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29 Mar, 7 tweets, 3 min read
I wrote about how mRNA technology could change the world

theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

Here are 5 favorite details from the piece
1. How the failures of HIV-vaccine efforts ironically accelerated the development of the Moderna, Pfizer-BioNTech, and J&J vaccines.

When HIV-vax researchers realized that established methods weren't working, they pushed into wacky areas like … synthetic mRNA.
2. How BioNTech, Pfizer's partner, plans to use what it learned from the COVID vaccines to accelerate its efforts to design individualized cancer therapies by targeting the proteins associated with specific tumors
3. Why the next generation of RNA tech—self-amplifying RNA, or saRNA—could lead to a breakthrough against perhaps the world’s most diabolical disease: malaria
4. @PeterHotez's wise warning that just because a medical technology solves the problems of right-now doesn’t mean that it’s going to solve all the problems of tomorrow
5. The mRNA vaccine is a model of the true story of scientific progress: not a hero’s journey, but a heroes’ journey.

theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

Onward! 🚀🚀🚀
Coda: I spoke to many wonderful scientists in this piece about the present/future of mRNA, but my understanding of its history is deeply indebted to this magnificent essay in STAT, which has more detail on the technology's long road to breakthrough.

statnews.com/2020/11/10/the…

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More from @DKThomp

Derek Thompson Profile picture
26 Mar
Before my Florida piece, I spoke to many people who were astonished by the mask-wearing diff between northeast metros and Florida.

After it published, I've heard from a lot of FL ppl who say their communities take masks and distancing v seriously despite the governor's approach.
At least 2 lessons here.

1. Florida is a big place.

2. One answer to the Florida mystery—how did it have only avg mortality in an "open"ish economy with so many old people?—is that the public, and seniors in particular, used masks and distancing far more than DeSantis insisted.
Florida is being held up, by some, as proof that masks and distancing don't work, or are dramatically overrated.

One reason I think that's wrong is their impression of Florida's mask/distancing protocols is a caricature of the state's actual behavior.

theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
Read 4 tweets
Derek Thompson Profile picture
24 Mar
I talked to Princeton sociologist @patrick_sharkey about America's crime surge.

theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

It's not just the mass shootings. 2020 had the most gun deaths of any year in US history and was, on a per capita basis, the most violent year of this century. Why?
If you have a deep need for single-cause answers to complicated questions, definitely don't read this story, or any other story, about why crime rises and falls. There are things we know for sure about this surge of violence—and then there's a tug-of-war over interpretation
So, what we know. Violent crime surged by its highest rate in many decades to its highest level in many decades. Fatal shootings rose more than 40% in several cities, including

Madison: 60%
Sacramento: 51%
Milwaukee: 47%
Atlanta: 46%
New York: 44%
Minneapolis: 43%
Boston: 41%
Read 7 tweets
Derek Thompson Profile picture
23 Mar
Everybody is wrong about Florida

theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
1. Liberals and a lot of public health experts were wrong:

They predicted COVID would specially ravage FL, given its YOLO policies and elderly population. But the state is still officially reporting fewer deaths-per-million than the national average and nearby states.
2. Conservatives are wrong:

There is a lot of chest-beating about how the Florida economy is kicking ass. But as far as I can tell, its economic performance is—kind of like its pandemic performance—much more *average* than the national narrative would make you think.
Read 6 tweets
Derek Thompson Profile picture
17 Mar
Shutting down half the economy and losing half a million lives anyway is totally unacceptable.

If we're gonna have 1 pandemic per decade—as we have this century—the U.S. must develop "institutional memory" to ensure this horror show never happens again.

theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
I asked experts what they considered the "original sin" of our COVID response.

To my surprise, there was strong unison: Our testing fiasco was the early failure that made every other failure worse and every hard decision harder.

theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
With more and faster tests, the U.S. would have benefited, at least a little, in almost every thinkable capacity: We would have had greater and faster epidemiological knowledge, less stringent lockdowns, a more open economy, and fewer overall deaths.
Read 4 tweets
Derek Thompson Profile picture
15 Mar
Seeing lots of people RT this and similarly gloomy analysis about how the US won't spend money in the pandemic. It's just wrong.

Many ways to evaluate a nation's response to COVID. But by fiscal impact—spending and tax cuts—U.S. relief is among the biggest in the world.
Here's the IMF global analysis.

imf.org/en/Topics/imf-…

Different countries use a variety of spending, tax,and loan program. But the U.S. fiscal response was the 2nd highest in the world in January—larger than any European country—before counting then entire Biden relief bill.
There is an unhelpfully doom-pilled approach to Twitter, where the game isn't to figure out true stuff, but rather to sign on with one's most pessimistic and disappointed opinion about the world, irrespective of accuracy, then collect some commiseration tokens and peace.
Read 4 tweets
Derek Thompson Profile picture
7 Mar
i think it would help the discourse to have a more sophisticated theory of—and maybe a word for—instances when perceived cancellations create publicity and riches for the cancelled party
We have a Streisand Effect: efforts to remove information often ironically publicize that information

It needs a Cancel Culture Corollary: the perception of unfair cancellation often leads to more subscriptions, or purchases
what I need is a PhD student in Internet sociology to write the following dissertation asap: "Cancel Culture or Can-Sell Culture? On the Merchandization and Mendacity of Cultural Stigma in 21st Century America"

Read 4 tweets

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