Toxic Masculinity Is Going to Get Us All Killed by Jessica Valenti

Today at the grocery store, I saw two different couples comprised of a woman wearing a mask and a man opting against it. “Make no mistake: This is macho bullshit at its most lethal,” Jessica Valenti writes in regard to this sort of behavior, in an article published by GEN. As she’s wont to do, Valenti doesn’t just lay out a complaint. She goes into the deeper research to back up her argument, testing her theories against research and history. Over a century ago, during the flu pandemic that killed as many as fifty million people worldwide, U.S. health officials had to come up with specific campaigns targeted at men and boys to get them to take up the simplest measures to protect the public health.

A Young Doctor, Fighting for His Life by Nicholas Kristof

As a reminder of what precisely is at stake here, this article from last Sunday’s New York Times recounts the experience of a Bronx physician — with a main base of operations in the emergency department — who contracted COVID-19. The story is harrowing, which is precisely why it’s important to share it. Online, there’s a supplemental video that provides additional details about his experience and the way it impacted the people who care about him.

The Facts on Herd Immunity by Carl T. Bergstrom and Natalie Dean

Also from last week’s Times, two professors — one of biology and one of biostatistics — explain the concept of herd immunity, employing a welcome just-the-facts approach common in academia. One of the chief failings of the media in this vital moment is that they’ve persisted in giving airtime and column inches to politicians, pundits, and protestors well after the point those individuals have proven themselves incapable of meeting the moment with knowledge and care. We should be looking to experts, not selfish pontificators.