Slate Health

Last fall it seemed like everyone got sick—not just with COVID, but from a slew of respiratory diseases, from the mild to the severe. Researchers are trying to untangle how our immune systems have changed in the COVID era, and if we’re paying back an “immunity debt” or are victims of “immunity theft.” 

Guest: Tim Requarth, contributing writer to Slate. 

Host: Lizzie O’Leary

If you enjoy this show, please consider signing up for Slate Plus. Slate Plus members get benefits like zero ads on any Slate podcast, bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn and Dear Prudence—and you’ll be supporting the work we do here on What Next TBD. Sign up now at slate.com/whatnextplus to help support our work.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Earlier this year, our listener, Rell, nearly failed a promotion. Not because she was unprepared or unqualified, but because she didn’t maintain enough eye contact with the interviewers. Rell’s eye hasn’t been fully receiving information since she was born, a condition that’s outwardly visible and known colloquially as a “lazy eye.” It’s beginning to affect her self-confidence and is this “ugly thing [she] can’t let go of.” On this episode of How To!, new co-host Carvell Wallace brings on Sarah Ruhl. Sarah is an award-winning playwright, and author who wrote about her experience with Bell’s palsy in her recent book, Smile: The Story of a Face. Sarah has some wonderful advice for letting go of your inner rage, making interactions with strangers less painful, and even finding people who light up your mirror neurons.

If you liked this episode, check out: “How To Dress with Confidence.” 

Do you have a question without an answer? Send us a note at [email protected] or leave us a voicemail at 646-495-4001 and we might have you on the show.

If you enjoy this show, please consider signing up for Slate Plus. Slate Plus members get an ad-free experience across the network and exclusive content on many shows—you’ll also be supporting the work we do here on How To!. Sign up now at slate.com/howtoplus to help support our work.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On this week’s episode of The Waves, Slate Money co-host Emily Peck is joined by New York Times writer, Amy Larocca to discuss, as Amy says, the “menopause gold rush.” They dig into when exactly menopause starts, how younger women embracing their bodies has trickled up to their moms, and the companies that have started aggressively targeting menopausal women - for better and for worse.  

In Slate Plus, how telehealth and online medicine have changed the menopause game. 

Podcast production by Cheyna Roth with editorial oversight by Daisy Rosario and Alicia Montgomery.

Send your comments and recommendations on what to cover to [email protected].

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

January is barely two weeks old and already some of our ambitious New Year’s resolutions may be starting to fade. No shame! Approximately 90% of resolution makers don’t reach their goal. Which means there’s gotta be a better way. Our listener this week, Emily, is discouraged about her unhealthy eating and lack of exercise and wants to form better habits that last long after the new year. On this episode of How To!, we bring on Maya Shankar. Maya is a cognitive scientist and host of the award-winning podcast, A Slight Change of Plans. Relying on decades of research, she helps Emily (and all of us) set ourselves up for success based on what works for actual humans.

If you liked this episode, check out: “How To Eat Whatever You Want” and “How To Lose Weight and Keep It Off”

Do you have a question without an answer? Send us a note at [email protected] or leave us a voicemail at 646-495-4001 and we might have you on the show. Subscribe for free on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen.

Podcast production by Derek John, Rosemary Belson, and Kevin Bendis.  

If you enjoy this show, please consider signing up for Slate Plus. Slate Plus members get an ad-free experience across the network and exclusive content on many shows—you’ll also be supporting the work we do here on How To!. Sign up now at slate.com/howtoplus to help support our work.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The idea that COVID-19 vaccines are linked to sudden deaths among young people has no scientific support, but the theory nevertheless has a lot of traction on social media. 

How can public health officials educate the public—especially on subject like vaccines, where their effectiveness renders them effectively invisible? 

Guest: Katelyn Jetelina, epidemiologist and data scientist

Host: Lizzie O’Leary

If you enjoy this show, please consider signing up for Slate Plus. Slate Plus members get benefits like zero ads on any Slate podcast, bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn and Dear Prudence—and you’ll be supporting the work we do here on What Next TBD. Sign up now at slate.com/whatnextplus to help support our work.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the final episode of Trumpcare Tracker, Jim Newell and Jordan Weissmann ponder the latest, mysterious developments in the Republican effort to repeal and replace Obamacare. Senate leadership is still pushing for a vote next week, even though nobody knows which bill they’ll be considering. On Thursday, Sen. John Cornyn told reporters that senators knowing what’s in the bill before it goes to the floor is “a luxury we don’t have.” If it does indeed proceed, it will be a vote-a-rama for the ages.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jim Newell and Jordan Weissmann recall the sudden collapse of the Republican health care bill on Monday night and wonder if master tactician Mitch McConnell can still bring it back from the dead. Could President Donald Trump change senators’ minds, and is there any hope for a bipartisan compromise?

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jim Newell and Jordan Weissmann discuss the latest developments in the Republican attempt to repeal and replace Obamacare. They ask whether John McCain’s surgery makes the bill more or less likely to pass; they analyze the incentives administration officials are offering to moderates; and they break down Vice President Mike Pence’s spectacularly ineffective (and thoroughly debunked) pitch for the bill at the National Governor’s Association meeting this weekend. 

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jim Newell and Jordan Weissmann discuss the latest draft of the health care legislation, which Republicans released on Thursday. Sen. Mitch McConnell’s bold tactic was to try to sway conservatives with policy concessions and to throw money at moderate holdouts. They ask why Senate moderates still haven’t definitively come out against the bill and whether Republican leadership will use a partisan source to score the bill if they decide the Congressional Budget Office would take “too long” to do the job. 

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jim Newell and Jordan Weissmann discuss the latest developments in the Republicans’ quest to repeal and replace Obamacare. Will Ted Cruz’s amendment pass muster with the Senate parliamentarian? Does this legislative saga prove that politics are local once again? And can Lindsey Graham craft a bipartisan compromise to fix Obamacare?

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices