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‘We Had been Left With Nothing’: Argentina’s Distress Deepens within the Pandemic

‘We Were Left With Nothing’: Argentina’s Misery Deepens in the Pandemic

Before the pandemic, Carla Huanca and her family made modest but meaningful improvements to their cramped apartment in the Buenos Aires slums.

She worked as a hairdresser. Her partner ran the bar in a night club. Together, they brought home about 25,000 pesos ($ 270) a week – enough to add a second story to their home and make extra space for their three boys. They were just about to plaster the walls.

“Then everything closed up,” said Ms. Huanca, 33. “We had nothing left.”

Amid the lockdown, she and her family needed emergency handouts from the Argentine government to keep food on the table. You have come to terms with rough walls. They have chosen to use wireless internet service so their children can manage distance learning.

“We have all spent our savings,” said Ms. Huanca.

The global economic devastation that has accompanied Covid-19 has been particularly severe in Argentina, a country that has entered the pandemic deep in crisis. The economy contracted nearly 10 percent in 2020, the third straight year of the recession.

The pandemic has accelerated an exodus of foreign investment, which has depressed the value of the Argentine peso. This has increased the cost of imports such as food and fertilizers and kept the inflation rate above 40 percent. More than four in ten Argentines are plunged into poverty.

Hanging over national life is an inevitable renegotiation later this year with the International Monetary Fund, an institution Argentines widely loathe for bailing out crippling budget cuts two decades ago.

With public finances exhausted from the pandemic, Argentina must work out a new repayment plan for $ 45 billion in debt to the IMF. That burden is the result of the fund’s most recent bailout and the largest in the institute’s history – a $ 57 billion package of loans to Argentina extended in 2018.

Now under new management, the fund has diminished its traditional fear of austerity and alleviated some of the usual fears. Even so, the negotiations are sure to be complex and politically stormy.

The Argentine government, led by President Alberto Fernández, is deeply divided ahead of the mid-term elections in October. The government faces a major challenge from the left. A former president – and the current vice president – Cristina Fernández de Kirchner are calling for a more combative stance towards the IMF

Companies assume that the government has not developed a strategy that can generate sustainable economic growth. Liberating Argentina from stagnation and inflation is a goal that has eluded the country’s leaders for decades. In a country where its national debt has defaulted no less than nine times, skepticism continues to harm national wealth by limiting investment.

“There is no plan. There’s no going forward, ”said Miguel Kiguel, a former Argentine finance secretary who heads Econviews, a Buenos Aires-based advisor. “How can you get companies to invest? There is still no trust. “

The Fernández government is taking advantage of a more cooperative relationship with the IMF and is trying to reach an agreement with the institution that will save the government penalizing budget cuts and allowing spending to stimulate economic growth.

Such hopes would once have been unrealistic. From Indonesia to Turkey to Argentina, the IMF has forced countries to cut spending amid crises, remove fuel for economic growth and punish those in need of public aid.

Today’s IMF, led by Kristalina Georgieva for the past two years, has eased the institution’s traditional obsession with budget discipline. She has called on governments to impose property taxes to help finance the cost of the pandemic – a measure Argentina passed late last year.

The Fund’s analysis of Argentina’s debt picture and the conclusion that the burden was unsustainable formed the basis for an agreement with international creditors last year. Investors eventually agreed to write down the value of approximately $ 66 billion worth of bonds to overcome opposition from the world’s largest wealth manager BlackRock.

The Argentine government believes it can close a deal from the fund that will allow the country to move its debt significantly and free up impending payments – $ 3.8 billion this year and more than $ 18 billion – dollars next year – without strict requirements it lowered spending.

“The IMF leadership has made it clear that this is the framework,” said Joseph E. Stiglitz, Nobel Laureate from Columbia University in New York. The new regime will reflect “the new IMF,” he added, “recognizing that austerity measures are not working and recognizing their concerns about poverty. “

The expected flexibility of the IMF vis-à-vis Argentina reflects the increasing trust in President Fernández and his Minister of Economics, Martin Guzmán, who studied with Mr. Stiglitz.

Updated

April 19, 2021, 5:23 p.m. ET

On the surface, its management represents a return to the thinking that has animated public life in Argentina since the 1940s under the leadership of Juan Domingo Perón. His presidency was characterized by muscular state authority, public generosity for the poor, and contempt for budgetary considerations.

