What happens if you get infected with the coronavirus? Who's most at risk? How can you protect yourself? Public health expert David Heymann, who led the global response to the SARS outbreak in 2003, shares the latest findings about COVID-19 and what the future may hold. (Recorded February 27, 2020)

COVID-19 will change everything -- and the way students learn is no exception. Nora Flanagan draws on her experiences as a teacher in the Chicago Public Schools system to share strategies on how educational institutions can pivot to meet the needs of students, teachers and parents amidst radical circumstances.

As the threat of COVID-19 continues, infectious disease expert and TED Fellow Adam Kucharski answers five key questions about the novel coronavirus, providing necessary perspective on its transmission, how governments have responded and what might need to change about our social behavior to end the pandemic. (This video is excerpted from a 70-mi...

TED Connects is a live conversation series featuring experts whose ideas can help us reflect and work through this uncertain time with a sense of responsibility, compassion and wisdom. View the TED Connects archive

A look inside of a global tech giant since the pandemic: What's changed, and what innovations have helped combat challenges stemming from COVID-19? In conversation with TED technology curator Simone Ross, Verizon's Craig Silliman discusses how to lead and communicate during a time of change.

Crisis interventions often focus on a single aspect of a big, complicated problem, failing to address the broader social and economic context. Kwame Owusu-Kesse describes how the Harlem Children's Zone is taking a more holistic approach to the pandemic, weaving together a network of services to help communities recover and rebuild. Learn more ab...

Capitalism needs an upgrade, says PayPal CEO Dan Schulman, and it starts with paying people enough to actually invest in their futures. He discusses why companies need to cultivate trust to recover and rebuild after the COVID-19 pandemic -- and how we can use this defining moment to create a more inclusive, ethical economy. (This virtual convers...

Developing a vaccine usually takes five to 10 years, costs about a billion dollars and has a failure rate of 93 percent. Under the pressure of the coronavirus pandemic, scientists are being asked to speed that timeline up to 12 to 18 months, says Jerome Kim, director general of the International Vaccine Institute. How are things going? Kim updat...

The coronavirus pandemic is unlike anything we've ever seen in health care, says emergency physician Esther Choo. Sharing insights into how health workers are responding to the outbreak, she explains what makes this public health emergency different from others -- and provides a few simple things you can do to help. Watch to the end to hear abou...

"We are living through the tech-enabled unraveling of full-time employment itself," says anthropologist Mary L. Gray. As the pandemic exposes and accelerates the shift to on-demand online labor, Gray takes us inside the jobs being created to solve the problems artificial intelligence can't handle -- and explains why our economic recovery hinges ...

In the face of three simultaneous crises -- health, the economy and climate -- do we have a chance to do capitalism differently? Economist Mariana Mazzucato explains why we shouldn't try to go back to normal after the pandemic but should instead rethink how governments work together with businesses to solve big problems. Learn more about how gov...

Conventional vaccine testing is a slow, years-long process. As thousands of people continue to die each day from COVID-19, bioethicist Nir Eyal proposes a radical idea that could dramatically accelerate the vaccine development timeline: "human challenge trials," in which scientists would deliberately expose volunteers to the virus to more quickl...

How can we return to work without spurring a second surge of coronavirus infection? Biologist Uri Alon shares a thought-provoking strategy: four days at work followed by 10 days of lockdown, a cycle that would exploit a weakness in the virus's biology and potentially cut its reproductive rate to a manageable level. Learn more about this approach...

(Update: the CDC and international science community urge everyone to wear face coverings in public.) Where did the new coronavirus originate, how did it spread so fast -- and what's next? Sharing insights from the outbreak, global health expert and TED Fellow Alanna Shaikh traces the spread of COVID-19, discusses why travel restrictions aren't ...

In the 16th century, physician Andreas Vesalius described how a suffocating animal could be kept alive by inserting a tube into its trachea and blowing air to inflate its lungs. Today, Vesalius's treatise is recognized as the first description of mechanical ventilation— a crucial practice in modern medicine. So how do our modern ventilators work...

When a new pathogen emerges, our bodies and healthcare systems are left vulnerable. And when this pathogen causes the outbreak of a pandemic, there's an urgent need for a vaccine to create widespread immunity with minimal loss of life. So how quickly can we develop vaccines when we need them most? Dan Kwartler describes the three phases of vacci...

While on lockdown, the galleries of Singapore's iconic ArtScience Museum were empty -- but online, the museum was abuzz. Honor Harger shares how they're engaging deeply with its visitors through streamed talks, performances and workshops that investigate the COVID-19 landscape and uplift marginalized voices. (This virtual conversation, hosted by...

A new virus emerges and spreads like wildfire. In order to contain it, researchers must first collect data about who's been infected. Two main viral testing techniques are critical: one tells you if you have the virus and the other shows if you've already had it. So, how exactly do these tests work? Cella Wright explores the science of PCR tests...

COVID-19 will change everything -- and the way we work and learn will be no exception. Will the traditional office structure be a thing of the past? Could our education system start to look more like a lifelong journey? Tech futurist Ben Pring and head of TED Chris Anderson tackle these questions and more in this thought-provoking interview. (Re...

The COVID-19 pandemic has upended how we think about the workplace. TED curator Chee Pearlman and James Ludwig, vice president of global design and product engineering at Steelcase, discuss how we can use this time as an opportunity to reflect on what matters most – and make the office of the future even better in the process. (Recorded June 16,...

Philanthropist and Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates offers insights into the COVID-19 pandemic, discussing why testing and self-isolation are essential, which medical advancements show promise and what it will take for the world to endure this crisis. (This virtual conversation is part of the TED Connects series, hosted by head of TED Chris Anders...

Karen DeSalvo, the chief health officer at Google, explains the partnership between big tech and public health in slowing the spread of COVID-19 -- and discusses a new contact tracing technology recently rolled out by Google and Apple that aims to ease the burden on health workers and provide scientists critical time to create a vaccine. (This v...

Your hands, up close, are anything but smooth. With peaks and valleys, folds and rifts, there are plenty of hiding places for a virus to stick. If you then touch your face, the virus can infect you. But there are two extraordinarily simple ways you can keep that from happening: soap and water, and hand sanitizer. So which is better? Alex Rosenth...

Museums are vessels of memory, knowledge, inspiration and dreams. Anne Pasternak, director of the Brooklyn Museum, makes the case for cultural institutions to take a leading role in supporting the world's recovery from COVID-19 -- and shows how, in times of turmoil and disruption, the arts help us come together, heal and rebuild a better society...

Offering a vision of Afghanistan that goes beyond what's often depicted in the media, President Ashraf Ghani shares his thoughts on peacemaking, the true cost of war, the nation's COVID-19 response strategy and the sweeping economic and social reforms happening throughout the country. "The ultimate goal is a sovereign, democratic, united Afghani...

Can technology create a democracy that's fast, fair ... and even fun? Digital minister Audrey Tang shares how Taiwan avoided a COVID-19 shutdown in early 2020 through innovations like developing apps to map mask availability, crowdsourcing ideas that could become laws and creating a "humor over rumor" campaign to combat disinformation with comed...

To combat COVID-19, countries have enforced city-wide shutdowns, stay-at-home orders and mask mandates -- but the reaction (and adherence) to these rules has differed markedly in the East and West. In conversation with TED's head of curation Helen Walters, writer and publisher Huang Hung sheds light on how Chinese and American cultural values sh...