we're far behind at least in terms of rural alaska in terms of the percentage of homes with complete plumbing and if you look at this graph you can see that on the x axis is dead cake, on the y axis is percentage of homes with complete plumbing inch the u.s. we went from 55% in 1940 up to 100% in lower 48 states. alaska is pretty high but when you look at rural alaska, as of 20 you draw a line across, we're where the u.s. was in 1959. ...

in the winter it gets very cold in alaska. that raises. they dump those frozen blocks into the sewage lagoon. and alaska we call those poopcicles. your priority is going to be for drinking and for cooking. is going to be a much lesser priority for personal hygiene, washing clothing and cleaning the home. when people think about waterborne disease, most people think about pathogens in the water causing illness. we think in alaska water washed diseases are probably of greater

import. that is the rushing water. about washing their hands. is lack of water or hygiene and that allows for person-to-person transmission of a variety of different infectious diseases. we have done a different number of studies in alaska. this is one slide. you can see proportion of homes served with hot water. you conceived rates of invasive pneumococcal disease a very very serious illness and deaths in children less than five and alaska. you can see that in villages with less than 10% of running water that the invasive pneumococcal disease rates are astronomically high almost 400 per 100,000. as the water service increases, the rates of disease go down. we've seen this for a number of other diseases also. so increasing the proportion of a alaska with access to in home

water and wastewater service is quite important to alaskans. it's one of the 25 leading health indicators for healthy alaskans 2020. rebaselining 2010, 70% of row homes had running water. our target for 2020 is 87% and i pulled this off the web that red stop sign symbol means we are not on target. to reach 87% of water come of water distribution systems to rural homes. which is a bit of women. one of the things we've done in response to this that actually isn't an economic is a department of environmental conservation at the state of alaska has put forth the alaska water and sewer challenge, and this is the website you can is listed at the bottom if you want more information. it basically this is a challenge that was put out to ask for teams to come together and

propose decentralized water distribution systems for rural alaska. there are many places in rural alaska i will never have hyped water, where the substrate, you can't put in place. there are other places where it probably isn't affordable and so we need some alternate technologies some innovative technologies to help us with this. these teams, the work they do is private sector driven. they need to be able to provide sufficient water for health. it needs to be affordable for the homeowner. feasible capital cost, long-term operability and they need to get user input from communities. they are evaluating and mahoning counties retained and those three teams proposals are going to be implemented in rural villages and we've look over a period of years to see how they did in terms of health outcomes come in terms of engineering. did it work and then in terms of

acceptability and the community. and so that's actually ongoing right now. and then this is one of my last slides is just thinking about the upcoming u.s. the chairmanship of the arctic council and our water and sanitation initiative. i guess some of the deliverables that we have for this we are planning on a white paper looking at water and sanitation across the arctic to look at populations within home water service and looking at related health indicators and challenges and propose solutions or we are going to be traveling, i'll be traveling and less than two months to the finland international congress on hold healthy which will discuss this with our international partners. we are planning on a circumpolar water and sanitation conference bringing together circumpolar partners and sort of internationalizing the alaska water and sewer challenge for all of the arctic. we are sponsoring that in

anchorage sponsored by the state of alaska in september 2016 looking for innovation and water distribution for small communities. we have many partners in this effort that i have listed. no and for the sake of time i'll say thank you and that's it. [applause] >> thank you very much, michael. timothy? >> maybe go the other way. go the other way.

there's always technological challenge. why don't you just start your presentation and then we will catch up. >> yes. i've been asked to talk about the arctic human development report, which just recently came out, as heather said i guess cannot a couple of months ago but is dated 2014. this is the second arctic human development report refers was published in 2004. and one of the things well going through my slides already. it was put together by a number of different teams. there some 27 lead authors, lead editors, their international team of drawing from across the

arctic. here we go. across the arctic. this is not a research report necessarily. it's more of a review of research that other people have done. done any auspices of sustainable department. a number of targeted audience. one of them was the arctic council, policymakers in the arctic, other people interest in the arctic like to sell. what we found is from the first arctic human development report the use of this report rather extensively. these are the different chapters in the arctic human development report. i believed offer but i will -- i will focus on human health and well being. we had a number of guiding

