{"id":22661,"date":"2025-02-22T09:15:06","date_gmt":"2025-02-22T10:15:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=22661"},"modified":"2025-02-22T10:24:54","modified_gmt":"2025-02-22T10:24:54","slug":"the-interview-ed-yong-wants-to-show-you-the-hidden-reality-of-the-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=22661","title":{"rendered":"\u2018The Interview\u2019: Ed Yong Wants to Show You the Hidden Reality of the World"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n
\n
\n

The science journalist and author Ed Yong likes to joke that during the first wave of Covid-19 in 2020, the impact and reach of his reporting for The Atlantic turned him into \u201ca character in the season of \u2018Pandemic.\u2019\u201d Indeed, his Covid journalism \u2014 which documented the earliest stages of the pandemic and made him one of the first chroniclers of long Covid \u2014 established Yong as a key and trusted public interpreter of the illness and its many ripples. It also won him a Pulitzer Prize. (Additionally, Yong\u2019s 2022 book about animal perception, \u201cAn Immense World<\/a>,\u201d became a best seller. A young reader\u2019s edition will be published on May 13.)<\/p>\n

But despite having achieved a level of success and attention that most writers can only dream of, Yong\u2019s immersion in Covid left him feeling as utterly depleted as many of the health care professionals and patients he was covering. So much so that in 2023, he decided to leave his prestigious perch at The Atlantic. Since then, in addition to working on a new book, he has found a measure of salvation, even transcendence, in birding, a pastime that he, like so many others, took up in the wake of those grim days of social distancing and time stuck inside.<\/p>\n

So as we approach the fifth anniversary of the U.S. pandemic lockdowns, I wanted to talk with Yong about his Covid lows, his hopeful response to those struggles and his perspective on the lessons we learned \u2014 or maybe more accurate, didn\u2019t <\/em>learn \u2014 <\/em>from that strange and troubling time.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n

Listen to the Conversation With Ed Yong<\/h3>\n

The Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer talks about burnout from covering the pandemic and how bird-watching gave him a new sense of hope.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/figcaption>

\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n
\n
\n

Subscribe: <\/strong>Apple Podcasts<\/a><\/strong> | <\/strong>Spotify<\/a><\/strong> | <\/strong>YouTube<\/a><\/strong> | <\/strong>Amazon<\/a><\/strong> | <\/strong>iHeart<\/a><\/strong> | <\/strong>NYT Audio App<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
\n
\n

I want to start with a subject that a lot of people can relate to: burnout. How did you realize that you had given all that you had to give?<\/strong> I remember talking to public-health experts for a story and hearing people say that they were feeling depressed, anxious, they couldn\u2019t sleep, and thinking, Man, that feels very familiar. That was in June of 2020. By the middle of 2023, I realized that I was doing my best work at severe cost to all of the other parts of myself. I actually dislike the word \u201cburnout.\u201d It creates this image that the person in question did their job, the job was really hard and after a while they couldn\u2019t stand how hard it was and they stopped doing it. Which I don\u2019t think is correct. A lot of the health care workers I spoke to said that it wasn\u2019t that they couldn\u2019t handle doing their job. It was that they couldn\u2019t handle not being able<\/em> to do their job. They saw all of the institutional and systemic factors that prevented them from providing the care that they wanted to provide. For them, it was more about this idea of moral injury, this massive gulf between what you want the world to be and what you see happening around you. At some point that becomes intolerable. I think that\u2019s much closer to my experience of pandemic journalism too.<\/p>\n

Do you have any answers for how to contextualize your feelings in a world where people are struggling for subsistence or with the threat of violence? I often think, when I\u2019ll be low, What right do I have to complain? I\u2019m sure you must have had similar thoughts. <\/strong>This is a great point because you don\u2019t even have to go to that extreme of folks who are struggling to get by, folks who are in the middle of war zones. Let\u2019s just talk about the people whose stories I\u2019m trying to tell. What right do I have to say, \u201cI have listened to your stories, and I\u2019m trying to write about them, and that, for me, is too hard\u201d? Doesn\u2019t that sound a little bit pathetic?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n

