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Katherine J. Wu

Katherine J. Wu

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Men Are First in Line for the Best New Contraception

The next generation of birth control will be effective and reversible, with almost no side effects. Within the next couple of decades, a new...

03.04.2024 9

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

The CDC Is Squandering a Breakthrough Vaccine

New RSV shots could make winter much safer for infants, but experts think current guidelines may be too strict. When a new RSV vaccine for pregnant...

29.03.2024 10

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

How Long Should a Species Stay on Life Support?

Decades into their recovery program, black-footed ferrets still don’t have a clear-cut path to leaving the endangered-species list. At about 3:30...

15.03.2024 20

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

Why Are We Still Flu-ifying COVID?

The diseases are nowhere near the same. Four years after what was once the “novel coronavirus” was declared a pandemic, COVID remains the most...

28.02.2024 10

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

Great Apes Know Just How Much to Annoy One Another

Playful teasing might have evolved to help our ape ancestors gather crucial intel on their family’s and friends’ thoughts. In the late aughts,...

14.02.2024 10

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

Your Flu Shot Might Have One Fewer Ingredient This Fall

One type of flu virus has gone missing for so long, it doesn’t make sense to vaccinate against it. In Arnold Monto’s ideal vision of this fall,...

05.02.2024 10

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

Deer Are Beta-Testing a Nightmare Disease

Prion diseases are poorly understood, and this one is devastating. Scott Napper, a biochemist and vaccinologist at the University of Saskatchewan, can...

01.02.2024 10

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

How One Tiny Insect Upended an Ecosystem

On a conservancy of Kenya, lions are struggling to hunt zebras. An invasive insect may be to blame. Out on the savannas of East Africa, lions have...

25.01.2024 8

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

‘If Exercise Could Cure This, I Would Have Been Cured So Quickly’

Striving for fitness is usually healing. But for most people with long COVID, it can be toxic. In the weeks after she caught COVID, in May 2022,...

25.01.2024 8

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

How Much Less to Worry About Long COVID Now

New cases seem to be less common nowadays, but that change is not as comforting as it sounds. Compared with the worst days of the pandemic—when...

18.01.2024 3

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

You Really Can Love a Pet Like a Kid

Calling pet owners the “parents” of their dogs or cats might be the best shorthand for these relationships. For the 10 years they were together,...

16.01.2024 40

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

California Grizzlies Got More Carnivorous. Blame Humans.

Before Europeans arrived on the West Coast, the bears were 90 percent vegan. On the subject of grizzly bears, the San Francisco Call—a short-lived...

10.01.2024 10

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

The Most Mysterious Cells in Our Bodies Don’t Belong to Us

You carry literal pieces of your mom—and maybe your grandma, and your siblings, and your aunts and uncles. Some 24 years ago, Diana Bianchi peered...

03.01.2024 100

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

America Lost Its One Perfect Tree

Lumber, shelter, delicious nuts—there was nothing the American chestnut couldn’t provide. Across the Northeast, forests are haunted by the ghosts...

24.12.2023 100

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

Winter Illness This Year Is a Different Kind of Ugly

Facing down simultaneous surges of flu, COVID, and RSV, most Americans still aren’t getting the vaccines that could temper the worst effects....

19.12.2023 7

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

One of Tuberculosis’s Biggest, Scariest Numbers Is Probably Wrong

Decades-old dogma holds that tuberculosis is lying dormant in the bodies of 2 billion people. What if that’s just not true? Growing up in India,...

15.12.2023 9

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

Sick Season Will Be Worse From Now On

Living with one more very deadly respiratory virus means … exactly that. Last fall, when RSV and flu came roaring back from a prolonged and erratic...

30.11.2023 2

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

Cats That Fetch Are an Evolutionary Mystery

Humans have bred generations of dogs to bring back the things we throw. Cats seem to do it on their own. The way my spouse likes to tell it, our cat...

22.11.2023 2

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

Earth May Never Again Know a Plastic-Free Sea Turtle

Even if plastic pollution stopped tomorrow, turtles would be dealing with the repercussions for centuries—at least. As recently as the 1960s,...

15.11.2023 5

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

The Benefits of Being More Bat-Like

A team of researchers dreams of anti-aging, disease-tempering drugs—all inspired by bats. In Linfa Wang’s ideal world, all humans would be just a...

09.11.2023 9

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

How Bad Are America’s COVID-Vaccination Rates?

Even if few people get the shots, this winter might look like this last one. But that trend won’t hold forever. Relatively speaking, 2023 has...

02.11.2023 6

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

The Other Group of Viruses That Could Cause the Next Pandemic

Flu viruses and coronavirus started the last few pandemics. Could the next one be a paramyxovirus? Whether it begins next week, next year, or next...

29.10.2023 6

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

What If There’s a Secret Benefit to Getting Asian Glow?

A genetic mutation carried by about 500 million people makes drinking dramatic, but may protect against infectious diseases. At every party, no matter...

25.10.2023 2

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

These Birds Got a Little Too Comfortable in Birdhouses

Purple martins may have been saved by human-built nest boxes. What happens when our hospitality runs out? Whether it’s because we destroy their...

17.10.2023 20

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

An Unusual Theory Suggests That Sex Helps the Body Tolerate a Fetus

16.10.2023 3

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

The Calendar of Human Fertility Is Changing

American births have historically peaked in late summer. But our changing behaviors, technology, and environment are flattening that bump. As the...

22.09.2023 2

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

This Fall’s COVID Vaccines Are for Everyone

Certain groups are absolutely at higher risk for COVID. But experts say it makes the most sense to encourage everyone to get a vaccine. Paul Offit...

13.09.2023 1

The Atlantic

Katherine J. Wu

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