questions of the offers an author can split off to address. one was how does a the arctic differ from the outside world from the court of the arctic states. certainly look at issues of ethnicity, and how those affect the population of the arctic climate change was a factor also. certainly regional variations among different part of the arctic i will sort out some of those. also the last bullet point what would the changes over roughly the first decade of the 20th century since the first arctic human development report. but focusing on health disparities or health, division of disparities containing health this parity is isn't issue that comes with the previous speakers highlight of this chapter, that's a trend that is highlighted in a number of different places. the sperry-sun countries regions and certainly disparity between indigenous and

non-indigenous peoples. and i pulled this section from the report, and has this report also and this different grouping, the nordic countries high overall health indicators not march dispersed them not large disparities between the different peoples. and then that kind of north american arctic good health indicators overall budgeting these disparities between indigenous and non-indigenous people. again, high disparities between those places in canada and denmark come and thing of russian arctic which i will highlight over all, poor health indicators in general. just a short example from the polar health atlas. what he does is a contrast infant mortality between greenland and denmark and basically the story is greenland

is some 30 years behind denmark in reducing infant mortality. the two lines converge rather nicely but a 30 year generation gap. this is from my chapter come together-some of these regional disparities among the 27 or so arctic regions and you can see there's a huge difference between the islands, iceland, so these places and then going down to -- again to make this an international person i put of the world more developed and less developed regions and this is according to the u.n. definition. this huge difference where you have a life expectancy of 58 years, large difference between men and women. life expectancy for men is 53 years. one of the factors that drive a lot of the overall disparities is the differences between men

and women. on the website are some of the russian regions where men can wear women outlive men by over a decade. extremely large differences possibly some the largest in the world. the point is when you have roughly half of your population with a life expectancy you of low overall life expectancy. infant mortality show some of the same trends. the highest rates of infant mortality are in some of these are dumbly indigenous regions or countries. greenland, going down to places like iceland and so the nordic countries which are really having among the lowest levels of infant mortality in the world. but does one family to highlight come to the whole world and then less developed countries to show even though these are high relatively to some these countries, in the arctic

regions, actually exist within highly developed high-income countries so that possibly some hope for something that can be drawn upon that there. apologize for the quality of this graph but basically the point that shows the trends in tv across some of the circumpolar regions. the first one is the canadian inuit, greenland and alaska natives. you can see the large decline in tb but kind of continued disparities in tb. one of the previous speakers talked about suicide. this was from some work that jack hicks hasn't done looking at the suicide rates in canada and then among the inuit. you can see candid shots of a flat with trends for the new it's an has continued to go up. likely check is a rather

cheerful guy. it's a rather depressing research but he correlates this with various historical events and also points out kind of a cluster of suicide. there's one that tends to be several. this is from some work i did. this shows the ratio the ratio of males to females in russia. this is 1989 prior to the breakup of the soviet union. he said most of the arctic, the northern regions have much higher male sex ratio than the rest of the country. this is because of the demands of industry. they draw more men than women. as steve introduced put a lot of research on migrations i was looking at the same sex ratio in the arctic. i thought i would be telling and migration store that would cope with the downsizing of the arctic of the north economy. and what happens you is you can see a declining male sex ratio that is not due to migration.

only about a quarter of that is due to migration from the record 50 the fact that men are dying in much larger numbers than women in the russian north. if we keep going down, this ratio continues to decline. these gaps in life expectancy and russia over all has among the highest female advantages in life expectancy in some of these regions. is extraordinarily high and i speculate it's probably among the highest in the world. the first arctic human development report really focused on health and the chapter was called health and well being but this one really tries to push back a little bit and look a little bit more broadly at all indicators and i think one of the previous speakers talked about suicide intervention has to go beyond just looking at what the health or health care sector can do. it's probably hard to read but the chart to the right basically shows the trends in gdp and the

trends in life expectancy over the first decade of the 20th century. the green shows improvement. for most of the arctic countries, it's generally been an improvement in life improvement in both come in life expectancy and in gdp. i won't go into detail if you're interested but what the arctic human development report, the subsequent reports do that they take the u.n. human development index, the three components of that but then they try to add some others that are kind of arctic specific of cultural agenda language and things are kind of important specifically to people in the arctic. so to conclude, there has been a lot of research on health and well being of indigenous peoples

