Midday

What did we learn from our battle with COVID-19? When the next pandemic comes, will we do a better job of handling it?

In late April, the COVID Crisis Group issued a report called Lessons from the COVID War. They assessed how the world handled the deadly disease, and they assert, “no country’s performance is more disappointing than that of the United States.”

Dr. Alexander Lazar joins Tom to discuss the report's findings on the American public health response to COVID-19.

Dr. Lazar is professor of Pathology and Genomic Medicine at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, and one of 34 experts who served on the COVID Crisis Group. The group formed in 2021, assembling an international team to study the global response to the coronavirus pandemic.

Dr. Alexander Lazar joins us on Zoom from Houston, Texas.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

It's time for another visit with Midday theater critic J. Wynn Rousuck, who joins us each week with her reviews of the Maryland-DC regional stage.

Today, she talks with Tom about two classic shows currently in town: Chesapeake Shakespeare Company’s production of Hamlet and Everyman Theatre’s production of Harvey.

Hamlet is widely considered to be William Shakespeare's greatest tragedic play, while Harvey is a 1944 comedy about a man whose best friend is a giant, invisible rabbit. Do these two plays have anything in common?

In this new production of Hamlet, Baltimore native and nationally recognized Shakespeare director, Eleanor Holdridge, reveals this iconic piece of Shakespearian literature as a contemporary world full of tension.

“We’re creating a world of magic and wonder in which Hamlet can grapple with the questions of our existence,” Holdridge said of the production in a press release. “Even when he tries to make sense of and avenge his father’s untimely death, he discovers the ineffable strength of his own humanity.”

Harvey tells the story of Elwood P. Dowd (played by Resident Company Member, Bruce Randolph Nelson), a lovable eccentric who claims his best friend is a six-foot-tall invisible rabbit named Harvey.

When Elwood’s sister, Veta, tries to have him committed in hopes of protecting the family’s social standing, chaos ensues. The original Pulitzer Prize-winning play was written by Mary Chase.  It's directed at Everyman by Jackson Gay.

Chesapeake Shakespeare Company’s production of Hamlet and Everyman Theatre’s production of Harvey both continue through May 21.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

Welcome to Midday at the Movies, our monthly look at films and filmmaking. Today, a look at what's new in movie theaters. Among the film's we'll discuss: CHEVALIER, SHOWING UP and ARE YOU THERE GOD? IT'S ME MARGARET, the new adaptation of Judy Blume's 1970 young-adult novel of the same name.

Plus, we'll look at the writers' strike shutting down production in Hollywood. Screenwriters are going against the major studios, including Amazon, Apple, and Disney.

Ann Hornaday, film critic for the Washington Post and author of the best-selling moviegoers' guide, Talking Pictures: How to Watch Movies, joins us on our digital line.

And joining Tom in Studio A today is Jed Dietz, founding director of the Maryland Film Festival, and another regular on Midday at the Movies.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

Today, Tom welcomes back to Midday the comedian and writer Lane Moore.

In addition to being a published author, she is also a songwriter and the frontperson for the band, It Was Romance.

Moore is in Baltimore featuring tonight at Baltimore Soundstage, where she will perform her stand-up show, Tinder Live. During the show, she displays her dating app on a screen and checks out various profiles in front of the audience, who vote as to whether she should swipe left or right.

She will also be signing copies of her new book, You Will Find Your People: How to Make Meaningful Friendships as an Adult. The book is a how-to guide, a touching memoir, and a funny take on the complexities of platonic relationships. It follows her first book, a New York Times bestseller published in 2018 called How to Be Alone: If You Want To, and Even If You Don’t.

Lane Moore joins Tom in Studio A.

Photo: Lane Moore with her dog Lights, in the WYPR studio. (credit: Rob Sivak/WYPR)

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

Today on Midday on Ethics, a discussion about advancements in technology that change the way humans reproduce.

Tom's guest is Dr. Jeffrey Kahn, the director of the Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics. He is also Professor in the Dept. of Health Policy and Management of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

In a 2016 book, a researcher named Henry Greely predicted that in a few decades, most people will make babies by methods other than sex. And a recent article in The New Yorker from writer Emily Witt looks into the booming,multi-billion-dollar industry that's driving advances in reproductive technologies such as in vitro fertilization, or IVF.

And now, IVF may eventually give way to a procedure known as IVG, or in vitro gametogenesis. That’s just one of several new methods by which babies can be made, and the reproductive clock for women can be extended.

Dr. Jeffrey Kahn joins Tom in Studio A.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

The case of Adnan Syed took another dramatic turn yesterday. You may recall that in 2000, Mr. Syed was convicted of the murder of Hae Min Lee, his girlfriend and classmate at Woodlawn High School. He served more than 20 years in prison, until September of last year, when his conviction was vacated and he was released.