Peronist politicians have repeatedly showered aid to struggling communities and been forgotten by paying the bills in pesos. This has often led to runaway inflation, crisis and despair. Reformists have temporarily taken power with mandates to restore the financial regulation by cutting public spending. This made the poor angry and laid the foundation for the next upswing of the Peronists.

The last president, Mauricio Macri, took office as the supposed solution to this cycle of booms and busts. International investors celebrated him as a pioneer of a new, technocratic governance approach.

But Mr Macri went over the top by taking advantage of his popularity with investors. He borrowed profusely, despite fighting the poor by cutting government programs. Its debt frenzy, coupled with yet another recession, forced the country to submit to the ultimate humiliation and seek help from the IMF.

In the elections two years ago, voters rejected Mr Macri and installed Mr Fernández – a Peronist. Some suggested that Mr Fernández might take a tough stance on creditors, including the IMF. However, the Fernández administration has shown itself to be pragmatic, gaining the trust of the IMF while continuing to exonerate the poor.

“We have to avoid following the patterns of the past that have caused so much damage,” said Minister of Economic Affairs Guzmán in an interview. “We want to be constructive and solve these problems in a way that works.”

The most damaging problem remains inflation, a reality that is attacking businesses and households and adding to the burden of higher food prices on the poor.

In large economies like the United States, central banks traditionally respond to inflation by raising interest rates. However, this wipes out economic growth – not a tenable proposition in Argentina, where the central bank is already keeping interest rates at the stultifying level of 38 percent.

Instead, Mr Guzmán has pressured unions to accept meager wage increases, arguing that smaller paychecks will go on if inflation can be tamed. He introduced price controls on food and urged other companies to maintain lower prices on their products.

The government has also raised taxes on exports, angering ranchers and farmers.

“They spend more time filling out government tables than producing,” complained Martín Palazón, a farmer who grows soybeans, corn and wheat and raises cattle outside of Buenos Aires.

However, the lawsuits from Argentine companies and the mounting burdens on the poor coincide with the fact that the country’s prospects are already improving.

The Argentine economy is expected to grow nearly 7 percent this year as soybean exports generate growth while high commodity prices give the country a necessary source of hard currency.

Many Argentine companies remain doubtful that the recovery can gain momentum, especially as the central bank maintains high interest rates.

Edelflex, a company based outside of Buenos Aires, develops liquid management equipment used by breweries, food processors, and pharmaceutical manufacturers. High borrowing costs have prevented the company from making improvements to its assets that could lead to additional growth, said company president Miguel Harutiunian.

“We are inevitably short-term and we cannot invest in new technology,” said Harutiunian. “The ultimate goal of a company – or a country – cannot be just to survive.”

Texcom, a textile manufacturer with three plants in Argentina, produces fabrics for international sporting goods brands. The company stopped production amid a government-mandated quarantine last March. By May, Texcom had reopened and moved to an urgent need area: it was supplying materials for protective equipment such as masks that were needed by the medical staff on the front lines.

Even so, the company’s production is down in half from last year’s 2019, and production is expected to hit just 70 percent of preandemic levels this year.

The company’s president, Javier Chornik, is now used to the fact that his wealth rises and falls with the constantly volatile fluctuations in the economy.

“Argentina has been in a maze for years and it can’t get out,” he said. “The country always seems to grow, then there is a crisis and we go back. We go and come back and we never get any further. “

In the slum in southern Buenos Aires, Ms. Huanca’s partner recently reclaimed his old nightclub job, but rising food and fuel prices had effectively reduced her income.

Then came a spate of new Covid cases in their neighborhood. The government imposed new restrictions amid concerns that variants could spread rapidly in neighboring Brazil. Her partner’s employer reduced his working hours and halved his salary.

“I’m scared of what might happen now,” she said. “Everyone is very concerned.”

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Health

The Significance of Routines, Even Interrupted by a Pandemic

The Importance of Routines, Even Interrupted by a Pandemic

I grew up insecure all the time, thanks to an unstable home life as a child, parents who moved a lot and from the age of 16 no longer have a home of their own. The trauma from these experiences began to haunt me, it wore me down, and mixed with my diagnoses of ADHD, depression, and obsessive-compulsive disorder, making it nearly impossible for me to focus on one, work, and generally be productive and happy Every day.