as previous speakers talked about that. the report talks about that. there's been a number of different research intervention efforts underway to improve the health and well being of people in the arctic. one of the particularly messages in the report is that there has been considerable improvements in a lot of areas of health. i pointed out life expectancy as did others but there are some issuescome health issues in the arctic to remain rather intractable. talked about suicide, tb and some others some sexual transmitted diseases, domestic violence. i just don't really show any kind of improvement. i think the report also talked about the warming climate and how this may impact water food security, certainly some infectious diseases and things like that. and lastly senator murkowski talked about the importance of

educating the next generation about the arctic. and i think some of the speakers mentioned that as well. so i will finish with this slide. it shows my young to your older daughter look at the arctic human development report when it came in. notice the smile on her face and the thrill. she was actually born and raised kind of during my writing the whole thing. silenced up and take any questions you may have. [applause] >> thanks very much. we've heard a lot about suicide. we heard a lot about water and sanitation, both with respect to the work on your way specific to alaska but also worked as a new in the broader arctic health context. so i take that to mean from certainly in the cdc and nih perspective that these are the areas where there's the greatest promise.

as an agenda form of in a way forward, i also took away from listening to your presentations and listening to tim that we need to be quite realistic, that there are there are some significant barriers to this going forward. packaging or other broader infectious disease agendas that huge creation, as you pointed out, huge variation culturally demographically, geographically three significant differences across these different communities and across these different sovereign entities. we didn't talk much about what the political barriers might be in terms of getting cooperation within the council of some of these very sensitive and culturally-based problems. and we did hear much about questions of prioritization

across the constituency government we're talking about. to what degree are these issues come issues within a broader health, to what degree are these becoming prioritized and to what degree is the political and financial resources and commitments to try to move his agenda forward? so on the one hand we have the u.s. come into the chairmanship next week. we have this body of work out of there. we human development report out. there's a lot of new content to move forward. there's a lot of active ongoing work but what can what should we realistically expect in a two-year company. of a two-year chairmanship and moving the agenda forward? both at home and in a state of alaska but on the broader content of the arctic council. maybe i can ask pamela and michael to say a few words

about, so what you hope is given that makes him both opportunities have arisen all of the good work you've done and some of the questions around what are we likely to see in this period? how do we set our compass is in a realistic fashion? >> well, i think one important aspect of the u.s. chairmanship is actually bring attention to these issues. so bring attention to the mental health needs in the arctic and alaska specifically bring attention to where the risks are, bringing attention to what resources we have to build on. so that's one important issue. from the nih asserted will continue to fund research to try to answer some of these questions in alaska specifically, and as well as in other fights is relevant. but i think that's a big one and

i think the opportunity to have a mental health project as one of the sustainable defaulted working group projects invites this collaboration across countries to address some of these issues. as i mentioned in the presentation the project in the sustainable developer working group is one such thing but certainly within hhs with respect to mental health interventions the substance abuse and mental health services, administration continues to support work on service delivery for mental health as well as for substance abuse and for suicide prevention. they, in fact just released an artist a earlier this month for tribal communities on the suicide prevention intervention. so to make a long story short there are many things happening in concert but i think this is a great platform to bring attention to an area that often doesn't get the kind of

attention it needs. and the global health context particularly and with respect to think about the disparities in mental health that are clearly evidenced. >> you do feel that the groundwork has been done in terms of the rising sun in consensus among the constituent governments of the arctic council, that this framework has come it is a buy-in for this framework, preliminary buy-in to move this forward? >> music groundwork, so yes, this has been a proposed project that has been reviewed by the various members of the arctic council and at this point we do not buy-in from countries that would like to join us if this works a we are looking speed is what is it going to take in your estimation to bring it to life and carry it forward? >> so for that specific project there will be, it will take country partners that will

