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Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. Are you confused enough yet about whether masks are required or not required now on public transportation? Are you relieved or concerned enough yet by the fact that they are coming or going or staying on whatever form of mass transit you use? The Times says a story today about the mix of celebration and concern that includes an anecdote of an airline pilot in mid-flight announcing that a court had struck down the federal mandate and so people were now free to mask or unmask in their seats as they chose, and a cheer went up in the cabin, but also the level of fear went up in the cabin among some of the passengers who did not find that sudden change of protection level in the middle of their flight to be a cause to party.

Listeners, in this segment, we will try to go down the list of where the mandate still applies and where it does not. It might even be different at different stations on the same train line, believe it or not. We'll check in with some of the science, some of the law around the court ruling, and take your questions now, as well as your answers to this question. Listeners, does lifting the mandate make you more likely or less likely to take public transportation or does it not affect your personal decisions about that in cases where you have a choice? Obviously, in many cases, people have little choice, but in cases where you have a choice, will this affect how likely you are to take a trip? 212-433-WNYC, 433-9692.

Do you still want to take that plane trip you were contemplating for this summer? 212-433-9692. Do you still want to ride in that Uber or Lyft car now that the driver no longer is required to wear a mask or anything else you want to say or ask about this, 212-433-WNYC. We'd also love to hear from people who work in transportation because, obviously, this affects you too. In fact, it probably affects nobody more than you. Many of these masks rules, vaccine mandates are really worker protection programs. Is anyone listening right now who works in the airline industry? Are you happy about this, concerned about this? Do you think it'll cause more of your colleagues to come back to work?

Remember, everybody, there's been a staffing shortage causing flight cancelations in recent months, or will it cause more industry workers to stay away? 212-433-WNYC. Is this really good for the airlines' business models? Apparently, they lobbied the government to remove the mask mandate so they must think it's a business plus, I guess, to remove that layer of COVID protection. Who from the industry wants to call in and give us your take? 212-433-9692. Of course, where all of these questions as our lines are filling up quickly, you can also tweet @BrianLehrer and we'll watch our Twitter go by.

If you drive for Uber or Lyft, are you lifting your mask? Is this the Uber best thing that the government could do or are you now more afraid of your passengers and their breath than you were two days ago? 212-433-9692. With us for this conversation, our WNYC and Gothamist health and science editor, Nsikan Akpan, and WNYC and Gothamist reporter, Gwynne Hogan, whose story out now is called Confusion, conflicting info for commuters after federal mask mandate ruling. Hi, Nsikan, hi, Gwynne.

Nsikan Akpan: Hey, good morning.

Gwynne Hogan: Hey, good morning, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: All right, Gwynne, let's start by just running down the checklist of some of these people carriers. New York City buses and subways, I think this is the easiest one, masks on or masks allowed to be off?

Gwynne Hogan: Masks on, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: On the buses and subways within the city, the MTA commuter lines, Long Island Rail Road and Metro-North, masks on or masks allowed to be off?

Gwynne Hogan: Also masks on.

Brian Lehrer: Also, those trains are in New York. What about NJ Transit buses and trains?

Gwynne Hogan: That is mask optional, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Mask optional. Here's a tricky one, I think. The PATH trains, which run in both states?

Gwynne Hogan: That is mask on, confusingly.

Brian Lehrer: Even in New Jersey?

Gwynne Hogan: Even in New Jersey, yes, yes. An interesting wrinkle there. They're required on the PATH train even in New Jersey.

Brian Lehrer: Same with Amtrak?

Gwynne Hogan: Amtrak is mask off even in New York.

Brian Lehrer: Wow. There is some of the confusion.

Gwynne Hogan: Yes, that's right.

Brian Lehrer: If you get on a train that's a Long Island Rail Road train at Penn Station, it's masks on. If you get on an Amtrak train at Penn Station, it's mask optional?

Gwynne Hogan: That's right and even if you're in some of the concourses, which are mostly overseen by Amtrak, you can have a mask off in the concourse, but then you could have to put the mask on when you get on the LIRR.

Brian Lehrer: Wow. How about if you're boarding NJ Transit at Penn Station?

