Speaker 1: You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovic on Bloomberg Radio. Here we
Speaker 1: are a third year of the global pandemic, and with
Speaker 1: that in mind, the Global Communications from Edelman surveyed some
Speaker 1: ten thousand individuals in ten countries that includes China, Germany
Speaker 1: in the US for a special report looking into trust
Speaker 1: in healthcare. Richard Edelman is chief executive officer of Edelman.
Speaker 1: He joins us once again on the phone from New
Speaker 1: York City. Richard, great to have you back with us.
Speaker 1: How are you? Thanks? Really great? And you know, for me,
Speaker 1: for the two of you, the most important thing is
Speaker 1: the pandemic really reduced people's confidence in the healthcare system
Speaker 1: and they really find it difficult to get medical advice
Speaker 1: that's not politicized, and that has a huge consequence on
Speaker 1: their behavior because low trust individuals actually have much less
Speaker 1: likelihood of getting vaccinated or even going for checkups regularly. Well,
Speaker 1: what can you tell us about where this mistrust comes from?
Speaker 1: And you know, I'm a little worried about where it
Speaker 1: comes from. I mean, I imagine a lot of it
Speaker 1: comes from the messaging. Some part of it comes from politics,
Speaker 1: meaning Republicans are less than Democrats trusting. Um. Some part
Speaker 1: of it comes from from race. Blacks and Hispanics are
Speaker 1: less trusting than white some part of it. You'll be surprised.
Speaker 1: Actually urban people are you know, more more trusting than
Speaker 1: than rural Uh. And the problem is Internet um searches
Speaker 1: is the number one source of information for the unvaccinated,
Speaker 1: not experts, and it just means that you get urban
Speaker 1: myths passed around. Yeah, it's interesting. I have members of
Speaker 1: my family in the medical community, and it's like, you've
Speaker 1: got to be careful about dr google um because you know,
Speaker 1: you all of a sudden think you have something and
Speaker 1: then you walk into a doctor's office and this is
Speaker 1: what you say you have, and you know you've got
Speaker 1: to really rely on the experts in the science, you know,
Speaker 1: whether it's the pandemic or anything else that's out there. Um,
Speaker 1: it isn't. On that point. Two thirds of people say
Speaker 1: that there's a gap between how well they take care
Speaker 1: of their health and how well it should be taken
Speaker 1: care of. So they're self aware. But information is equal
Speaker 1: to cost in driving that gap. In other words, you know,
Speaker 1: in America, under half the people say they consume health
Speaker 1: information once a week, which is crazy. Um, and how
Speaker 1: do they feel it? Well? As you say, they go
Speaker 1: online and or they just rely on themselves, which is spooky,
Speaker 1: which is interesting. You know. I was thinking about having
Speaker 1: done a couple of virtual doctor visits and was pretty
Speaker 1: skeptical running into it. Are going into it? I realized
Speaker 1: actually how great it can be if you're busy or
Speaker 1: you know the access it can give you. It's not
Speaker 1: perfect and it won't work for everything. Um, there's nothing
Speaker 1: like face to face. But I do wonder, you know.
Speaker 1: I think we thought to some extent that this would
Speaker 1: be a great game changer. What's the thought on technology
Speaker 1: and medicine and access. What we found is that the
Speaker 1: most trusted source for people who are basically distrusting is
Speaker 1: my doctor or pharmacists, people close to them, and also
Speaker 1: Carol employers And that's really important for the listeners of
Speaker 1: this show because they are the leading believable source of
Speaker 1: health information. So my employer is is critical. Wow. So
Speaker 1: what's the recommendation when you take all this together, Richard,
Speaker 1: what are the takeaways for as to change this? We
Speaker 1: have to we have to be through this information. But
Speaker 1: should it be employers who are the ones who do
Speaker 1: this because not everybody trust their employer. Here's the thing, Um,
Speaker 1: we have to build trust in the health ecosystem. You know,
Speaker 1: we have low trust in government right now, and therefore
Speaker 1: it's on my employer, and it's on my employer influencing
Speaker 1: good health choices, giving reliable information, giving people incentives to
Speaker 1: their health. Um. And we have also address the disparities
Speaker 1: and health outcomes. You know, people in lower income neighborhoods, etcetera. Um,
Speaker 1: they have a two to one worse outcome for COVID,
Speaker 1: partly because their frontline workers and also partly because they
Speaker 1: don't have equal access to our docks. Well, it's interesting. Well,
Speaker 1: I was thinking about the work shifting summit that we
Speaker 1: did last week for Bloomberg Live. And I've talked with
Speaker 1: Franco Studas, overt Cisco Chief People, Policy and Purpose Officer.
Speaker 1: She's a senior you know, executive VP there, and so
Speaker 1: you know, in the c suite, the mental well being
Speaker 1: has certainly been something that company, certainly at Cisco and elsewhere,
Speaker 1: that they are taking seriously. UM and and understand their
Speaker 1: role in it. Hey, Richard, before we go, just got
Speaker 1: about a minute or so left. We'd be remiss if
Speaker 1: we didn't ask you. You talked to the global corporate
Speaker 1: community on a regular basis. The Russian invasion of Ukraine?
Speaker 1: What does it mean longer term? Our companies going to
Speaker 1: step away from Russia as they need to as required
Speaker 1: by sanctions, but also stay away longer term. I think
Speaker 1: that they're being pushed by their employees and by their
Speaker 1: consumers to say we're out. Um. And three companies have
Speaker 1: made that choice. And the obvious ones were the energy
Speaker 1: companies who were joint ventures with Russian state companies, but
Speaker 1: then it became the tech companies and financial services, and
Speaker 1: then more more recently people in QSR, restaurants and so Um.
Speaker 1: This is a dramatic a move by companies that I
Speaker 1: can remember, Um, since South African sanctions in the seventies
Speaker 1: and eighties during apartheid. Is it permanent? I think it
Speaker 1: is certainly permanent, given the state of affairs in the
Speaker 1: Garden government in Russia. Yeah. I mean I have a
Speaker 1: hard time seeing how some of these companies can say,
Speaker 1: wait a second, okay, putin you know, whatever happens next, Yeah,
Speaker 1: we're gonna go back in. Whatever that looks like and whatever.
Speaker 1: You know how long that takes, well, especially if this
Speaker 1: war goes on for another couple of weeks and you know,
Speaker 1: Kiev gets destroyed and there you know, thousands of casualties
Speaker 1: and five million people who have had to immigrate. It
Speaker 1: has all the aspects of a complete mess. And companies
Speaker 1: don't want to be part of a mess. All right,
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, Richard be well. Richard Edelman, chief
Speaker 1: executive officer at Edelman on the phone in New York City,
Speaker 1: out with their latest trust barometer here in two special
Speaker 1: report Trust in Healthcare, really looking at that issue specifically,