A worker removes the Sackler name from a building at Tufts University in 2019.

The Problem of Pain

It’s easier to blame individuals for the opioid crisis than to attempt to diagnose and cure the ills of a society.
A screencap from a news show reading "Outrage after video taken inside Florida supermarket goes viral" from MSNBC.

Misinformation, Vaccination, and “Medical Liberty” in the Age of COVID-19

Vaccination is of critical importance right now. History shows us that our problems are nothing new.
Nurse Harriet Curley takes the pulse of a patient at Sage Memorial Hospital on the Navajo Indian reservation in 1949. (AP)

How Native Americans Were Vaccinated Against Smallpox, Then Pushed Off Their Land

Nearly two centuries later, many tribes remain suspicious of the drive to get them vaccinated against the coronavirus.
An illustration of a man holding a photo of a naked man who is curled up defensively.

A Virginia Mental Institution for Black Patients Yields a Trove of Disturbing Records

Racism documented in files from the “Central Lunatic Asylum for the Colored Insane.”

Paper Products. Powder Rooms. What Past Pandemics Left Behind Forever.

Disease reshapes our lives in surprising ways.

Stop Blaming Tuskegee, Critics Say. It's Not An 'Excuse' for Current Medical Racism

It's the health inequities of today, not the infamous "Tuskegee Study," that explain many Black people's distrust of the American health system.
Armistice Day celebration with a large crowd of people

People Gave Up on Flu Pandemic Measures a Century Ago When They Tired of Them – And Paid a Price

At the first hint the virus was receding, people pushed to get life back to normal. Unfortunately another surge of the disease followed.
Black-and-white photograph of Louis Agassiz sitting in chair, looking through a magnifying glass at a sea urchin.

Louis Agassiz, Under a Microscope

The two prevailing historical visions of Louis Agassiz — one gentle and reverential, the other rigid and bigoted — may simply be two sides of the same coin.
profile illustration of human nervous system against black background

The Mystery of ‘Harriet Cole’

Whose body was harvested to create a spectacular anatomical specimen, and did that person know they would be on display more than a century later?
African-American child with polio
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Racial Health Disparities Didn’t Start With Covid: The Overlooked History of Polio

The coronavirus pandemic has highlighted racial disparities with roots in the past.
Cartoon of babies in petrie dishes.

A Long Incubation

It took hundreds of years of research to develop in-vitro fertilization or IVF.
Image of plastic human figurine hunched over at a desk and computer.

How the Personal Computer Broke the Human Body

Decades before 'Zoom fatigue' broke our spirits, the so-called computer revolution brought with it a world of pain previously unknown to humankind.
Cotton Mather.

The Hellfire Preacher Who Promoted Inoculation

Three hundred years ago, Cotton Mather starred in a debate about treating smallpox that tore Boston apart.
Richard Allen (above) and Absalom Jones' "A Refutation". book cover

How the Politics of Race Played Out During the 1793 Yellow Fever Epidemic

Free blacks cared for those infected with yellow fever even as their own lives were imperiled.
Illustrated 18th century man with hands on him

The Fever That Struck New York

The front lines of a terrible epidemic, through the eyes of a young doctor profoundly touched by tragedy.
Illustration of James McCune Smith, the African Free School #2, and the University of Glasgow

America's First Black Physician Sought to Heal a Nation's Persistent Illness

An activist, writer, doctor and intellectual, James McCune Smith, born enslaved, directed his talents to the eradication of slavery.
Drawing of a toppled statue head among grass, with a white bird

What Do We Do About John James Audubon?

The founding father of American birding soared on the wings of white privilege. How should the birding community grapple with this racist legacy?
Syringes with the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine on a table
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Having Vaccines Alone Isn’t Enough to Defeat Covid-19

Distributing them equally is key to defeating the coronavirus.
Illustration of a Lancasterian school building

A History of Technological Hype

When it comes to education technology, school leaders have often leaped before they looked.
Water contaminated with arsenic, lead and zinc flows from a pipe out of the Lee Mountain mine and into a holding pond
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Spin Doctors Have Shaped the Environmentalism Debate for Decades

“Green” public relations work has flown below the radar but made a huge impact.
Subject in sensory deprivation in 1957 isolation study

American Solitude

Notes toward a history of isolation.
Bathroom scales

The Completely Bonkers History of the Bathroom Scale

A century ago, few Americans had any idea how much they weighed. Here’s why that changed so dramatically.
The ocean

Chemical Warfare’s Home Front

Since World War I we’ve been solving problems with dangerous chemicals that introduce new problems.
Illustration of phrenologiy models

Phrenology Is Here to Stay

“Pseudoscience,” race, and American politics.
Posters reading "Is your child vaccinated? Vaccination prevents smallpox"

The Smallpox-Fighting “Virus Squads” That Stormed Tenements in the Middle of the Night

In the 1800s, they helped lay the groundwork for the anti-vaccine movement.
a artistic human face photo

Bring Back the Nervous Breakdown

It used to be okay to admit that the world had simply become too much.
Skiers queuing to get on The Dollar lift.

How a Railroad Engineer From Nebraska Invented the World's First Ski Chairlift

The device was part of an elaborate plan on behalf of Union Pacific to boost passenger rail travel in the American West.
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We’re Catching More Diseases From Wild Animals, and It’s Our Fault.

Scientists explain how viruses, like Covid-19, spill over from animals to people, and what we must do to stop the next pandemic.
A painted picture of someone receiving a vaccine

History Shows Americans Have Always Been Wary of Vaccines

Even so, many diseases have been tamed. Will Covid-19 be next?
COVID-19 dashboard
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Covid-19 Dashboards Are Vital, Yet Flawed, Sources of Public Information

Unlike our car dashboards, covid-19 dashboards do not give individuals actionable information.