Gwynne Hogan: Also, mask off, because, again, this concourse is overseen by Amtrak.

Brian Lehrer: You don't have to wait until you get across the river?

Gwynne Hogan: Right, correct.

Brian Lehrer: All right, Kennedy and LaGuardia airports, masks on or masks optional?

Gwynne Hogan: Mask on.

Brian Lehrer: What about Newark Airport?

Gwynne Hogan: Mask off, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: All right, now, Gwynne, I keep seeing the requirement is off for Uber and Lyft but is that true even for the ones operating within New York or the public-- Go ahead.

Gwynne Hogan: No. I had to rewrite this story 10 times yesterday. Basically, Uber and Lyft both lifted their mask requirement, but then several hours later, the Taxi & Limousine Commission which oversees for-hire vehicles within the five boroughs, says it is still in place for New York City riders. Again, you can imagine a scenario where you get on an Uber in New York and you drive across the river to New Jersey, and theoretically, you could take your mask off somewhere mid-ride.

Brian Lehrer: Nsikan, we'll get to you on the science in a minute.

Nsikan Akpan: Sure.

Brian Lehrer: Let's hear from a flight attendant calling from Palm Springs. McKenzie, am I saying your name right? You're on WNYC. Hello, from New York.

McKenzie: Yes, you are. Good morning.

Brian Lehrer: What can you tell us? Are you happy--

McKenzie: Can you hear me?

Brian Lehrer: Yes, can you hear me, McKenzie?

McKenzie: Yes, thank you. I have to say that this has really been horrible for my mental health the last few days. I am a flight attendant for a major US carrier, and I believe in the science behind masking and how much safer it makes us. I took a long furlough from my company during the pandemic because I have a high-risk partner at home to protect. My company made me feel like it was really safe to come back to work because everyone was masking and we were getting vaccinated, and up until halfway through the day on Monday, all of their marketing still included how safe it was to fly with a little asterisk about if you're wearing a mask.

Then suddenly they say no more masks and we're getting emails about how happy they are to see our smiles, and it feels like they're really encouraging us to not only have the option not to wear masks but we're being encouraged not to wear them. I hate to use this term because I think it gets used a little too much, but I do feel like I'm being gaslit by my company and by the government to an extent, but especially by my company right now.

Brian Lehrer: I could see it.

McKenzie: I don't feel as safe going to work anymore, yes.

Brian Lehrer: They're trying to--

McKenzie: I'm very passionate about it, obviously.

Brian Lehrer: If gaslighting is making something up to make somebody think they're going crazy, or if I can even overgeneralize to say it's making something up to put people in a certain mental frame of mind, whatever that is, even if it's fake reassurance, it might be gaslighting. They've been reassuring people, as you say, that it's safe to fly because filtration, masks, et cetera, and now they're saying, "Whoopee, the masks can come off." That's giving mixed mental health messages at very least.

What's your sense, McKenzie, if you have one of the question that I asked in the intro about whether this is good for business in the airline industry because probably a lot of people are like you. Some of the people who've been reluctant to come back to work and there's been a staff shortage will continue to be reluctant or be more reluctant to come back and maybe more passengers will be scared away than attracted by this, but I don't know.

McKenzie: My feeling, and I've only been back flying for the last six months, is that the majority of people will be pleased with this and a smaller minority of people will just continue to fly and wear their own masks. Personally, I have a friend group of non-flight attendants who is going to be a little bit more fearful of flying at this point without the mask mandate. From my experience with passengers, I do think that is going to be the minority. Most people seem pretty pleased to take their mask off or at least to not have to constantly remember to put it back on. I do think it will be better for business, but my heart really breaks for people with small children that can't be vaccinated who now especially feel like they can't travel with their kids.

Brian Lehrer: Yes. What about your colleagues? Do you think this will draw more people who are sitting it out back to work, because they didn't like the mask mandates and the enforcement or the mask mandates either or scare more people away?

Mackenzie: Honestly, I think it would be kind of a wash. I don't think that there's that many people that left specifically because of the mask mandates. I can't say how many folks I know that will actually stay home now, because we don't have an option to stay home. You'd have to find a new career. There's no more unemployment or leaves for us, and everybody who flies, we love this career. It's our passion. It's just really sad what's come.