commit funds to move the project forward, and i think we're expecting some of those kinds of commitments to occur and we will certainly hear more about that after the u.s. officially assumes the chairmanship. oh, yes, so commitments of time commitment of funds, commitment of expertise, and commitment of helping us to get access to the networks out there that bring access not only to the experts but also to the community members who we hope to engage in this process as well. >> thank you. michael, on the arctic water and sanitation issue, if you could say a few words about how much consensus exists today and what's it going to take to really move this forward? >> sure. yeah, i guess i would second pamela's comments in terms of increasing and strengthening our collaboration with our international circumpolar partners. i've been working in the arctic now for come it's my 16th

year, and when we started this circumpolar surveillance system that brought us together focused on invasive bacterial diseases but there's a lot more out there beyond just the narrow focus on infectious diseases. and i think broadening that with our partners is very important but with a focus on health. and so we try to address many of the health, a number of different health issues in alaska but our current focus is on water and sanitation. one of the reasons for that is that i sent all all of it about it earlier, is that we have piped water to about 78% of those rural villages but a significant portion that don't have it. and may never get it. so what do we do? one of the interim steps we've taken was to develop small hold water systems into these villages. so if you have a small hull take

in your home, you can drop water to the home and fill the tank and you can have fostered and you can have a shower and you can have some water in the home in that respect. but as it turns out that model doesn't deliver a lot of water into the home. and so what we've learned is that homes that have honey buckets, that basically no system of any central watering point we go fill up the buckets they deliver about 1.5 galleons of water per person per day. if you have baseball -- small hull system they deliver about two and half gallons of water per person per day. the w.h.o. recommends a minimum of 13-15 gallons of water per person per day. if you look at what our usage is in the united states in general we generally use about 50 gallons per person per day.

so our village -- villages in alaska are doing extreme extreme water ration. and we know that this isn't just true for alaska. there are other areas in the arctic council were other neighbors in the arctic and northern canada, greenland and northern russia also have issues with remoteness and water and sanitation. so what we are hoping to do come and we've done this with circumpolar surveillance, we are hoping we have learned many things from a circumpolar partners. we are hoping that this alaska initiative on water and sanitation that i explained to you earlier can potentially be used as a model and help in pushing that model for word to develop these technologies across the arctic. >> tim, this 10 year study a new study for the first time in a decade, very comprehensive

its encyclopedic. how is he going to be used on the health front, in your view? i was actually going to be used by the leadership of the arctic council to move an agenda forward? >> well, i'm not exactly sure but i think one of the things we were supposed to do is to highlight some of these differences and to put this out there in front of them and say you know, especially since this was a septic arctic human development efforts was a stock taking. that wasn't a lot known. like i said this wasn't necessarily new research. it was kind pulling together existing data, pulling together from a number of scientific studies. one of our mandates was to look at some of the trend over time. and all of the chapters do that economics my chapter certainly the health chapter. i think what we've done is we've

looked basically over the first decade of the 20th century since the first arctic human development report said okay we have identified and hopefully i bought some of these out, if these are the areas that there's been improvement, if things are getting better in certain areas but this tip is certainly highlighted areas with hasn't been improvement, there hasn't been improvement in specific arctic regions are across the arctic and certainly the suicide and some of these others that i mentioned kind of intractable diseases, the issue of domestic violence keeps coming up. again and again. so hopefully the arctic council other people interest in the arctic can look at this and say okay these areas are getting better but there's other areas that are actually not getting better and those are maybe the areas we need, there needs to be some focus on. >> heather, could you say a few

words about the u.s. calculus? i mean, you know the policies here. unit history on these are the issues. you talk all the time we keep administration around these issues. what can we hope for in this next phase in terms of prioritization of leadership on these issues? and wealthy take up the recommendations of? >> well, here's hoping. you know i think the really disappointing thing i just about 12 or 18 months ago it was put forward to the office of management and budget to create a budget for the u.s. a chairmanship that their the extra funds that would be given to implement some of his key priorities. on be said that was not a good idea. so what is happening -- going be. we have these fantastic priorities that agencies come

again what we pray for senator murkowski don't have to use existing resources try to reprioritize and we know in this budget scarcity especially difficult. so that was step one. we missed a huge opportunity that can it can produce chairmanship is going to because a lot of really good projects putting projects modeling project that we will showcase but quite frankly the funding will just not be sufficient to boost them your great work being done but they need some turbocharged budgets. i never like to end on a pessimistic note so the white house did have a new body in place, the arctic executive stephen cribb which is led a very senior level. this group has been charged with doing a gap analysis. so if you dared to read the white house implementation plan for the national strategy for the arctic region, short little

