Some news: After 8 years & 750 stories, I've decided to leave The Atlantic. Today's my last day.
Being a writer means you can’t say things like "I can’t tell you what this means" cos, well, I can. That's kind of the point of me. So here’s an attempt at looking back & forward: 1/ I’m really proud of the work I did here. Hagfish. Lichens. Endlings. Source diversity. 60+ pandemic pieces. Long COVID especially. More important than the awards, I know this work helped people, and it changed my understanding of what journalism can do & whom it should serve. 2/

🛑I wrote about what “fatigue” really means for people with long COVID and ME/CFS, and why this profoundly debilitating symptom is so often misunderstood and trivialized.

(This piece also covers PEM.) 1/

theatlantic.com/health/archive… First, an important note. I’ve been told that this piece will be free to read for 24 hours, but will then go behind the paywall. Best I could do. If you’re not a subscriber and this is useful to you or your loved ones, I’d suggest saving a copy ASAP. 2/ theatlantic.com/health/archive…

👋I’m back. And I wrote about the current wave of attempts to downplay long COVID—less outright denial & more "it’s real but no big deal".

Except: it very much is. It’s a substantial and ongoing crisis that still demands our attention. 1/
theatlantic.com/health/archive… This piece addresses the gaping flaws in the most common downplaying arguments. It covers biomarkers, disability claims, the spectrum of severity, the oft-repeated “I don’t’ know anyone with long COVID” line, and more. 2/
theatlantic.com/health/archive…

🧵Some personal news: I’m taking a 6-month sabbatical, starting now. These past 3 years have been the most professionally meaningful of my life, but they’ve also deeply broken me. The pandemic isn’t over, but after a long time spent staring into the sun, I need to blink. 1/ I’ve talked openly about the mental health challenges of pandemic reporting—e.g.

https://twitter.com/edyong209/status/1514976969447903237

& traumastewardship.com/2022/02/ed-yon… I know stepping away is a huge privilege most people don’t have. Persistence matters, but it has limits, and I’ve long since reached mine. 2/

🧵I want to share some thoughts about reporting on long COVID and other complex chronic illnesses. (e.g. below)
This is a thread about the ethos behind these pieces, and how I’ve approached interviewing, writing, and the rest of it. 1/

https://twitter.com/edyong209/status/1569302974811308032

I still consider myself new to this kind of reporting & am learning as I go. This isn’t a finger-wagging lecture. I'm just sharing some stuff I've thought about a lot. I hope it will be helpful to other journalists who want to do this kind of work & inspire more to do so. 2/

🚨I wrote about ME/CFS (chronic fatigue syndrome). The US has millions of people with it & maybe two dozen docs who specialize in it.

This medical crisis needs urgent attention, esp. now COVID has hugely increased the number of long-haulers. 1/
theatlantic.com/health/archive… ME/CFS involves a panoply of debilitating symptoms that affect almost every organ system. People are intensely sick for years or decades. They spend much of that time getting stigmatized, dismissed, misdiagnosed. 2/ theatlantic.com/health/archive…

🚨I wrote about “brain fog”—one of the most common & disabling symptoms of long COVID (and many other pre-pandemic conditions), and one of the most misunderstood.

Here’s what brain fog actually is, and what it’s like to live with it. 1/

theatlantic.com/health/archive… First, what it’s not: Brain fog isn't anxiety, or depression. It’s not psychosomatic. It’s really nothing like a hangover, stress, or tiredness, and comments equating it to those things—“hey we all forget stuff”—trivialize what people are going through. 2/ theatlantic.com/health/archive…

I love watching @LizNeeley win, and she won big this week. She & her team convened 10 incredible scientists on Catalina Island for the inaugural @USCWrigley Storymakers fellowship—a transformative week of learning and community-building. 1/ Most (maybe all?) of the fellows who took part described it as life/career-changing. I taught a writing workshop as part of the week and felt the same. It’s the program Liz has always wanted to create and watching it unfold was magical. 2/

🚨I wrote about a new study that makes clear just how exceptional America is, compared to other wealthy nations, at killing its own people--in large numbers & at young ages, during the pandemic and long before it. 1/ theatlantic.com/health/archive… .@jacobbor & his colleagues worked out how many Americans wouldn't have died each year if the US had the same mortality rates as its peer countries.

In 2019, there were 626,000 of these “missing Americans.”

In 2021, there were 1.1 million. 2/ theatlantic.com/health/archive…

🚨I wrote about BA.5—the latest coronavirus variant to rise to dominance—and why it matters.

This is an attempt to clearly lay out what we know about it, and to cut through the morass of misinformation that has already accumulated around it. 1/

theatlantic.com/health/archive… BA.5 is a variant in the Omicron family.

