healthcare system, and why the public often does not see the full story behind how medicines are discovered, developed, funded, and delivered.

Whether you are a biotech leader, investor, policymaker, or simply interested in the future of medicine, this episode offers a timely look at the pressures facing the industry and the choices that will shape what comes next.

What if the systems that keep people alive, healthy, and productive were valued the same way elite organizations value performance?

In this episode, Solomon Wilcots speaks with Dr. Michelle Williams, professor of epidemiology and population health at Stanford University School of Medicine, former dean of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and author of The Cure for Everything. She explains how the often-invisible systems of public health shape daily life, from clean air and safe water to maternal health and prevention, and why public health should be seen not only as a moral imperative, but as an economic one.

This conversation examines what happens when public health systems are built well, when they are neglected, and why prevention should be understood not as an afterthought, but as an investment in resilience and long-term prosperity.