Pandemic Lessons from a Biomedical Reporter

Environmental & Science Education, STEM, Health & Medicine, History of Science, Nature of Science, Politics, Society

Ed Hessler

Helen Branswell, a senior writer for STAT shares a list of things she has learned from the COVID-19 pandemic.

I follow my usual practice and list them since a summary seems inadequate although I have added a few, short comments from Branswell in three of them.

1. You gotta act fast.

2. Simplicity rules.

3, The calculus for kids is just different.

4. Even in the face of a deadly pandemic, politics override public health.

5. Most people have no clue how science works. And that's a problem. (The nature of science is iterative.)

6. Downplaying what lies ahead helps no one.

7. Winning the vaccine race really does matter. So does experience.

8. In a pandemic, it's pretty much every country for itself. ("I hate that this is true. But I fear that it is.")

9. Conducting clinical trials during a pandemic is doable, but it takes coordination.

10. American are willing to put up with a lot of death. ("This insistence on returning to life as normal came at an unfathomable cost....")