At some point I happened to realize that the more I implemented boundaries and schedules – wake up and eat and meditate at certain times, exercise, write down the schedule for the next day – the more I felt not just controlled. but also luck. By setting routines for myself, I was able to protect myself from the chaos.

“It helps you feel in control,” said Charles Duhigg, who wrote The Power of Habit, in an interview. “It helps you remember how to do things that – perhaps because of your ADHD – you would forget because of your short-term memory.” In his book, Mr. Duhigg examines the type of ouroboros – the ancient symbol of a snake eating its own tail – that I performed on myself. I needed some sort of cue, a routine, and then a reward. I didn’t think of rewards as part of the process, but they are essential.

For me the reward was peace of mind. What I didn’t realize was that I was giving myself other little trophies too: when I went to the gym five days a week, there was a little voice in my head that said, “You deserve two slices of pizza.” When I tidied up the house on Sunday mornings, I always opened a beer in the afternoon. And sometimes you are not even aware of the rewards you give yourself for the routine, and I find those are the most important. With these rewards, I am good to yourself and tell myself that I did something, so I deserve something.

“You force yourself to anticipate rewards,” said Mr. Duhigg. “All of this is really good.”

For Esmé Weijun Wang, author of the essay collection “The Collected Schizophrenias,” “Routines and rituals are central to maintaining my mental health,” she told me. Ms. Wang’s routines include: “My analog planner, in which I write diaries, manage my appointments and write down tasks. Along with a number of other notebooks and binders, he organizes things so that life feels less overwhelming. “

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Feeling Blah Throughout the Pandemic? It is Referred to as Languishing

Feeling Blah During the Pandemic? It's Called Languishing

A pun in the early morning catapults me into the river. A nightly Netflix binge sometimes does the trick too – it puts you in a story where you feel connected to the characters and concerned about their wellbeing.

While finding new challenges, positive experiences, and meaningful work are possible remedies, finding a flow is difficult when you cannot concentrate. This was a problem long before the pandemic, when people used to check email 74 times a day, switching tasks every 10 minutes. Over the past year, many of us have also struggled with interruptions from kids around the house, colleagues around the world and bosses around the clock. Meh.

Fragmented attention is an enemy of commitment and excellence. In a group of 100 people, only two or three people can drive and store information at the same time without affecting their performance in either or both of the tasks. Computers can be made to process in parallel, but humans are better at serial processing.

That means we have to set limits. Years ago, a Fortune 500 software company in India tested a simple guideline: No interruptions Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday before noon. When the engineers managed the border themselves, 47 percent had above average productivity. However, when the company put quiet time as an official policy, 65 percent achieved above-average productivity. Doing more wasn’t just good for work performance: we now know that the most important factor in everyday enjoyment and motivation is a sense of progress.

I don’t think Tuesday, Thursday and Friday are anything magical before noon. The lesson from this simple idea is to treat uninterrupted blocks of time as treasures to be protected. It removes constant distractions and gives us the freedom to focus. We can find solace in experiences that draw our full attention.

The pandemic was a great loss. Try to start with small wins, like the tiny triumph of figuring out a unit or the rush to play a seven letter word. One of the clearest ways to flow is a barely manageable difficulty: a challenge that will expand your skills and increase your determination. That means taking time each day to focus on a challenge that is important to you – an interesting project, a worthwhile goal, a meaningful conversation. Sometimes it is a small step to rediscover some of the energy and enthusiasm that you have been missing all these months.

Language isn’t just in our heads – it’s in our circumstances. You cannot cure a sick culture with personal bandages. We still live in a world that normalizes physical health problems but stigmatizes mental health problems. As we move into a new post-pandemic reality, it is time to rethink our understanding of mental health and wellbeing. “Not depressed” doesn’t mean that you aren’t struggling. “Not burned out” doesn’t mean you’re cheered. By recognizing that so many of us languish, we can give voice to silent despair and pave a way out of the void.

Adam Grant is an organizational psychologist at Wharton, author of Think Again: The Power to Know What You Don’t Know, and host of the TED podcast WorkLife.

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Health

People Replicate on How the Pandemic Has Modified Them

Americans Reflect on How the Pandemic Has Changed Them

Times Insider explains who we are and what we do, and provides a behind-the-scenes look at how our journalism comes together.

The pandemic has changed our reality. To better understand this transformation, Elizabeth Dias and Audra DS Burch, the National Desk correspondent, recently spoke to people across the country about her own experiences. They made a call to readers online, conducted interviews to hear from a number of voices, and collected these reports in the Who We Are Now article. Ms. Dias and Ms. Burch shared what they have learned in their reporting and how they have changed during this time. Read a slightly edited excerpt below.

How did this story come about?

ELIZABETH DAYS Last year, I reported on the mental crisis that sparked the pandemic. People everywhere have faced mortality and the deepest questions people have about life, death and suffering. National Desk Editor Jia Lynn Yang and I talk a lot about what it all means, and this story grew from one of those conversations to a collaboration with Audra and our image editor, Heather Casey. The subject of transformation is deeply spiritual and we wanted to hear from people who are now living differently and can share these stories with us.

How did you work with photography for this story?

DAYS It was a collaboration from the start. Art can give a voice to moments in our lives when words fail. The pictures and words together offer readers a journey to reflect on their own lives.

What did you look for in your appeal to readers?

AUDRA DS BURCH We tried to frame the questions in such a way that people are forced to think in obvious and not-so-obvious ways about what this year means to them. I think even the exercise of responding to the callout was a journey in its own right. Some people clearly struggled with who they had become in a year and when they came out of the “darkness” what they wanted for themselves. I can’t tell you how many people thanked us for investigating what caused the pandemic. Probably in the middle of reading the entries, I remember thinking, in a way, this really felt like a public service.

What did you find most interesting about the answers?

DAYS So many people found the reflection process enormously difficult or even impossible. It showed me how difficult it is to face, let alone change, feelings, and how little collective language there is to talk about these deep issues. Realizing that helped me think about how this story could help readers in this process.

BURCH I think I was most surprised by the bookends, the people willing to share their deepest thoughts and experiences on one end of the spectrum, and the people who – even though they were attending – were clearly in some sort of private hold pattern and unwilling or unable to come to terms with the emotional or spiritual toll of the pandemic.

Were there certain topics that you kept hearing?

DAYS So many people struggled with their homeland and wanted to get back to the core of who they are and where they come from. Time and again, people reassessed their most important relationships, where they want to live and how they want to be in the world.

What changes do you think we will see as a result of this time?

DAYS The most honest answer is I don’t know. I hope we can remember the common humanity revealed this year and help each other on this journey. But it is also true that the clarity that comes with intense suffering often tarnishes over time – it is one reason we made this story to name the transformation that is visible at this moment.

BURCH I think the big challenge is how long we can hold on to the clarity that such an event brought and how long the truths we discovered this year will shape our lives.

Was there anything that you thought of a lot while working on this story?

BURCH I thought of death. Much. One of the people I interviewed for the story was Joelle Wright-Terry. She is a Covid survivor. Her husband died of Covid last April. Your story stayed with me. I have thought many times about how it must feel when your family is knocked down by this virus and the ongoing trauma of loss.

DAYS I have thought many times about narratives of the apocalypse and awakening in spiritual literature and how closely they are intertwined with suffering. There were so many times that beings had to die to be reborn, like the phoenix, the old bird that went up in flames and then rose from the ashes.

How have you changed personally during this time?

DAYS One of the most amazing things about all of these interviews was hearing echoes of my feelings in the stories of so many other people with so many different life experiences, from anger to loneliness to newfound strength. It helped me feel less alone and took courage.

BURCH The process of working on this story had its own convenience. I also saw myself in so many of the stories told, from fear to helplessness to feeling not tied down as we trudged through the pandemic month after month.

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Health

It is OK Our Our bodies Have Modified Throughout the Pandemic

It's OK Our Bodies Have Changed During the Pandemic

If your own mind is spitting out negative thoughts on its own, try practicing “thought-stopping,” a technique often used in cognitive behavioral therapy, said Dr. Cox. When a negative thought about your body penetrates your brain, say “stop”. Then, mindfully replace that thought with a positive one. For example: when you stand in front of the mirror and focus on your belly fat, stop this thought and remind yourself that your body carried a baby, ran marathons, or you can haul mulch around your yard.

Diet culture is everywhere. For example the terms “Quarantine 15” or “Covid 19”. These weight gain conditions fueled the idea on social media and pop culture websites that an aspect worthy of your emotional energy stayed thin enough to fit your jeans in the face of mass sickness, unemployment, and other pandemic issues.

Even if no one has ever found a flaw in your body, you most likely have internalized ideas about what bodies should look like. Probably these ideas are separate from our actual health. These ideas are tied to capitalism’s relentless need to sell diet products, said Connie Sobczak, co-founder and executive director of Body Positive, a nonprofit that leads body positivity training. Creating a hierarchy of good, better, and best bodies creates market opportunities for selling what we need to sustain those bodies.

Take a close look at your media and social media consumption. Consider unfollowing or muting friends, influencers, and celebrities who advocate thinness. One more step? Examples of fat phobia in TV shows, movies, and more – if only for yourself. When you start deliberately jotting down diet culture whenever you watch it, you’ll be amazed at how it has permeated our daily discourse.

People who live in larger bodies often don’t feel welcome in certain rooms – like the gym, said Dr. Cox. But practicing body acceptance can change that.

“Research shows that shame doesn’t work,” said Dr. Cox. “Shame does not actually lead to changes in behavior, but acceptance encourages behavior changes and encourages us to be active in spaces where we are traditionally not welcome.” She referred to a 2011 study in the journal Qualitative Health Research. Participants were invited to join the Fatosphere, an online community where the word “fat” was neutral and treated like any other descriptor: that is, having brown hair or being short or tall. Negative discussions about weight were not allowed and participants were encouraged to share their experiences in a safe, body-positive room. After a year of participating in the Fatosphere, participants reported positive changes in their general wellbeing. They also felt safer entering rooms that they would traditionally have avoided. When people begin to see their bodies as the wonder they are, not the things they are not, “people actually find the freedom to do things that society tells them they don’t can, “said Dr. Cox.

Taking that first step into a seemingly hostile room can be daunting – especially after a year at home. Dr. Cox recommends starting with positive statements.

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Drug Overdose Deaths Have Surged Through the Pandemic, C.D.C. Says

Drug Overdose Deaths Have Surged During the Pandemic, C.D.C. Says

On Tuesday, several dozen organizations dealing with addiction and other health issues asked Mr. Biden’s Health and Welfare Minister, Xavier Becerra, “to act urgently” to remove the rule that doctors go through a day of training before they get federal permission to prescribe Buprenorphine. Many addiction experts are also calling for the abolition of rules that were already relaxed during the pandemic so that patients do not have to come to clinics or doctor’s offices to receive addiction drugs.

Although many programs offering treatments, naloxone, and other services to drug users resumed, at least in part, as the pandemic dragged on, many others remain closed or severely constrained, especially if they were initially on a tight budget.

Sara Glick, an assistant professor of medicine at the University of Washington, said a survey of about 30 syringe exchange programs she conducted last spring found many were temporarily closed at the start of the pandemic. After reopening, many programs would have limited the services or the number of people they could help.

“With health departments spending so much on Covid, some programs really had to cut their budgets,” she said. “That can mean seeing fewer participants or stopping their HIV and hepatitis C tests.”

At the same time, increases in HIV cases were reported in several regions of the country with high drug use, including two cities in West Virginia, Charleston and Huntington, and Boston. West Virginia lawmakers passed law last week introducing new restrictions on syringe exchange programs that proponents of the programs say would force many to complete.

Mr. Biden’s American Rescue Plan Act provides $ 1.5 billion to prevent and treat substance use disorders and $ 30 million to fund local services that benefit addicts, including syringe exchange programs. The latter is important insofar as federal funds can still largely not be spent on syringes for drug users, but the restriction does not apply to money from the stimulus package, according to the Office for Drug Control Policy. Last week, the government announced that federal funds could now be used to purchase fentanyl rapid test strips, which can be used to check whether drugs have been mixed or cut with fentanyl.

Fentanyl or its analogs have been increasingly detected in counterfeit pills illegally sold as prescription opioids or benzodiazepines – sedatives like Xanax used as anti-anxiety drugs – and meth in particular.

The northeastern states, which have been hardest hit by opioid deaths in recent years, had some of the lowest deaths in the first half of the pandemic year, with the exception of Maine. The states hardest hit included West Virginia and Kentucky, which have long led the way in overdose deaths, as well as western states like California and Arizona, and southern states like Louisiana, South Carolina and Tennessee.

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Might the Pandemic Immediate an ‘Epidemic of Loss’ of Ladies within the Sciences?

Could the Pandemic Prompt an ‘Epidemic of Loss’ of Women in the Sciences?

Like many women during the pandemic, Alisa Stephens found working from home to be a series of tired challenges.

Dr. Stephens is a biostatistician at the University of Pennsylvania, and the technical and detail-oriented nature of her work requires long, uninterrupted deliberation. Finding the time and mental space to do this work at home with two young children proved impossible.

“That first month was really tough,” she recalled of the lockdown. Her young daughter’s daycare was closed and her 5-year-old was at home instead of school. Since her nanny could not come into the house, Dr. Stephens looked after her kids all day and worked late into the evening. Schools did not reopen in the fall, when her daughter was about to start kindergarten.

Things relaxed when the family was sure to bring in a nanny, but there was little time for the deep thought that Dr. Stephens had left every morning for work. Over time, she has adjusted her expectations of herself.

“Maybe I’m 80 percent versus 100 percent, but I can get things done at 80 percent to some degree,” she said. “It’s not great, it’s not my best, but it’s enough for now.”

Dr. Stephens is in good company. Several studies have found that women published fewer articles, conducted fewer clinical trials, and received less recognition for their expertise during the pandemic.

Add to this the emotional upheaval and stress of the pandemic, protests against structural racism, concerns about children’s mental health and education, and lack of time to think or work, and an already unsustainable situation becomes unbearable.

“The confluence of all these factors creates this perfect storm. People are at their breaking point, ”said Michelle Cardel, an obesity researcher at the University of Florida. “My great fear is that we will have a secondary epidemic of losses, especially from women in early STEM careers.”

Women scientists had problems even before the pandemic. It wasn’t uncommon for her to hear that women weren’t as smart as men, or that a woman who was successful must have received a handout along the way, said Daniela Witten, biostatistician at the University of Washington in Seattle. Some things are changing, she said, but only with great effort and at an Ice Age pace.

The career ladder is particularly steep for mothers. Even while on maternity leave, they are expected to keep up with laboratory work, teaching requirements, publications, and mentoring PhD students. When they return to work, most of them do not have affordable childcare.

Women in science often have little recourse when faced with discrimination. Your institutions sometimes lack the staffing structures that are common in the business world.

The road is even more difficult for color scientists like Dr. Stephens, who encountered other prejudices in the workplace – from everyday reactions, professional reviews or promotions – and now dealing with the disproportionate impact of the pandemic on black and Latin American communities.

Dr. Stephens said a close friend, also a black scientist, has five family members who have contracted Covid-19.

Updated

April 13, 2021, 6:10 p.m. ET

The year was a “break” for everyone, added Dr. Stephens added, and universities should find a way to help scientists when the pandemic ends – perhaps by adding an extra year to the time they have to earn a tenure.

Others said while additional tenure may help, it will now be far from enough.

“It’s like you’re drowning and the university is telling you, ‘Don’t worry if you need an extra year to get back on land,” said Dr. Witten. “It’s like,’ Hey, that is not helpful. I need a flotation device. ‘”

The frustration is compounded by outdated ideas about how to help women in science. But social media has allowed women to share some of those concerns and find allies to organize and exclaim injustices when they see this, said Jessica Hamerman, an immunologist at the Benaroya Research Institute in Seattle. “It’s just a lot less likely that people will sit still and hear biased statements that concern them.”

In November, for example, the influential journal Nature Communications published a controversial study on women scientists, suggesting that female mentors would hinder the careers of young scientists and recommending that young women seek men to help them instead.

The reaction was intense and unforgiving.

Hundreds of scientists, men and women, abandoned the paper’s flawed methods and conclusions, saying they had reinforced outdated stereotypes and failed to account for structural biases in science.

“The advice from the newspaper was essentially similar to the advice your grandmother gave you 50 years ago: get a man to look after you and you’ll be fine,” said Dr. Cardel.

Nearly 7,600 scientists signed a petition asking the journal to withdraw the paper – which it did on December 21st.

Class disturbed

Updated March 29, 2021

The latest on how the pandemic is changing education.

