Illustration of a man lying on a couch

Workplace Burnout is Nothing New

Doctors were talking about the dangers of chronic stress, exhaustion, and anxiety back in 1909, predicting dire consequences if the symptoms were ignored.
A physician wearing a seventeenth century plague preventive costume

How the Plague Reshaped the World

The bacterium that causes the plague emerged relatively recently, as bacterium go. And yet the pandemics it's created have altered the world.
A woman with a protective mask in a plane

Do Airplanes Really Make You Sick?

A Curious Reader asks: Am I really at a higher risk of getting sick on an airplane?
A doctor talking to a female patient

Blaming Women for Infertility in the 1940s

In the early days of fertility treatments, some doctors theorized that women’s unconscious hatred of their husbands kept them from conceiving.
A drone delivering a package

The Drone Will See You Now

As drones become normalized, companies like Zipline are using them to deliver life-saving medicines to faraway places.
A man breathing in nitrous oxide (laughing gas) and a man exhibiting its exhilarating effects.

How Medical Researchers Used to Party

There’s always been some fuzziness in our distinctions between medicine and recreational drugs. Just look at nitrous oxide.
An opium den in London's East End

How Opium Use Became a Moral Issue

In the 19th century, England's working classes frequently used opium. But there weren't laws against the drug until the middle classes started using it.
An empty bottle for opium tincture

When Doctors Took Opiates To Gain Credibility

Long before today's opioid epidemic, doctors shared stories of their own experiments with the drugs they prescribed their patients.
Two heart-shaped balloons against a pink background

Rethinking Love and Autism

Scholars question the common conception that people with Autism Spectrum Disorder don't experience love like neurotypical people do.
Group photo in front of Clark University: Front row: Sigmund Freud, G. Stanley Hall, C. G. Jung; Back row: Abraham A. Brill, Ernest Jones, Sándor Ferenczi.

When Psychoanalysts Believed in Magic

Sigmund Freud told Carl Jung it was important to keep sexuality at the center of the human psyche, rather than anything spiritualist.