title, we do see where in the implementation plan that are clear outlined four, ethical to coordinate better coverage of health and survival rates the arctic and indigenous people to facilitate improvement in welding as an objective. some hoping this gap analysis says we need to have come the use of chairmanship team is arctic improvement and arctic economic and living in welding conditions. we have some great things but they are not funny. we will prioritize this. i would argue as they domestic party for the state of alaska, it is an absolute tragedy to hear some of the figures that you have cited. it's appalling. is unacceptable. leadership begins at home. we need to start focusing our time and attention on americans that are suffering from these conditions. and then exactly we need to pull this out and provide that leadership effort circumpolar.

my concerned about insisting but a government working group it is the mothership of the working group it is a monster working group. that's what think it gets stuck because it does so much. if i think it's obsolete vital that we pull this out and say look, if we're serious about this we're going to put those resources, hold of those arctic a government to account. let's put that money in. and my frustration quite frankly the arctic human development part, it's not the arctic council project. it's not. that's a problem because if it's not a product, that's elaborate report, thank you very much come into we can keep on going to a regular basis to this is exactly why we need is one of assessments and reports. we need to governments accountable for how are they moving. i love that stops and the arctic council needs that crap and to stop centric you promised it. ministers, you sign and you said we agree with this. that our governments have done

nothing about who's holding him accountable. this is part of the arctic council governance requirements but it comes from leadership, from national council. i think we have an opportunity here and it creates public awareness but we must start making the tough budget choices. show me, show me that money. and so far we said it's important but we haven't reflected that it's important in our budget. i would encourage only be a much more generous. this is easy for me to say from cdc and an agent health and human services we've got to start addressing these challenges. >> thank you very much. let's go to our audience. we've got 15 minutes. let's collect several, bundle together several. we have one here, one year and one there.

>> first of our, i completely support your recommendation, heather. bless you, sister. i would take health out of it as fast as i possibly could. agostini things into. also structurally, it is not in my personal opinion can each head of delegation should be service officer hoosiers brand spanking every two years. that causes difficulties. the of the foreign ministry is the same thing. we need to get subject matter experts for this and specifically on health. dr. collins, thank you so much. i'm very pleased to say nimh involved in this activity. part of the journey of focusing on this note that the small numbers of people. they will point to the large numbers of deaths in sub-saharan africa if you're allocating funds to try to know what the large number of people's are.

but these are u.s. citizens. i am greatly appreciative initiative you doing there. but a question for you is, you mentioned rigorous evaluations. samhsa funds a lot of services. some people would argue that truly don't look at the root cause research wise in terms of -- the commission unsuccessfully tried to get an institute of medicine study focusing on this. we failed because we did not adequate engage with alaska native communities in developing this and explaining what this study was come explaining how committees are formed and how editorial control is done. dude you think an iom study if we tried it again would be a useful way to do a rigorous evaluation of this issue in the north? and voted on in that question is, very hard to get capacity, even if you have money oriented towards these problems, hard to get capacity. is no medical school and alaska. there's not a lot of

investigators out in the lower 48 or capable or interested in a grant in this kind of work. so i went and had to be built capacity, even if there is funds? >> thank you. good afternoon. state department and i hasten to add i'm speaking for myself, not the department or i will find myself in the basement without a flip phone. i'm very impressed, for sure, i'm very impressed by the broad scope and expertise that this panel represents. it's truly impressive, and also very impressed with the way that you and our colleagues have brought international cooperation into play in dealing with this. that's the important have been mentioned the main thing is money, and i found, and i think

most people would agree with this that international scientific cooperation is a great multiplier on what you can do with your budget. so i applaud your efforts in that way. and my specific question. i'm wondering if the panel could compare in their series of different fields the health situation in russia there is regions, compared with that in the west with alaska, canada, greenland, et cetera. and final question is, has mr. putin made committees trying to become a star again as we all know, has to get some perfect on the arctic get? is that discernible? is that good or bad? >> thank you so much. there was a hand -- >> linda fernandez, virginia commonwealth university.

