{"id":24810,"date":"2025-03-27T12:00:10","date_gmt":"2025-03-27T13:00:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=24810"},"modified":"2025-03-27T13:23:26","modified_gmt":"2025-03-27T13:23:26","slug":"for-john-green-its-tuberculosis-all-the-way-down","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=24810","title":{"rendered":"For John Green, It\u2019s Tuberculosis All the Way Down"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The first time I read a book by the best-selling young adult novelist John Green, I was on a plane. \u201cThe Fault in Our Stars,\u201d about a teenage cancer patient who falls in love, <\/em>made me cry so hard that a flight attendant repeatedly came to check on me.<\/p>\n

Mr. Green\u2019s new book is nonfiction and it\u2019s about tuberculosis, the infectious disease. TB, he says, has become his great obsession<\/a>; he talks about it to his millions of young followers on TikTok and YouTube, who at times have mobilized to confront drug manufacturers about high TB drug prices. The book, \u201cEverything is Tuberculosis: The History and Persistence of Our Deadliest Infection,\u201d explains how TB is responsible for everything from romantic poetry to New Mexico\u2019s statehood, and asks why a fully curable disease nevertheless killed 1.3 million people last year alone.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a chronicle of slow but hopeful progress. But that progress was derailed recently when the Trump administration\u2019s abruptly dismantled the U.S. Agency for International Development, ending American support for key health programs around the world. I invited Mr. Green to The New York Times for a conversation about where tuberculosis came from, why it hasn\u2019t gone away and where it all goes from here.<\/p>\n

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Listen to the Full Conversation with John Green<\/h3>\n

The Times\u2019s global health reporter Stephanie Nolen sits down with the novelist and YouTuber for a conversation about tuberculosis and his new book.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/figcaption>

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The transcript below has been edited for clarity and brevity.<\/em><\/p>\n

Stephanie Nolen:<\/strong> I really love talking about tuberculosis; I can talk about TB all day. But there aren\u2019t a lot of people in my life who are super happy to sit and talk about TB with me. So this feels like a real luxury. I\u2019m so glad that you\u2019ve come to see us at The Times. Want to sit and talk about TB?<\/p>\n

John Green: <\/strong>I do, so badly, not least because I am in the same boat. Like, every time I get three or four words into an observation, my kids will raise their hands and say, \u201cYeah, Dad, we know: It\u2019s tuberculosis.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The first time I read a book by the best-selling young adult novelist John Green, I was on a plane. \u201cThe Fault in Our Stars,\u201d about a teenage cancer patient who falls in love, made me cry so hard that a flight attendant repeatedly came to check on me.Mr. Green\u2019s new book is nonfiction and it\u2019s about tuberculosis, the infectious disease. TB, he says, has become his great obsession; he talks about it to his millions of young followers on TikTok and YouTube, who at times have mobilized to confront drug manufacturers about high TB drug prices. The book, \u201cEverything is Tuberculosis: The History and Persistence of Our Deadliest Infection,\u201d explains how TB is responsible for everything from romantic poetry to New Mexico\u2019s statehood, and asks why a fully curable disease nevertheless killed 1.3 million people last year alone.It\u2019s a chronicle of slow but hopeful progress. But that progress was derailed recently when the Trump administration\u2019s abruptly dismantled the U.S. Agency for International Development, ending American support for key health programs around the world. I invited Mr. Green to The New York Times for a conversation about where tuberculosis came from, why it hasn\u2019t gone away and where it all goes from here.Listen to the Full Conversation with John GreenThe Times\u2019s global health reporter Stephanie Nolen sits down with the novelist and YouTuber for a conversation about tuberculosis and his new book.The transcript below has been edited for clarity and brevity.Stephanie Nolen: I really love talking about tuberculosis; I can talk about TB all day. But there aren\u2019t a lot of people in my life who are super happy to sit and talk about TB with me. So this feels like a real luxury. I\u2019m so glad that you\u2019ve come to see us at The Times. Want to sit and talk about TB?John Green: I do, so badly, not least because I am in the same boat. Like, every time I get three or four words into an observation, my kids will raise their hands and say, \u201cYeah, Dad, we know: It\u2019s tuberculosis.\u201dWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and\u00a0log into\u00a0your Times account, or\u00a0subscribe\u00a0for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?\u00a0Log in.Want all of The Times?\u00a0Subscribe.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":24812,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24810","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\/24810","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=24810"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24810\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24813,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24810\/revisions\/24813"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/24812"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=24810"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=24810"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=24810"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}