The study came at a time when many women scientists were already concerned about the impact of the pandemic on their careers and were already nervous and angry about a system that offered them little support.

“It was an incredibly difficult time being a woman in science,” said Leslie Vosshall, a neuroscientist at Rockefeller University in New York. “We’re already down, we’re already on our knees – and then the newspaper comes and kicks us to say, ‘We have the solution, let’s take the PhD students to an older man.'”

Some people on Twitter suggested that the Nature Communications paper had been withdrawn because a “feminist mob” requested it, but in fact the paper was “a dumpster fire of data,” said Dr. Vosshall.

According to several statisticians, the study was based on incorrect assumptions and statistical analyzes. (The authors of the paper declined to comment.)

Dr. Vosshall said she felt compelled to push back because the paper was “dangerous”. Department heads and deans of medical faculties have used the research to direct doctoral students to male mentors and to roll back all advances in equality of science. She said, “The older I get, the more windows I have for this job that really works.”

She used some of her wisdom to bring about change at Rockefeller University, one of the oldest research institutions in the country.

A few years ago Rockefeller University invited news anchor Rachel Maddow to present a prestigious award. On the way into the auditorium, Ms. Maddow pointed to a wall adorned with pictures of Lasker Prize and Nobel Prize winners – all men – who were affiliated with the university. At least four women at the university had also won prestigious awards, but their photos were not on display.

“What’s up with the guy wall?” Mrs. Maddow asked. And Dr. Vosshall, who had walked past the wall a thousand times, suddenly saw it differently. She realized that it was sending the wrong message to all the high school students, undergraduates, and graduate students who routinely walked by it.

“As soon as you notice a guy wall, you see them everywhere,” she said. “They are in every auditorium, in every corridor, in every departmental office, in every conference room.”

Rockefeller University eventually agreed to replace the display with a display more representative of the institution’s history. The pictures were taken on November 11th, announced Dr. Vosshall on Twitter and will be replaced with a more comprehensive set.

The departments at Yale University and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston have also rethought their buddy walls, said Dr. Vosshall. “There are some traditions that shouldn’t be perpetuated.”

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Business

Cinerama Dome in Hollywood Will not Reopen After Pandemic

Movie theater chain in Los Angeles, forced to close by the pandemic, will not reopen.

ArcLight Cinemas, a popular chain of Los Angeles-based cinemas, including the Cinerama Dome in Hollywood, will permanently close all locations, Pacific Theaters said on Monday after the pandemic decimated cinema business.

ArcLight’s locations in and around Hollywood have been home to many movie premieres and are popular spots for moviegoers looking for blockbusters and prestige titles. They are operated by Pacific Theaters, which also operate a handful of theaters under the Pacific name, and are owned by Decurion.

“After closing our doors more than a year ago, today we have to share the difficult and sad news that Pacific will not reopen its ArcLight cinemas and Pacific Theaters locations,” the company said in a statement.

“This was not the result anyone wanted,” he added, “but despite a tremendous amount of effort that has exhausted all potential options, the company has no viable path forward.”

Between the Pacific and ArcLight brands, the company owned 16 theaters and more than 300 screens.

The cinema business was particularly hard hit by the pandemic. But in the past few weeks, most of the country’s biggest theater chains, including AMC and Regal Cinemas, have reopened in anticipation of the list of Hollywood films to be reopened, many after repeated delays due to pandemic restrictions. There is even an air of optimism in the air as a result of the Warner Bros. film “Godzilla vs. Kong,” which has generated revenues of around $ 70 million since it opened over the Easter weekend.

Still, the industry’s trade organization, the National Association of Theater Owners, has long warned that the criminal closings would most likely affect smaller regional players like ArcLight and Pacific. In March, the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema chain, which operates around 40 locations nationwide, announced that it had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, but that most locations would remain operational during the restructuring.

This does not appear to be the case with Pacific Theaters, which two knowledgeable people said they laid off all their staff on Monday.

The response to the ArcLight Hollywood closure has been emotional, including a pour out on Twitter.

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Business

Movie show chain in Los Angeles, pressured to shut by the pandemic, is not going to reopen.

Movie theater chain in Los Angeles, forced to close by the pandemic, will not reopen.