i have a question for michael, and it's largely it's a question combined with a suggestion to keep did mention a circumpolar water sanitation conference scheduled for next year. perhaps as a result of what would be success of the alaska water and sewer challenge that's going to be magnified to the antarctic. a suggestion as well as a question. are you teamed up efforts with all of the international collaborators during the world water week that's convened in sweden every year that has great buy-in across a lot of international countries as well as private sector organizations like rotary international w.h.o.? it's clear to me that while you've made great strides in having the arctic partners involved in some of what you're suggesting as technology development on sanitation and water has been addressed in

other settings with the arctic perhaps engaged in different ways comply would make a suggestion come and question whether you can, in fact synchronize efforts and join in with that group. >> thank you very much. are there any other comments or questions at this time? yes, please. >> hi. i'm michelle bernard coming from a different perspective. we work on hunger and malnutrition apathy. so my question is a just in general, would you consider that malnutrition or food insecurity lack of money clearly, how do you think that's impacting the health of people in the arctic? >> thank you. okay so we have questions about should to be an iom study would that be useful? with the commercial russia versus the west? i think we will turn to tim on that although a few here will have something to continued on the. and what impact on?

what about time to water week in sweden come and then the food insecurity issue. michael, why do we don't we start with you and sweep down this way? >> okay. i think the first question is relevant to me was sort of a question from a gentleman from the state department about the health situation in russia versus other circumpolar nations. i have to say that i know very little about at least in regards to water and sewer and russia. my folks have been in infectious disease and because some collaboration with the russians and eastern russia on a number of variety and different infectious diseases. i know that in many of those areas there are issues with infrastructure and there's poor infrastructure. there certainly is a great possibility that there are issues with water dissipation and sewage in russia versus the other countries, that i can't tell you for sure. the next question was are we

teaming up with partners of the world water week in sweden. i would like to speak to you about the world water week in sweden because i actually am not aware of that meeting him and we probably should be attempting. we've had, we've had some of our circumpolar partners in some discussions regarding sanitation on water and health, but they haven't been formalized. they are through our international collaborations on infectious diseases. so i would be very interested in learning more and we certainly should attend the beauty and learn from them, so thank you. and then from the woman at the barefoot work institute in regards to food insecurity, i'm an infectious disease epidemiologist -- i'm sorry. i'm an infectious disease epidemiologist and food insecurity is something i am a

specialist in. i know as an alaskan that it is an issue, particularly in rural alaska in relation to climate change and melting of the permafrost of any other native peoples put food in food lockers buried in the ground in the permafrost. and as the permafrost melts or as this increased erosion into the village, those food lockers are failing. so food insecurity is death of an issue in rural alaska as well as other places in the arctic. and i think i went through the questions. >> in response to you john. i will start with a research capacity because i think that's critical in places where you don't have a lot of researchers and one responded to try to develop cadre of research is about some commitment and some insight understanding of the context the we do need to see more research career development

in the context of alaska. so i would certainly support that. i think that means a number of things. that means figuring out how to establish mentoring for students, that the idea of pursuing research as a career option becomes a feasible and realistic idea. it means working with institutions in order for them to develop an adequate infrastructure and base for training and sustaining young researchers and researchers throughout their career as well. so yes i agree that would be important, particularly in the context of mental health mental health research. some of those efforts are underway at nih with our initiatives that focus on the american indian and alaska natives research capacity building. and we need to continue those efforts. with respect to the iom meeting i think i would probably ask you

again, that sounds like how much of buy-in is there in the local context for the. to me that seems like it would be one starting place to make sure that you've got all the stakeholders in alaska being a of a single mind about pursuing something in that direction but certainly whatever avenues whether it's an iom report, was ait's some other avenue to bring attention to the needs and to regulars in document where we are with respect to effective intervention in these contexts it would be an interesting intervention. >> thank you. wonderful questions. two quick comments. first a preview of coming attractions. we'll be releasing hope in june and major study on the russian arctic to help us understand come you heard on the energy panel russia has enormous economic status in the arctic. they have a long history in writing very comprehensive and detailed strategies. some of the strategies quite

interestingly and caitlin has been a great -- study these strategies can think of a very robust sustainable develop a component but as the russian economy continues to experience extraordinary difficulties, you know, this is going to be a challenge for them to sustained their very ambitious strategies but we need to understand what's important, why they are so important to russia. my thesis is that we actually have seen some significant and certainly disturbing changes in russia's arctic policy, particularly after the crimea annexation that we need to understand and study that more. so thank you for your question, coming to you soon in a comprehensive report. and just one final comment on sort of the world water week. i think what we are starting starting to see him when he did a much more purposeful job, there's an arctic diplomacy that is starting to be formulated.

