Alice Dreger, Ph.D. Profile picture
Author of Galileo's Middle Finger, named NYT's Editors' Choice. Bylines include @nytimes @washingtonpost @WIRED @TheAtlantic. Runner, swimmer, thinker.
Jan 11, 2022 10 tweets 2 min read
My mom just said to me, "We're all going to get it now, so why not just give up and go back to normal?" So this is what I explained, in case this explanation helps you:
1/n
Yes, Covid will now find almost everyone, and almost everyone vaccinated will be okay. Only a small percentage of us will need hospitals. (More unvaccinated than vaccinated will need hopsitals, but still only a small percentage of all of us.) 2/n
Sep 25, 2021 8 tweets 3 min read
Okay, a thread. So, I was taking the Metra Electric line today from Hyde Park to Millenium to walk around, find some plant pots for some new plants, get some good lunch. Walked on the train, immediately saw a wallet with a key loop attached left on a seat. 1/n I asked everybody around me, "Whose is this?" People told me this young woman had just got off and must have left it. UGH. I picked it up, looked in. ALL HER STUFF. License; social security card; student ID; credit cards; money. Ugh. 2/n
Apr 6, 2021 7 tweets 3 min read
Thread coming. This piece by @petridishes seems on the surface quite reasonable. Basic argument: The very first man who Gaetz showed naked photos of "conquests" to on the House floor should have stopped the whole business. 1/n
washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/… 2/n But this fails to understand the very insidious nature of sexual harassment at work -- which this was. When Gaetz showed other men these photos at work, without them every wanting it, he was harassing those men with his sexuality and sexual needs (to brag).
Mar 13, 2021 8 tweets 2 min read
I remember one time I asked a colleague to walk me back to my hotel at a conference and he expressed skepticism that the city we were in was unsafe. So, as we walked I narrated for him how I saw the walk back, as a woman. Pointed out the creepy stuff. The dark alleys. The stares. By the time we got to the door of my hotel's lobby, he said he had never seen the world that way. I think he was genuinely stunned at the difference. So I explained I also don't really sleep with any depth in hotels. I never feel like it's safe enough. Every trip wears me out.
Mar 9, 2021 5 tweets 1 min read
Everyone deserves due process. Title IX at many universities has been broken a very long time. I had a horrific experience in the early 2000s when a colleague was falsely accused. Have seen much ridiculousness since. This is NOT a partisan issue. Justice matters for everybody. The title IX investigator in that case made her decision before hearing any evidence: he was guilty. When I was called in to testify, I told her all the evidence the accusation was false & done for purposes of the accuser keeping a job that was due to expire.
Mar 9, 2021 6 tweets 1 min read
I was very careful (mostly double-masked) while doing necessary elder care but turns out was exposed to someone who now has covid. So I get to self-isolate for 14 days. The mate & I are figuring out how to divide the house. This is going to suck. We did this successfully when I had to flu and neither the mate nor kid got the bad flu I had 2 years ago. So we know it's doable. And maybe I won't get sick. He's vaccinated. The kid is away at school. Could be a lot worse. And maybe I won't get sick.
Feb 26, 2021 9 tweets 2 min read
I spent a while last night on the phone with someone who is pretty well known and being cancelled in a way that will destroy his life. I hadn't heard of him before he reached out to me with a note that made me worry he was suicidal. 1/n I asked him to tell me his story. I know the importance of getting people who are traumatized to turn their chaos into a narrative as it helps with healing. (Thanks, Art Frank, "The Wounded Storyteller," and @JonathanMAdler for that insight.) 2/n
Feb 24, 2021 6 tweets 1 min read
Gynecologist: What are you here for?
Me: I've reached the age of polyps and my internist thinks I have one on my cervix.
Gyn: The age of polyps?
Me: Two in my colon, one on my cervix, the occasional skin tag. Apparently being 54 turns one into a mushroom farm. Told the mate this when I got home. He said, "You forgot your toes."

Awesome.
Dec 8, 2020 4 tweets 1 min read
Writing an obituary for one of my dearest neighbors. I feel so grateful every time a friend asks me if I would do the obituary -- for a historian like me, doing an obituary feels like an incredible privilege of listening and composing. And it gives me a path of grief. But man, it's hard to write while you're crying and crying.
Dec 5, 2020 4 tweets 1 min read
One of the most useful things a friend taught me was saying, "This is the worst thing that has ever happened to us!" when something goes wrong. It makes problems magically shrink from perspective juice. I just had to use it (with a glass of wine) for a data problem. It worked. I taught it to my sister last year, as a trick, when we were texting intensely about mom without realizing we were using a thread that had mom's phone included. 😱
Mar 11, 2020 4 tweets 1 min read
So, back in January, I started suggesting we all needed to be prepared to self-quarantine for a few weeks. I had never suggested this before except for telling my History of Med students over the years that my MD spouse and I keep emergency "epidemic boxes." Someone asked me how I "knew" this might be "the one" back in Jan. I didn't know - I just had a feeling based on having taught SARS and knowing experts in that case said "We got lucky. We won't get lucky with the next really bad coronavirus." The signs this time were like SARS.
Feb 11, 2020 9 tweets 5 min read
On rare occasions, my background in medicine studies meets my deep personal background meets the reporting I now do for my community @eastlansinginfo. I just came from such an occasion: East Lansing 54B District Court "Drug Court" graduation. 1/n @eastlansinginfo Probation Officer Amy Iseler (left) and Judge Andrea Larkin (right) get it -- that opioid use disorders require deep, supportive interventions if people are to be saved. They get that people with the disorder struggle with shame, loneliness, low self-worth and need huge help.
Jan 27, 2020 11 tweets 13 min read
For 5 years I've run a successful, sustained, local, factual, online news operation @eastlansinginfo. Yesterday I was told I'm ineligible for a Knight Foundation fellowship meant for "senior leadership of new journalism organizations and projects based in the Midwest." 1/2 @eastlansinginfo The reason I'm not eligible? Because journalism has not been my "primary" source of income for 6 years or more. I resigned my job at Northwestern in 2015, over censorship. So I'm ineligible for wallacehouse.umich.edu/knight-wallace… 2/n