ArcLight Cinemas, a popular chain of Los Angeles-based cinemas, including the historic Cinerama Dome in Hollywood, will permanently close all locations, Pacific Theaters announced on Monday after the pandemic decimated cinema business.

ArcLight’s locations in and around Hollywood have been home to many movie premieres and are popular spots for moviegoers looking for blockbusters and prestige titles. They are operated by Pacific Theaters, which also operate a handful of theaters under the Pacific name, and are owned by Decurion.

“After closing our doors more than a year ago, today we have to share the difficult and sad news that Pacific will not reopen its ArcLight cinemas and Pacific Theaters locations,” the company said in a statement.

“This was not the result anyone wanted,” he added, “but despite a tremendous amount of effort that has exhausted all potential options, the company has no viable path forward.”

Between the Pacific and ArcLight brands, the company owned 16 theaters and more than 300 screens.

The cinema business was particularly hard hit by the pandemic. But in the past few weeks, most of the country’s biggest theater chains, including AMC and Regal Cinemas, have reopened in anticipation of the list of Hollywood films to be reopened, many after repeated delays due to pandemic restrictions. There is even a hint of optimism in the air after the Warner Bros. movie “Godzilla vs. Kong” has raked in revenues of around $ 70 million since it opened over the Easter weekend.

Still, the industry’s trade organization, the National Association of Theater Owners, has long warned that the criminal closings would most likely affect smaller regional players like ArcLight and Pacific. In March, the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema chain, which operates around 40 locations nationwide, announced that it had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, but that most locations would remain operational during the restructuring.

This does not appear to be the case with Pacific Theaters, which two knowledgeable people said they laid off all their staff on Monday.

The response to the ArcLight Hollywood closure has been emotional, including a pour out on Twitter.

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Health

Nationwide Poetry Month: Coping With the Covid-19 Pandemic

National Poetry Month: Coping With the Covid-19 Pandemic

Amanda Gorman’s inspired and inspirational poem, which the show stole from President Biden’s inauguration in January, has shown millions of Americans the emotional and social power of poetry and, hopefully, got them to use it themselves.

Diana Raab, psychologist, poet and writer in Santa Barbara wrote on her blog: “Poetry can help us feel part of a bigger picture and not just live in our isolated little world. Writing and reading poetry can be a stepping stone to growth, healing, and transformation. Poets help us see a piece of the world in a way that we may not have had in the past. “

Dr. Rafael Campo, poet and doctor at Harvard Medical School, believes that poetry can also help doctors become better carers, nurture empathy with their patients, and bear testimony of our shared humanity, which he believes are essential to healing. In a TEDxCambridge lecture in June 2019, he said: “When we hear rhythmic language and recite poetry, our body translates rough sensory data into nuanced knowledge – feeling becomes meaning.”

According to Dr. Robert S. Carroll, a psychiatrist from the University of California at Los Angeles, Medical Center, poetry can empower people to talk about taboo subjects like death and dying and enable healing, growth, and transformation.

Regarding the pandemic, Dr. Rosenthal: “This crisis affects more or less everyone, and poetry can help us deal with difficult feelings such as loss, sadness, anger and hopelessness. While not everyone has the gift of writing poetry, we can all benefit from the thoughts that so many poets have expressed beautifully. “

Indeed, the first section of the book contains Elizabeth Bishop’s poem “One Art” about losses that can comfort those who suffer. She wrote::

Even to lose you (the joking voice, a gesture

I love) I won’t have lied. It is obvious

The art of losing isn’t too difficult to master

though it can look like (write it!) like a disaster.

“When people are devastated by casualties, they should be allowed to feel and express their pain,” said Dr. Rosenthal in an interview. “They should be offered support and compassion, and not asked to move on. You cannot force it to close. If people want a shutdown, they will do it in their own time. “

The closure wasn’t a state that Edna St. Vincent Millay, who wrote this, cherished

“Time brings no relief; you all lied

Who told me that time would free me from my pain? “

Dr. However, Rosenthal pointed out that time brings relief to most people, despite what his friend Kay Redfield Jamison wrote in her memoir, An Unquiet Mind. For her, the relief “took up her own and not particularly sweet time”.

I now know that thanks to Dr. Rosenthal can be a literary panacea for the pandemic. They let us know that we are not alone, that others have survived devastating loss and desolation before us, and that we can be lifted up by the images and cadence of the written and spoken word.