so countries that are working together in the item -- imo come were so instrument in pushing through a mandatory older code. reoccurrence i think a similar arctic caucus, my words come at the paris climate summit at the end of this year saying how are we focusing governments because climate change currently in the art, i previously times faster than anywhere else. could we have in governmental agencies and bodies in water and sanitation? whizz of the arctic subgroup that is pushing this agenda? we have to think where issues cross and let's gather the eight arctic council members let's have a state of service if they have a role to play, how can we caucus in the variety of international fora and let's say put the arctic on the agenda.

>> i will address the question about the comparisons between russia and the united states in terms of health indicators life expectancy et cetera. i've done a lot of research on russian demographic issues. russia more so than other countries seems to be extremely susceptible to economic downturns. you can kind of correlate yeah, declines in gdp per capita declines in life expectancy so after the breakup of the soviet union, the kind of economic downturn with the transition things improved and then things got worse with the 98 ruble crisis. and i haven't checked the numbers but i think there's been some increase in the death rate over the last year or so with this economic downturn. it's hard to say why but i mean, it just seems be more like most

of the most other countries. we are financial crisis in the late $2 i didn't, life expectancy didn't drop by three or four years all of a sudden because of that. but in russia especially among men. that seems to be particular trend. and like i highlighted, these gaps in life expectancy between men and women but overall life expectancy in his arctic regions, especially if you go further out into siberia, they are extremely low. i haven't seen anything that's the priority of the russian government to address some of these issues. maybe around the margins but i forget the name of the institute but there was an institute for the arctic indigenous peoples, that's been kind of abolished. i just don't think it's a priority like it is in the u.s. i will end on that pessimistic note. >> well, we've gone gotten to the

end of our time now. i think this is, just in closing, this is a very good in a way that very opportune year. we have the arrival of use of chairmanship. we have the sustainable development goals coming forward. in september. we have the paris climate change at the end of the year the summit there. is going to be multiple opportunities to sort of move this forward. i want to thank tim pamela and michael for bringing the enormous expertise that you have in your respective areas around the arctic. it's been really kind of astonishing to just listen. and we know you had to travel a bit of a distance to get there, and carve out some time and we are very grateful for you to do that. has become thank you so much for your leadership on all of us. watching over the course of this morning has just exhausted me.

so congratulations come and thank all of you for your great questions and comments and your patience and sticking with us. and so thank you all, and we are adjourned. >> thank you. [applause] [inaudible conversations] >> on this first monday may the senate returns at 3 p.m. eastern with a veto override vote on tap this afternoon to a couple of

weeks ago the president vetoed a gop measure that would block new union election rules as public and by the nlrb. also senators are expected to continue work on the iran nuclear oversight bill and begin consideration of the 2016 budget resolution. negotiate by the house and senate. the house is out this week. they are back next tuesday may 12. several new republican presidential candidates in the race today. ben carson and carly fiorina, the former hewlett-packard ceo both announcing they are in the race for 2016. mike huckabee expected to announce tomorrow. we will have live coverage of the announcement tomorrow on the c-span networks propublica what all this means to the wider republican race we talked today to a capitol hill reporter. >> talk to us about dr. ben carson and what he's going to bring to the race.an guest: >> guest: well dr. carson is a 63 year-old retired neurosurgeon. he's a world-famous neurosurgeon

as he was a key player in a critical operation.. but in terms of politics he brings a lot. he was born and brought up in detroit in pretty difficult circumstances. he has made it personal responsibility in things of that nature. part of his credo by his also become known as a very vigorous critic of president obama. in 2013 when he spoke at the national prayer breakfast, he was very critical of the affordable care act at that time, and that was memorable not least because president obama was sitting just a few feet away. so that endeared dr. carson to the conservatives, even as it irritated liberals. >> host: so that one name we're also hearing carly fiorina is getting into the race

