Post Reports

How the approval of anti-covid pills from drug companies Pfizer and Merck could impact the course of the pandemic. And the life and legacy of feminist author bell hooks.

Read more:

On Tuesday, President Biden urged calm as coronavirus cases rise, and the omicron variant becomes dominant in the United States. He touted a plan for more readily available testing and more resources for strained hospitals nationwide. 

But on the horizon is another treatment against covid-19: antiviral pills. The pills are said to dramatically reduce the risk of hospitalization and death in vulnerable populations, and could be approved for use as early as this week. Health reporter Carolyn Y. Johnson explains what we know about the pills and what role they could play against the omicron variant.

Plus, a remembrance of bell hooks. Hooks died last week at the age of 69. She was a Black feminist author and critic who had a wary eye even on Beyoncé. “Hood Feminist” author Mikki Kendall reads her remembrance of hooks.

Seemingly overnight, the pandemic has changed — again. On today’s Post Reports, everything you need to know about the omicron variant — and whether you should still plan to travel for the holidays.

Read more:

Over the weekend, health reporter Dan Diamond wrote a Facebook post that changed the way we’re thinking about the omicron variant. 

“Every expert I’ve interviewed, including some of the nation’s top health officials, has adjusted his or her mindset and now is mentally bracing to test positive after spending two years dodging this virus,” Dan wrote. 

Today on Post Reports, we tell you everything we can about the omicron surge – and we talk to health reporter Fenit Nirappil about whether and how to travel and gather safely for the holidays.

A record number of Americans quit their jobs this year. Today for our special series “Quitters,” economist Darrick Hamilton examines why that is — and why he thinks it might be a good thing.

Read more:

Many Americans have reconsidered their relationship with work this year.

There’s lots of reasons for that — an ongoing pandemic, stagnant wages and a severe labor shortage all made work harder.

But Darrick Hamilton, a professor of economics and urban policy at the New School, says that workers also had more flexibility than ever before, thanks to government stimulus and expanded unemployment. And he wants us to reframe this not as a “Great Resignation” but as a moment of worker empowerment.

Today on Post Reports, we’re bringing you the third installment in “Quitters,” a three-part podcast series about a few of the millions of Americans who quit their jobs this year. 

Listen to part one and part two here.

What happens when an entire fast-food restaurant staff quits? Today for our special series on “Quitters,” the story of a McDonald’s walkout, and what it can tell us about the labor market right now.

Read more: 

In September, the entire staff of a McDonald’s in Bradford, Pa., walked out and quit their jobs. One of the staff members left a parting note for the customers, written in blue highlighter because he couldn’t find a pen: “Due to lack of pay, we all quit.”

“The signs are…kind of like primal screams,” says reporter Greg Jaffe. “It’s [the worker’s] chance to convey a message: We’re being mistreated. We’re tired of it. This corporation treats us badly, and doesn’t care about us.”

Today on Post Reports, we’re bringing you the second installment in “Quitters,” a three-part podcast series about a few of the millions of Americans who quit their jobs this year. Jaffe takes us inside the fast-food workers’ season of rebellion.

You can listen to the first part of the series here.

2021 was a big year for quitting. Millions of Americans resigned. For the first episode in our series on “quitters,” we go to a restaurant in Arkansas where nearly every employee – and the owners – found themselves reassessing their work, and their lives.

Read more:

This year, millions of Americans quit their jobs in the “Great Resignation.” 

Over the next three days on “Post Reports,” we’re talking to some of the “quitters” and exploring why so many people are reassessing the role of work in their lives right now. 

On today’s show, economics correspondent Heather Long and “Post Reports” Executive Producer Maggie Penman head to Arkansas to tell the story of a family-run restaurant. And they report on how the stressors of covid, the pressures of running a small business and the hope for better, more-balanced lives led to a great resignation of sorts. 

How the fight in Chicago over a proposed scrap metal facility became a test case for the Biden administration’s approach to environmental justice. 

Read more:

General Iron Industries is a Chicago-based scrap metal recycling company with a bad track record of pollution. When the company announced its intention to move from a wealthy, White neighborhood on Chicago’s North Side to a working-class, Latino neighborhood on the city’s Southeast Side last year, the plan set off alarm bells. 

This proposal — and its apparent approval from city officials and state environmental regulators — sparked a massive backlash from Southeast Side residents. They claimed discrimination and argued that their neighborhood was already overburdened by pollution. After a series of protests, a federal civil rights complaint and even a month-long hunger strike, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency intervened in May. 

The opening of the facility has been temporarily paused, but more than seven months later, the conflict over whether the company will operate in that neighborhood is still unresolved.

Environmental justice reporter Darryl Fears and senior producer Robin Amer delve into the high-stakes fight between residents and the company, and what the outcome might reveal about the lengths the Biden administration is willing to go to to protect communities of color that disproportionately bear the cost of pollution — something it has explicitly promised to do.

On the ground in Mayfield, Ky., after a string of tornadoes devastated the town, flattening buildings and leaving streets unrecognizable. The tornadoes tore through a 200-mile swath of land, and may be the sign of a lengthening tornado season. 

Read more: 

Late last week, a string of tornadoes ripped through the South and Midwest regions of the United States. Dozens have died, and thousands of structures have been destroyed. National breaking news reporter Kim Bellware takes us on the ground to the hard-hit town of Mayfield, Ky., where survivors are in shock.  

Plus, Capital Weather Gang contributor Jeffrey Halverson explains how unusual it is to see a tornado event this powerful during the winter months, and why it may be a sign of a changing weather patterns. 

Follow The Washington Post’s live coverage of the tornado recovery efforts here. 

How the tight-knit community of Oxford, Mich., is healing after a mass shooting. Plus, remembering Post Editorial Page Editor Fred Hiatt.

Read more:

A 15-year-old opened fire at his Michigan high school on Nov. 30, killing four students and wounding seven others, police say. This is the deadliest episode of on-campus violence in almost three years. Reporter Kim Bellware and producer Rennie Svirnovskiy examine what it looks like for a town to start healing. 

The Post remembers Editorial Page Editor Fred Hiatt, who died this week after a sudden cardiac arrest. A beloved colleague and friend, Hiatt worked for The Post’s editorial pages for 21 years. He is survived by his wife of 37 years and his three children. 

You can also listen to the tributes for Hiatt on the Post’s Opinions podcast “Please, Go On.” 

What self-defense means in a country deeply divided over gun rights and race. And a story that shows the stakes of disappearing local news – about an Alaska community where climate change is costing them their school. 

Read more:

After the high-profile trials of Kyle Rittenhouse and the men who killed Ahmaud Arbery – we wanted to unpack the legal questions with Post columnist and Georgetown law professor Paul Butler and talk about what self-defense looks like in a country with gun rights, stand-your-ground laws and deep racial divides. 

In a remote town in western Alaska, climate change has become a daily reality: Thanks to erosion, the community’s only school sits just feet from a crumbling riverbank. But the state won’t pay to replace it until it falls in. Greg Kim reports from Alaska’s radio station KYUK as part of a Washington Post project on vital stories out of America's news deserts.

Earlier this year, Joe Biden ended the controversial “Remain in Mexico” policy — but a court has now reinstated it. Today, what that means for asylum seekers, who are forced to wait in Mexico for their immigration proceedings.

Read more:

Today on Post Reports, we revisit Nancy, a woman we followed as she fled gang violence in El Salvador and ended up stuck in a border camp in Matamoros, Mexico. Nancy’s story shows how this program affects asylum seekers left in limbo on the U.S. southern border.