“Across the board, gender issues were ignored.” — Julia Smith, a health policy researcher at Simon Fraser University [In Her Words is available as a newsletter. Sign up here to get it delivered to your inbox.] As the coronavirus snakes its way around the world — canceling events, shuttering offices and suspending classes — some…
The new coronavirus is a serious threat to the elderly, as federal officials have been at pains to note recently. But they have stepped gingerly around advice for another group of Americans also at special risk from the infection: those with chronic health conditions. It is not a small group. Roughly half of all Americans…
For weeks, the World Health Organization resisted declaring the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic, fearing that doing so would incite panic across the globe. But facing the cameras on Wednesday, the agency’s director general, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, did just that, asking for global unity to “change the course of this pandemic.” It was a symbolic…
Across Europe on Thursday, Americans scrambled to make sense of conflicting messages from Washington about if and when they would be allowed to return to the United States. They awoke to the news that President Trump had announced a 30-day suspension of most travel from Europe in a bid to stem the spread of the…
As the spread of the coronavirus leads to more school closings, many parents are finding themselves faced with the prospect of what amounts to home-schooling their children. Ideally, teachers will provide lessons, whether online or on paper, to help meet children’s academic needs, but school also fills physical and social needs. Answering the following questions…
“Alarming levels of inaction.” That is what the World Health Organization said Wednesday about the global response to coronavirus. It is a familiar refrain to anyone who works on climate change, and it is why global efforts to slow down warming offer a cautionary tale for the effort to slow down the pandemic. “Both demand…
Government-imposed quarantines were fairly common in ancient times, before medicine stemmed the ferocity with which contagious diseases spread. The very word quarantine is rooted in the Italian words quarantenara and quaranta giorni, or 40 days, the period of time that the city of Venice forced ship passengers and cargo to wait before landing in the…
Here’s what you need to know: ImageSeeking assistance at a Delta Air Lines counter at Paris-Charles De Gaulle airport on Thursday.Credit…Thibault Camus/Associated Press Europe condemns the U.S. travel ban as more nations add restrictions. On both sides of the Atlantic on Thursday, the consequences of President Trump’s decision to ban most travel from Europe began…
ImageAt a drive-in testing site for coronavirus in Liege, Belgium, on Wednesday. The United States is far behind many other countries in the number of people being tested for the new virus.Credit…Francois Lenoir/Reuters The ability of the American health care system to absorb a shock — what experts call surge capacity — is much weaker…
Every “Oh wow” in “Human Nature” is matched by an “Oh no” somewhere down the line. Together, these two competing emotions — excitement and unease — make for one pretty fascinating documentary. The film, directed by Adam Bolt, explores Crispr technology, which, broadly speaking, can be used to snip out problematic parts of DNA —…