This interview is part of the Global East Asian Health Insurance Oral Histories project, a collection of interviews with key individuals, particularly Americans, who have played significant roles in establishing or analyzing health insurance systems in East and Southeast Asia, especially in China and Taiwan. The project is part of the University of Minnesota Twin Cities Program in History of Science, Technology and Medicine. Dr. Wayne Soon conducted these interviews.

Wayne Soon: Hi, my name is Wayne Soon. I’m an Associate Professor in the Program in the History of Medicine at the University of Minnesota. Today is September 17, and it’s 11:32 am Central Time. I’m so pleased to have with me Karen Eggleston. Professor Eggleston is a professor and health economist at Stanford University’s Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center. Today, I just want to start the interview by asking you: Where did you grow up, and how was your experience growing up? Were there any formative events growing up that led you to consider a career in health care policy? 

Karen Eggleston: Well, thank you for the opportunity. Very interesting. I grew up here in California, San Diego, California, and none of those experiences specifically led me to health care. It was much more that Asia came first, particularly on my mother’s side of the family. We have longstanding links to East Asia, and so therefore I went on to an undergraduate, so-called Asian Studies major, and only later found health care policy and economics as areas of interest. 

Wayne Soon: Yeah, and so can you say a little bit about where you grew up in California and how, if you don’t mind sharing, your mom is connected to Asia? 

Karen Eggleston: Sure. Well, my grandfather taught Korean history at UC Berkeley. He also had the Korea desk in the State Department. His name is George McCune, of McCuneReischauer. 

Wayne Soon: Yes. I did not know that. Okay. 

Karen Eggleston: He’s my grandfather. As you may or may not know, he died very young, so I never met him. But through my mom and my grandmother—my first trip abroad, actually, was to Seoul with my grandmother when she was teaching. So I very early on was exposed. Mom had us—because she studied linguistics and studied in Japan—she spoke to us in Japanese and exposed us to native Mandarin speakers. Not that I remembered any of that when I was older, but it helped with the ability to pronounce correctly, so they tell me. So anyway, it was through those experiences that I was very intrigued. And as an undergraduate, actually, I wanted to study Korean, having just studied there, and Dartmouth at the time did not offer Korean. Would you believe it? So this is how I chose Mandarin. And second-year Mandarin was in Beijing, and so I’ve been going back and forth to Beijing almost every year since. 

Wayne Soon: Wow, that’s an incredible story. And so at Dartmouth, was there a particular Asian Studies professor that you felt really motivated your study of Chinese? 

Karen Eggleston: Well, Professor Susan Blader, bless her, she recently passed away. I just got back from Beijing yesterday, actually, having taught at the Stanford Center in Beijing, and I have to say everybody I met there would comment on my Chinese name, for which I have to thank Professor Susan Blader. So, it was through those connections and understanding.

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