What We Can Learn From Long Covid

Welcome to the week, Shit Givers.

I hope you all enjoyed the guest essay from Akshat Rathi on Friday! Can’t wait to start rolling more of those out.

Let’s get newsy.

This week:

• 😴 Chronic fatigue syndrome

• 🔌 Grid-enhancing technologies

• 🧽Spongey cities

• 💘 AI and online dating

• And more

Have a great week,

— Willow

This is science for people who give a shit.

Every week, we help 28,000+ humans understand and unfuck the rapidly changing world around us. It feels great, and we’d love for you to join us.

New Shit Giver Andrea wants to “help all people have access to a healthy and sustainable food supply.“

It sounds so simple, doesn’t it? And it should be.

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🦠 Health & Bio:

• 🌏️ Long Covid continues to puzzle us. Here’s what we know so far, and what we can learn from it

• 🌎️ A new study has discovered evidence of the biological basis that causes chronic fatigue syndrome

• Meet the virus hunters on a mission to detect emerging outbreaks as early possible by rapidly sampling environmental DNA in high-risk areas

• Will people forgo insurance coverage to get brand-name drugs? Bayer is betting on it by putting its popular birth control pills onto Mark Cuban’s online pharmacy, which provides discounted drugs by cutting out the middlemen.

⚡️ Climate change:

• More 2023 numbers are rolling in: About 2.5 million people in the US were forced from their homes due to weather-related disasters last year — and a third of those were displaced for over a month

• Grid upgrades and interconnection backlogs are holding back the clean energy transition. Smart tech called “grid-enhancing technologies” (GETs) could be the key to unleashing wind and solar while saving billions in upgrade costs

• 🌍️ Even as Europe’s fossil gas consumption is at a low, LNG capacity projects are still going strong

• 🌍️ Industrial companies in the EU want cuts to energy costs and regulations in order to keep up with China and the US through the energy transition

💦 Food & Water:

• 🌎️ Serious drought conditions are impacting 17% of the Mediterranean region in the EU, which could be the new normal

• Biden-Harris have announced $5.8 billion in funding for clean water and wastewater infrastructure in every state and territory

• Did you know LA is a sponge? Its infrastructure collected 8.6 billion gallons of water during the atmospheric river

• Remember when a glass of red wine was acclaimed as a health drink? Turns out it’s not (sorry) — here’s how that changed

👩‍💻 Beep Boop:

• 🌍️ How we can use video games to envision and inspire a more sustainable, green future

• 🌏️ Next up in the wave of AI-driven industries? Online dating. Following a deal with OpenAI, the conglomerate that owns Tinder and Hinge says that it wants to include AI into “literally everything”

• American pharmacies have been hit by a cyberattack, resulting in disruptions to prescriptions and other services, while

• 🌎️ iMessage is getting post-quantum encryption. What does that mean? I don’t really know to be honest, but this article will tell you

Last week’s most popular Action Step was brushing up on your climate change knowledge by taking the Climate 101 course from The Climate Reality Project.

• Donate to Earthjustice so their lawyers can keep suing to protect you, your family, and the environment.

• 🌎️ Volunteer with Doctors Without Borders (they have local, remote, and in-the-field options). You don’t need to be a nurse or a doctor.

• 🌎️ Get educated about whether your private data has been leaked, and how to get it back, by subscribing to Mozilla Monitor.

• Be heard about making sure kids get the nutrition they need and ask your representative to pass Child Nutrition Reauthorization legislation.

• Invest in a better world with tools and support from Impact Assets.

🌎️ = Global Action Step/news link

What are reverse coattails, and how might they slow climate change, prevent the next pandemic, and keep Nazis off of school boards?

That's this week’s big question, and our returning guest is Amanda Litman.

Amanda is the co-founder and co-executive director of Run for Something, which recruits and supports young, diverse progressives running for down-ballot office, state, and local, and all those fun levels.

Since launching in 2017, a thousand years ago, Run for Something has elected more than 1000 leaders across nearly all 50 states, mostly women and people of color.

And look, it's yet another election year in America because it's another year in America, so there is never a better time to invite Amanda back onto the show.

📖 Prefer to read? Get the transcript here.

How to nip deforestation in the bud

Forests are crucial carbon sinks, so deforestation unleashes stored carbon into the atmosphere, which as you may have heard, we really don’t need it to be.

Read about the basics of deforestation, and the solutions, in our deforestation explainer 👇️ 

To the moon

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