Then, in March of this year, the Appellate Court of Maryland reinstated that conviction and sentence.

Yesterday, in a 2-1 decision, the court denied Syed’s motion to reconsider its decision. Syed’s attorney, Erica Suter, has indicated she will appeal that decision to the MD Supreme Court.

Steven Klepper is an experienced appellate lawyer with the law firm Kramon and Graham here in Baltimore. Today, he helps us understand what led to the Appeals Court’s decision yesterday, the impact it might have on the Syed case, and the legal precedents it could establish.…

Steven Klepper joins Tom in Studio A.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

This week, Republican Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy led a bipartisan US congressional delegation to Israel, a delegation that included Maryland's Democratic Congressman Steny Hoyer. McCarthy addressed the Knesset, Israel's Parliament, and indicated that he might soon invite Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address the US Congress.

This is in stark contrast to President Joe Biden, who has so far refused to extend an invitation to Netanyahu to visit the White House since the Prime Minister put together a far-right coalition government that returned him to power last year.

Israel is celebrating the 75th anniversary of its founding, and reeling from a level of internal discord that the young country has never before encountered. Netanyahu is pushing radical reorganization of the judicial system which would greatly diminish the authority of Israeli courts. Mass protests over the past many weeks have forced the proponents of the judicial overhaul to pause their efforts for the moment, but the crisis is far from being resolved.

For an update on the situation in Israel, and perspective on Vladimir Putin’s posture against the Jews in Ukraine, we turn to Sam Sokol, a reporter for Haaretz, and the author of Putin’s Hybrid War and the Jews:  Antisemitism, Propaganda, and the Displacement of Ukrainian Jewry. 

Sam Sokol joins us on Zoom from New York.

Sam Sokol will be speaking about his book and the current situation in Israel on Wednesday night (May 3) at 7:00 at Beth Am Synagogue in the Reservoir Hill neighborhood of Baltimore.

For more information and to register for this event, click here.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

Tom's next guests are Dr. Mileah Kromer, the director of the Sarah T. Hughes Center for Politics at Goucher College, and Pamela Wood, who covers state politics for The Baltimore Banner, a WYPR news partner.

The Banner and the Hughes Center have released a poll surveying Maryland residents about a wide range of issues, including their feelings about Gov. Wes Moore's performance in his first 100 days in office. Tom's guests discuss some of the key findings.

They also discuss the retirement of one of the longest-serving members of the U.S. Congress from Maryland. Yesterday, Sen. Ben Cardin announced he would not seek re-election to the U.S. Senate in 2024. The speculation about who may seek to succeed him has begun.Dr. Mileah Kromer joins Tom in Studio A. Pamela Wood joins us on Zoom.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

Today, a look inside rapid turnovers in the administration of Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott.

Tom speaks with reporter Emily Sullivan, who covers local politics for the Baltimore Banner, a WYPR news partner. Yesterday, Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott fired his Chief of Staff and his director of Communications, neither of whom had been at their respective jobs for long. The changes are the latest in a series of staffing shake-ups in the Scott Administration.

Emily Sullivan joins us on our digital line.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

It's another edition of the Midday Healthwatch, our monthly conversations about public health with Dr. Leana Wen.

Today, Tom will be talking with Dr. Wen about the latest health news from Maryland. The state's COVID-19 Dashboard was moved to the Maryland Department of Health's main website.

The state COVID Alert system is set to end Tuesday, May 9, while the federal state of emergency comes to an end on May 11.

Meanwhile, the World Health Organization is keeping its eye on a new variant of COVID. Who should get a second bivalent booster, and will it be effective against this latest iteration? We’ll also talk to Dr. Wen about the deepening fentanyl crisis, and what we need to know about recreational marijuana.

Plus, Baltimore is looking for a new health commissioner. The current head of the health department, Dr. Letitia Dzirasa, is leaving her post to become the interim Deputy Mayor for Equity Health and human services. Dr. Wen was the city’s health commissioner from 2014 to 2018. We’ll talk about the skills an effective leader in that job needs.

Dr. Leana Wen joins host Tom Hall on Zoom.

Dr. Wen is one of America’s most trusted and knowledgeable public health experts, and she has been a regular guest on our show since her time as the Baltimore City Health Commissioner, from 2015-2018. Today, the emergency physician is a research professor of health policy and management at the George Washington University's Milken Institute School of Public Health. She’s a columnist for the Washington Post, a medical analyst for CNN, and a non-resident senior fellow at The Brookings Institution. And she's the author of Lifelines: A Doctor's Journey in the Fight for Public Health.

Email us at [email protected], tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.