2019 Schedule

More than 140,000 people from more than 140 countries have told researchers just what they think and feel about science and key health challenges, such as vaccinations. Wellcome is releasing the findings for the first time at Aspen Ideas: Health. The largest such survey to date cuts across language, culture, and literacy levels to reveal how much people trust science, whether they feel it benefits...

Can a Broadway musical actually help destigmatize and further the mental health conversation in our culture? The Tony Award-winning musical Dear Evan Hansen has proven that the answer is yes – doing just that through sensitive storytelling on stage and the cast and crew's work with mental health not-for-profits off stage. In this panel, Dr. Harold Koplewicz, president and medical director of the C...

Research supports the idea that creatives of all types are over-represented in the population dealing with mood disorders and other psychiatric challenges. Certainly some of the world’s greatest musical masterpieces were composed by musicians who struggled with mental illness. Was it a source of inspiration for their creativity, or did they turn to art to help them heal? Richard Kogan, a psychiatr...

Almost everyone knows America’s most famous sex therapist, Dr. Ruth Westheimer, now past 90. With her diminutive frame, thick German accent, and uninhibited approach to sex education, Dr. Ruth has transformed both public and private conversations around sexuality. Fewer people know about her early years as a Holocaust survivor and then a machine gunner in the Israeli army. Following a film screeni...

For more than two decades, Dr. Larry Nassar was the physician for the US women’s Olympic gymnastics team – and a serial sexual abuser who chalked up hundreds of victims. Director Erin Lee Carr’s powerful documentary, with its brave testimonials from athletes at the center of the story, reveals a dangerous system that prioritizes winning above all. Based on years of research and interviews with doz...

Alarms, intercoms, monitors, and other life-saving hospital equipment batter patients and clinicians alike with noise around the clock. The impact of that cacophony may be hard to measure, but it’s a fair bet that it doesn’t promote well-being. What if the auditory experience in hospitals was more than an assault on the ears? Redesigning the soundscape to make medical equipment more harmonious, ta...