Is the US in a BA.5 surge? Yep. Might not look that way from cases (and some wastewater data) because the rise of BA.5 is occurring concurrently with the fall of BA.2 --> illusion of a plateau. 2/
theatlantic.com/health/archive…

‼️ I still haven't quite grasped that this is real, but AN IMMENSE WORLD has apparently debuted at #2 on the NYT's nonfiction bestseller list.

nytimes.com/books/best-sel… This has been an awkward moment to launch a book, to say the least. But I'm heartened by the many messages I've had from readers saying that it gave them joy and relief during dark times. That was always the hope and intent.

🚨I wrote about what the US can do to fight the ongoing pandemic, which its leaders have decided to sleepwalk through. When political will evaporates, what rises in its place?

This piece is an attempt to resist fatalism, and find hope amid inaction. 1/
theatlantic.com/health/archive… First, the current situation: Protections have mostly vanished. Hundreds still die daily. Others are disabled. The health-care system is imploding. CDC uses rose-tinted metrics to drive toothless guidelines. Funding has stalled. Variants keep emerging. 2/ theatlantic.com/health/archive…

It’s finally here! AN IMMENSE WORLD is now officially published (in the US at least). I’ve been working on this since The Before Times, and I’m thrilled that it now exists outside my head and my home. Here's a thread about what the book means to me. 1/ AN IMMENSE WORLD is about wonder and curiosity. It’s about the new perspectives that the senses of other animals can give us—into their lives, and into our surroundings. It’s a travelogue—a call to find the magical in the mundane, and the unfamiliar in the familiar. 2/

🚨Here's The Atlantic's new cover story, adapted from my new book, An Immense World.

By flooding the world with light & sound--sensory pollution--we've confounded, routed, and harmed other animals. But we can still save the quiet & preserve the dark. 1/
theatlantic.com/magazine/archi… Sensory pollution is paradoxical--more obvious than many other forms of environmental damage, but also mostly neglected because we simply don't think of things like light as a pollutant. But it absolutely can be. 2/

theatlantic.com/magazine/archi…

Actual copies! It's real!

(Out in 20 days: bookshop.org/books/an-immen…) Here’s a few things about AN IMMENSE WORLD that are evident from the final versions. First, there are two gorgeous color inserts, with photos of the book’s many protagonist species.

When I say long-haulers are *the* experts on long COVID, I don't just mean "cos they have it." I mean stuff like this.

Of the academics who get quoted in long COVID stories, how many have a list like this? See the condition this widely? Know this literature or these players?

https://twitter.com/ahandvanish/status/1378073087988662282

People like Hannah have probably forgotten more about long COVID and related illnesses than some of the folks publishing long COVID studies in big-name journals have learned. Their knowledge is academic AND personal... and vast.

My book, AN IMMENSE WORLD, on the incredible sensory worlds of other animals, is out in the US in 1 month.🥳

I'm so proud of it; it's intended to be a deeply joyful experience at a time when we could all use more of that.

You can preorder here: bookshop.org/books/an-immen… You can also join the launch event (in-person in DC or virtual), where I'll be in conversation with the wonderful Clint Smith: sixthandi.org/event/ed-yong/

🚨Here you go: What we know & don’t know about monkeypox, & how to think about the current outbreak.

One thing: It’s unique partly because it’s, er, happening amid a pandemic. Our reactions are deeply influenced by the last 3 years—in good & bad ways. 1/
theatlantic.com/health/archive… It’s important to learn lessons from the past, but also to not just fight the last war. I’m seeing folks applying COVID principles directly to this outbreak & I can’t stress this enough: Monkeypox isn't COVID. Different diseases, viruses, implications. 2/
theatlantic.com/health/archive…

🚨I wrote about how the health-care system is faring. In many places, things are better than the winter's surge. But that's scant comfort. The system is now locked in a chronic, cumulative crisis that exerts a toll regardless of what COVID is doing. 1/

theatlantic.com/health/archive… As ever there's a patchwork. Several health-care workers said they’re seeing the lowest COVID caseloads in ages. But hosp’ns are rising in 40+ states. And one doc in VT told me: “3 ER docs said this is by far the worst that COVID has been at any point." 2/ theatlantic.com/health/archive…

This has been a good day. I think our industry has problems, that we don't exist in a meritocracy, and that big awards often misstep. But then, sometimes, all the stars align, a bunch of REALLY good people win Pulitzers, and it feels like we really can have nice things. Like... Jen won! 😭♥️

https://twitter.com/PulitzerPrizes/status/1523742211153702913

We're at the point when different news outlets will say NOW is the point the US passes 1,000,000 COVID deaths based on their own calculations.

But in truth, we passed that point long ago because deaths have always been undercounted. 1/

usatoday.com/in-depth/news/… What matters now is honoring those who we lost, extending grace and compassion to those who are still grieving,... 2/

theatlantic.com/health/archive…