Special Episode: David Quammen & Breathless

Special Episode: David Quammen & Breathless

What do you get when you combine a love of reading with an interest in biology/public health/medical history and a background in podcasting? The TPWKY book club, of course! This season’s miniseries of bonus episodes features interviews with authors of popular science books, covering topics ranging from why sweat matters to the history of food safety, from the menstrual cycle to the persistence of race science and so much more. So dust off that library card, crack open that e-reader, fire up those earbuds, do whatever it takes to get yourself ready for the nerdiest book club yet.


We’re starting off this book club strong with a discussion of Breathless: The Scientific Race to Defeat a Deadly Virus, the latest book by award-winning science writer David Quammen (@DavidQuammen). Breathless recounts the fascinating - and sometimes frightening - story of how scientists sought to uncover the secrets of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID. In this interview, Quammen, whose 2012 book Spillover explores the increasing pathogen exchange occurring among humans, wildlife, and domestic animals, shares with us how he decided to write Breathless and why this story of discovery needs to be told. Our conversation takes us into musings over why we saw this pandemic coming yet could not keep it from happening, the controversy over the origins of SARS-CoV-2, and the question of whether future pandemics are preventable or inevitable. Through this discussion, we find that the global response to future pandemics depends just as much on locating the gaps in our knowledge about this virus as it does on applying what we have learned so far. Tune in for all this and more.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Ep 191 Famine: More than starvation

Ep 191 Famine: More than starvation

As we learned last week, starvation extends far beyond hunger and what a lack of food does to the human body. Similarly, famine is much more than a food shortage and starvation on a population-level s...

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Ep 190 Starvation: More than hunger

Ep 190 Starvation: More than hunger

Deprived of food, our bodies do the best they can to keep us alive and functioning as long as possible. As the days pass, the rhythms of our lives change: our metabolism, our heartbeats, our hormones,...

14 Loka 20251h 4min

Special Episode: Antonia Hylton & Madness

Special Episode: Antonia Hylton & Madness

The United States is in the midst of a monumental mental health crisis, with one in four people predicted to experience mental illness at some point in their lives. Adequate mental health care remains...

7 Loka 202556min

Ep 189 Newborn screening: The future is here

Ep 189 Newborn screening: The future is here

Every year, millions of babies around the world are screened for dozens of treatable conditions within the first day or two of life. What it takes is a few drops of blood on some filter paper, and wha...

30 Syys 20251h 18min

Ep 188 Candida yeast: Here, there, and everywhere

Ep 188 Candida yeast: Here, there, and everywhere

None of us are ever truly alone. Our bodies are home to untold numbers of microbes, chilling on our skin, in our guts, throughout our respiratory tract, inside our bellybuttons, under our fingernails,...

23 Syys 20251h 17min

Special Episode: Mary Roach & Replaceable You

Special Episode: Mary Roach & Replaceable You

When your car breaks down or your fridge goes on the fritz, you can order a replacement part and get things back up and running in no time. The same cannot always be said for another intricate machine...

16 Syys 202548min

Ep 187 Hypothermia Part 2: How it helps

Ep 187 Hypothermia Part 2: How it helps

Last week, we took you through all the ways that cold can harm us and the harrowing history of humans perishing at its icy hands. Ending the story there would be skipping over the parts where cold get...

9 Syys 20251h 5min

Ep 186 Hypothermia Part 1: How it hurts

Ep 186 Hypothermia Part 1: How it hurts

For all our wondrous adaptations as a species - our big brains, our capacity for language, our opposable thumbs - we humans are not well-equipped to deal with the cold. Take us out of our insulated dw...

2 Syys 202557min

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