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As COVID-19 cases continue to mount across the country, many states are still preparing for the virus to hit their populations with full force. In Florida, state officials have voiced concerns about shutting down the economy, while local officials have noted surging hospitalizations in their cities. Now, some mayors are no longer waiting for the governor to order a lockdown. Guest: Jane Castor, Mayor of Tampa, Florida. Slate Plus members get bonus segments and ad-free podcast feeds. Sign up...

Just a few weeks ago, officials were saying the coronavirus outbreak posed a relatively low risk for people living in New York City. How did health experts and government officials misread the threat so completely? And what can the rest of the country learn from what’s happening in New York now? Guest: Elizabeth Kim, senior editor for Gothamist and WNYC. Slate Plus members get bonus segments and ad-free podcast feeds. Sign up now. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Slate Plus members get ad-free podcasts and bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn and Dear Prudence. Sign up now to listen and support our work. The United States failed to roll out widespread testing in the early days of the pandemic. Now it faces critical shortages of supplies as it scrambles to track the disease around the country. Until testing is available at scale, Americans won’t be able to return to their normal lives. So: what will it take to solve the country’s testing shortage?...

What happens when the people on the frontlines get sick? An ER doctor shares her experience with coronavirus as doctor and patient. Guest: Dara Kass, Emergency medicine physician at New York-Presbyterian Hospital and Columbia University Medical Center Slate Plus members get bonus segments and ad-free podcast feeds. Sign up now. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

There’s plenty to be learned from past pandemics. They tend to follow a dramatic arc: denial, blame, and mass mobilization. So far, the coronavirus tracks with some contagions of the past—but can history tell anything about where we’re headed? Guest: David S. Jones, professor of the culture of medicine at Harvard University. Slate Plus members get bonus segments and ad-free podcast feeds. Sign up now. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As the COVID-19 pandemic worsens, the United States might have to figure out how to hold an election in a time of social distancing. Will local, state and federal officials be able coordinate in time to transform our election infrastructure? Guest: Nate Persily, Stanford University Law Professor Slate Plus members get bonus segments and ad-free podcast feeds. Sign up now. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

To understand where the country is right now in battling this pandemic you have to confront some pretty grim statistics. Roughly one in three Americans are under some kind of orders to stay at home. The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases surpassed 33,000. And a nearly $2 trillion dollar coronavirus rescue package is hanging in the Senate’s balance. With many Americans and health care workers needing immediate assistance, will lawmakers respond? Guest: Jim Newell, Slate’s senior politics...

Slate Plus members get ad-free podcasts and bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn and Dear Prudence. Sign up now to listen and support our work. Google has spent the last decade trying to find a foothold in the health care industry. Now they’re partnering with the federal government to build a website that will seek to address the crisis. Can Google be trusted with our medical data? Guest: Mason Marks, law professor at Gonzaga University School of Law and an affiliated fellow at Yale Law...

Many Americans still can’t imagine how the coronavirus pandemic will upend their lives. In northern Italy, no imagination is needed. Coffins pile up in churches and cemeteries as funeral gatherings remain banned. Hospitals are overwhelmed. And those who die from COVID-19 die alone. Guest: Greta Privitera, an Italian journalist on her fourth week of lockdown in Milan. Slate Plus members get bonus segments and ad-free podcast feeds. Sign up now. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit...

As the novel coronavirus spreads sickness and anxiety around the U.S., it’s tempting to point fingers at government agencies that seemed wholly unequipped for the crisis. And, to be clear, Washington was not prepared. But here’s what decision makers can be doing right now to figure out what comes next. Guest: Beth Cameron, vice president for global biological policy and programs at the Nuclear Threat Initiative. Slate Plus members get bonus segments and ad-free podcast feeds. Sign up now....

When Senator Elizabeth Warren announced the end of her presidential campaign, she was asked about the role of sexism in the race. Warren didn’t venture an answer, promising she’d have more to say later. In the meantime, we have some thoughts. Guest: Rebecca Traister, writer for New York Magazine and author of Good and Mad: The Revolutionary Power of Women’s Anger. Slate Plus members get bonus segments and ad-free podcast feeds. Sign up now. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit...

In the face of the coronavirus outbreak, U.S. political leaders are moving faster than they have in years. But it still might not be fast enough. Guest: Jordan Weissmann, Slate’s senior business and economics correspondent. Slate Plus members get bonus segments and ad-free podcast feeds. Sign up now. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Open or closed? Across the country, state governors and mayors are asking themselves that question: Are we safer staying open, or are we safer closing down? Over the weekend, more cities and states ordered shutdowns to temper the spread of COVID-19. But we’re dealing with a threat we haven’t seen before. How are we supposed to make decisions when we’re lacking basic information about how this coronavirus works? Guest: Jeremy Faust, an emergency medicine physician at Brigham and Women’s...

Slate Plus members get ad-free podcasts and bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn and Dear Prudence. Sign up now to listen and support our work. Last week, the superintendent of the Northshore school district near Seattle made a difficult decision. With the coronavirus spreading rapidly in the area, she closed all 34 schools in her district and moved all classes online. But for many schools, remote learning at this scale simply isn’t an option. With new cases appearing around the country,...

We talk about polls a lot on this podcast. State polls, national polls, polls that make you shrug and vote for the other guy. Today, we’re talking about one of the most unusual polls we’ve ever seen: Slate teamed up with The Marshall Project to conduct a survey of incarcerated people across the country. We received 8,000 responses about political awakenings, party affiliations, and the biggest problems facing the country. Guests: Nicole Lewis, a reporter at The Marshall Project, and Lawrence...

Even though Kareem Shaheen left Syria a few years back, the reminders of his time there are everywhere. For nine years a brutal conflict has left millions seeking refuge with millions more still stuck in limbo. This past December, the Assad regime launched its latest attempt to seize back control of the largest rebel-held territory in Syria, Idlib. Today on the show, Kareem tells us about Idlib, its importance in the war, his experience covering the region, and what the world turning their...

On Monday morning, the Dow saw its biggest one day drop since 2008. This time, the cause was a combination of a volatile oil market and heightened fears of a pandemic. The usual economic tools may not be enough to reassure markets. Guest: Jordan Weissmann,Slate’s Senior Business and Economics Correspondent Slate Plus members get ad-free podcasts and bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn and Dear Prudence. Sign up now to listen and support our work. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit...

The Trump 2016 campaign had unprecedented success on Facebook. Ever since, Trump's reelection campaign has been pumping out ads and collecting data on a massive scale. Democrats are only just beginning to catch up. Guest: Andrew Marantz, staff writer at the New Yorker and author of Antisocial: Online Extremists, Techno-Utopians, and the Hijacking of the American Conversation Slate Plus members get ad-free podcasts and bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn and Dear Prudence. Sign up now to...

Slate Plus members get ad-free podcasts and bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn and Dear Prudence. Sign up now to listen and support our work. For pregnant women in the U.S., there are plenty of reasons to mistrust the medical establishment. Mortality rates are high compared to other western countries, and one-third of women in the U.S. give birth by C-section. It’s no wonder that many women turn to the internet for alternatives. This week, the story of one woman who was drawn into a...

Slate Plus members get ad-free podcasts and bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn and Dear Prudence. Sign up now to listen and support our work. Super Tuesday gave Joe Biden a blowout, in part because of a surge from black voters. While white voters tended to split their votes more evenly between Biden and Bernie Sanders, black voters overwhelmingly chose the former Vice President. So, what does Biden’s base see in him as a candidate? And what would they expect from him as president? Guest:...