<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/div>\n
\n
\n
\n

We are having trouble retrieving the article content.<\/p>\n

Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n

Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and\u00a0log into<\/a>\u00a0your Times account, or\u00a0subscribe<\/a>\u00a0for all of The Times.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n
\n
\n

Thank you for your patience while we verify access.<\/p>\n

Already a subscriber?\u00a0Log in<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Want all of The Times?\u00a0Subscribe<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The science journalist and author Ed Yong likes to joke that during the first wave of Covid-19 in 2020, the impact and reach of his reporting for The Atlantic turned him into \u201ca character in the season of \u2018Pandemic.\u2019\u201d Indeed, his Covid journalism \u2014 which documented the earliest stages of the pandemic and made him one of the first chroniclers of long Covid \u2014 established Yong as a key and trusted public interpreter of the illness and its many ripples. It also won him a Pulitzer Prize. (Additionally, Yong\u2019s 2022 book about animal perception, \u201cAn Immense World,\u201d became a best seller. A young reader\u2019s edition will be published on May 13.)But despite having achieved a level of success and attention that most writers can only dream of, Yong\u2019s immersion in Covid left him feeling as utterly depleted as many of the health care professionals and patients he was covering. So much so that in 2023, he decided to leave his prestigious perch at The Atlantic. Since then, in addition to working on a new book, he has found a measure of salvation, even transcendence, in birding, a pastime that he, like so many others, took up in the wake of those grim days of social distancing and time stuck inside.So as we approach the fifth anniversary of the U.S. pandemic lockdowns, I wanted to talk with Yong about his Covid lows, his hopeful response to those struggles and his perspective on the lessons we learned \u2014 or maybe more accurate, didn\u2019t learn \u2014 from that strange and troubling time.Listen to the Conversation With Ed YongThe Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer talks about burnout from covering the pandemic and how bird-watching gave him a new sense of hope.Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | YouTube | Amazon | iHeart | NYT Audio AppI want to start with a subject that a lot of people can relate to: burnout. How did you realize that you had given all that you had to give? I remember talking to public-health experts for a story and hearing people say that they were feeling depressed, anxious, they couldn\u2019t sleep, and thinking, Man, that feels very familiar. That was in June of 2020. By the middle of 2023, I realized that I was doing my best work at severe cost to all of the other parts of myself. I actually dislike the word \u201cburnout.\u201d It creates this image that the person in question did their job, the job was really hard and after a while they couldn\u2019t stand how hard it was and they stopped doing it. Which I don\u2019t think is correct. A lot of the health care workers I spoke to said that it wasn\u2019t that they couldn\u2019t handle doing their job. It was that they couldn\u2019t handle not being able to do their job. They saw all of the institutional and systemic factors that prevented them from providing the care that they wanted to provide. For them, it was more about this idea of moral injury, this massive gulf between what you want the world to be and what you see happening around you. At some point that becomes intolerable. I think that\u2019s much closer to my experience of pandemic journalism too.Do you have any answers for how to contextualize your feelings in a world where people are struggling for subsistence or with the threat of violence? I often think, when I\u2019ll be low, What right do I have to complain? I\u2019m sure you must have had similar thoughts. This is a great point because you don\u2019t even have to go to that extreme of folks who are struggling to get by, folks who are in the middle of war zones. Let\u2019s just talk about the people whose stories I\u2019m trying to tell. What right do I have to say, \u201cI have listened to your stories, and I\u2019m trying to write about them, and that, for me, is too hard\u201d? Doesn\u2019t that sound a little bit pathetic?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22663,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22661","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22661","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=22661"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22661\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22664,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22661\/revisions\/22664"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/22663"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=22661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=22661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=22661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}