formally today and the former governor of arkansas mike huckabee once again will run. he will announce tomorrow. what do the two of them bring to the race? >> guest: welcome i think carly, it seems will be the only woman in the race on the republican side. she very much plays after business experience. she's a former ceo of hewlett-packard. now, she was ultimately fired from the post but nonetheless she is presenting herself very much as a nonpolitician someone who brings the expertise and the decision-making skills from the business world into politics. governor huckabee is a different character, former governor of arkansas. he is expected to announce in his hometown on tuesday. and he is a very beloved by social conservatives in the republican party. he obviously ran in 2008. he won the iowa caucuses in that

year, that i think much less lavishly funded than for example, mitt romney. he also ran in 2008. so very different appeals i think on the part of those two candidates. >> host: as of this gop field expands further now, what challenges does it present over the individual candidate but the party as a whole? >> guest: for the individual candidates obviously it is a matter of trying to make one's self distinctive to stand up from this large field. for the party as a whole one of the major challenges is going to be televised debates which, of course starts some months before any votes are cast. and if you is growing all the time. were expected to grow very large, dimensions. there's a question of whether it's attracting -- is practical the televised debates with 16 17, 18 candidates which one

could quite possibly have on the republican side. if people think that that is not practically possible, then the party has to find some way to will that feel down without letting itself called the accusation is being arbitrary or not democratic. >> host: plug one into the equation for these three candidates, ben carson, carly fiorina, mike huckabee. where will they be getting their money? how much they realistically need to continue get out the message that they put out? what are their challenges? >> guest: well dr. carson asked, shinseki, has raised an independent political action committee on his behalf, has already raised over $15 million. something to in an era where fundraising is concerned at carly fiorina will have many contacts from our business career. governor huckabee as i said is pretty beloved among social conservatives.

but we are in a situation these days where a small number of wealthy benefactors can really make a candidate, even if that candidate has difficulties in polling or isn't raising money from a vast number of people. a couple of people to really pour money torture candidacy in support of your candidacy can really give you a much longer lifespan politically speaking than would've been the case in 2008 or 2004 or anytime before that. >> host: we'll be watching these three candidates in the next couple of days and will continue to watch the seals interest rates. niall stanage uphill is associate editor. thanks a a lot for your time. the second update on campaign 2016. >> my pleasure. >> tonight on "the communicators" we spoke with three members of congress with shared interest in communication issues and legislation. minnesota senator al franken,

virginia congressman bob goodlatte and california representative doris matsui we. >> i firmly believe if comcast were allowed to buy time warner cable that they would've been too big a company. they would've an anticompetitive not in the public interest that would've led to higher prices for consumers, less choice, and if it's even possible with these two companies. >> we are also working on a technology come together with privacy and protection of civil liberties and that is legislation dealing with the nsa and the fisa court, the foreign intelligence surveillance act court did it with revelations about the gathering of telephone metadata this bill which passed the house with a big bipartisan vote in the last congress we are about to bring it up again dan's metadata collection and storage by the government. >> if you saw the net neutrality debate also that was

unbelievable in the sense that people understand that the internet should be free. and there should not be people who get faster access or not. so when that occurred that whole energy that happened with that when chairman wheeler, because of the overturning of the open internet order when you had to have a new proposal out there when he just handed that there might be paid privatization which badly means the internet providers to the end-user, which is a customer you know that they may have to pay for faster speed or whatever, i mean 4 million comments? that was unheard of. >> tonight at eight eastern on

"the communicators" on c-span2. >> the u.s. senate starts start its work week momentarily. 5:30 p.m. a veto override vote was marked the second time this session that a veto override was attempted it is time to measure if the gop measure that aims to block new union election rules issued by the national labor relations board. we expect more work on the nuclear oversight bill and work beginning on the 2016 budget resolution negotiated by house and senate conferees. live now to the senate floor here on c-span2. the president pro tempore: the senate will come to order. the chaplain, dr. barry black, will lead the senate in prayer. the chaplain: let us pray. lord god omnipotent, your power