John: Good morning Hank. It's Tuesday so I want to tell you a story set in Alaska that I first heard from doctor Salman Khashovji. In 1950, the year our dad was born, tuberculosis was the leading  cause of death in Alaska. Up to 35% of native Alaskans  could expect to die of TB, a rate even higher than was seen at the peak of the 18th century epidemic in Europe.

Tuberculosis was an absolute scourge in Alaska and there was no indication that things could ever get better. Like I often think about this 1941 history of tuberculosis written in really flowery prose where the author is like the El Dorado of cure seems still far in the distance, but in fact the El Dorado of cure was only like nine years away. We cant see the future coming, we cant see the ways were going to work together to make the world better for each other.

I've said it before, its not just that the world can change, the world will change and together we have some say in how it changes. So right its 1950. TB is the leading cause of death in Alaska.

But then I some drugs prove effective against TB and when prescribed together they can actually cure the disease. Back then it took like 18 to 24 months of taking this cocktail of antibiotics, but still it was curable. Also, one of those drugs, Isoniazid, could be used to prevent the development of active TB in people who lived or worked near the sick.

So suddenly we have the tools to cure tuberculosis and to prevent tuberculosis. But of course tools that  you don't use are not tools. So we have these amazing new tools and public health officials set out to, one, search for cases so that people don't only get diagnosed with tuberculosis when they're so sick that they come to a hospital.

And two, treat every patient  that they find and three, offer preventative therapy to their close contacts. STP search for cases, treat people with TB and prevent future cases. And in one town, Bethel, Alaska, this strategy led to a 69% reduction in tuberculosis incidence in one year.

Statewide, between 1952 and 1960, TB and native Alaskans declined by over 75%. Now there is still tuberculosis in Alaska, as there is everywhere, but today the rate of TB is  99% lower than it was in 1950. Alright, so this is Lesotho, a southern African nation of 2.2 million people that today has the highest rate of tuberculosis in the world.

There are many reasons for this. Lesotho is an impoverished nation with high rates of malnutrition, which is a key risk factor for TB, there's a high incidence of  comorbidities like HIV infection, and also mining is a very important industry in Lesotho, and damage to the lungs caused by inhaling dust and silt and stuff is another  risk factor for tuberculosis. So Lesotho is one place where we see all these historic and social and economic forces coming together to create an environment that just allows TB to flourish.

But now, Partners in Health is working with the government of Lesotho to do a version of what happened in Alaska all those decades ago. Search, treat, prevent using chest x-rays and molecular tests that are  cheaper than they've ever been. Thanks to the hard work of Nerdfighteria, we can identify cases much sooner.

We can treat people effectively, and we can offer them preventative therapy. We have the tools. The experts I've spoken to believe this is a critical project for ending TB because it will provide a blueprint showing that even in impoverished communities with fragile healthcare systems, it is possible to dramatically reduce the burden of tuberculosis.

We want to help support this project, which is why today we are officially launching Keats and Co. Awesome Coffee Club is re-branding to become Keats and Co. Coffee.

And we now have tea! And we also ship to Europe. That's right.

We still make incredible coffee. That supports farmers working  to reverse deforestation. And our tea is delicious and back in stock.

And the best part is, 100% of the profits from Keats and Co. will go to support comprehensive tuberculosis care in Lesotho and beyond. A few months ago, we soft launched Keats and company to Nerdfighteria. And between that and the Awesome Coffee Club, we've already raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for better tuberculosis care.

But we believe that's just the beginning. So check it out. We can address all your coffee needs, from K-cups to decaf, and also all of your tea needs, from Earl Grey to herbal.

Our other good store brands, the Awesome Socks Club and Sun Basin Soap, will continue to support the Maternal Center of Excellence in Sierra Leone, which, by the way, is really coming together. And Keats and Co. will fight tuberculosis, its tea and coffee for TB. The company is named after the great poet John Keats, who died in 1821 of tuberculosis when he was just 25.

Keats often referenced tuberculosis, an ode to a nightingale he famously wrote, youth grows pale and specter thin and dies. There was nothing humanity could do for John Keats in 1821 or the millions of others who died of consumption that year. But that's no longer the case.

This isn't 1821 anymore. This isn't even 1950. We don't need 18 to 24 months to cure most cases of TB.

It can be cured within four or six months. I think the end of tuberculosis deaths would be the greatest achievement in human history. It's far harder and ultimately more impactful even than ending smallpox, and I know that's a distant dream.

And the El Dorado of ending TB death seems still far in the future. But it doesn't have to be. All that stands between us and a world without TB death is will and attention and funding, and we want to be a tiny little part of that by making coffee and tea.

That's absolutely incredible. That also makes the world better. And I know there's fundamentally no way to communicate taste through the wires of the Internet or whatever, but just ask people in comments like our coffee and tea are incredible.

If you've only ever had  grocery store coffee and tea, your mind is about to be blown. Links in the doobly doo let's make Lesotho Bethel. Hank, I'll see you on Friday.