To be clear, I'm very happy not to police people on masks anymore. It was very stressful. It was frightening because you never knew who was going to be aggressive. I'm really happy to not be the mask police, but I still think it's more important that we acknowledge we're in a pandemic, and wearing a mask is the simplest thing we can do for each other for a few hours on an airplane. It's just not that hard.

Brian Lehrer: Mackenzie, thank you so much for calling in from all the way across the country where it must be very early. Well, obviously, it's 10 after 7:00 there if it's 10 after 10:00 here, so thank you.

Mackenzie: We listen to you every morning when we're waking up here.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you very much and stay safe up there. Let me take one more flight attendant, who just called in who apparently was mid-flight when this was announced, is that right, Christopher, in Manhattan? Hi.

Christopher: Yes, that's right. I was on the plane as a passenger coming back from a duty day, then I was watching the DirectTV on the screen in front of me and I saw this mandate had been overturned by the federal judge. At first, I wanted to strip down. I wanted to take my mask off. I looked around to see what other people were doing, and certainly, I was not going to be the leader in this. I kept it on and no one seemed to take their masks off at that time. That was my situation the other day.

Today, I'm going off to work again, and I'll be taking the subway, so I'll be putting my mask on then when I get to Penn Station. Apparently, from what your guest there said, I will take the mask off as soon as I get into Penn Station on the train, New Jersey Transit to go out to Newark, and then I'll be able to keep it off. I will, however, I'll keep my mask on while flying during the high-density periods such as passengers boarding, during the service period when I'm in close contact when I'm helping with bags.

When it's downtime, and I'm in the galley, I'll certainly take that mask off, when I'm not around other passengers, around other folks just because some days I'm 15 or 16 hours with a mask on. It'll be a welcome relief to just be able to take that mask off for a few minutes here and there, but I certainly will be wearing it on the plane for the most part.

Brian Lehrer: Just take me one more step into that moment when the announcement was made, or when it came across the screen in mid-flight. What was the mix of concern and celebration that you saw on the part of the passengers? Or just wasn't it obvious because everybody was being quiet?

Christopher: I didn't know if people were watching movies or watching the actual news when it came on. I know for myself a million things came into my mind. Company policy for me is to keep the mask on, so I wasn't going to be a rebel at that moment and take the mask off and potentially get in trouble. I wasn't going to be taking that role as leadership, if you will, but I did notice the other passengers around--

[crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: You didn't know because there wasn't an [unintelligible 00:14:04]. What do you think then of that pilot in the New York Times story if you read it or if you heard me say it at the beginning, who actually made the announcement midflight reportedly? "Well, they just lifted the mask mandate, so you can take your mask off."

Christopher: I don't agree with that. I think that he probably should not have taken that into his own hands. It was a period that maybe he could have kept silent and maybe let the new policy or turning that down and maybe let that go on its own. I don't think that should have been the place of the pilot to make the announcement. I don't know if he went over that with the flight attendants because the flight attendants are then the ones who are on the front lines, so to speak, when he made that announcement. What of the passengers?

The passengers, as Sara Nelson, the flight attendant union had yesterday I believe it was, said those passengers bought an airplane ticket knowing or thinking that they were going to be protected with mask policy and suddenly mid-flight people around them are taking off their masks. That's a little disconcerting I'm sure for those passengers that are vulnerable to the effects of maybe getting exposed to it. I don't agree. I didn't agree with that.

Brian Lehrer: Christopher, thank you so much for your call, and be safe up there and out there. Here's the beginning of that article, folks, since I brought it up a couple of times, New York Times article today. "It began in midair. Shortly after a federal judge struck down mask requirements on planes, pilots got on intercoms to share the news, and some passengers tore off their masks with whoops and glee. Jonathan Russell Biehl, a pilot for Delta, was halfway from Tampa to Minneapolis on Monday night when the announcement came. “The day I’ve been waiting for,” he called it," and it went on from there and also documented passengers who were very discomforted by that.

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Brian Lehrer on WNYC. As we continue to push the changes and mask mandates on public transportation with our health and science editor Nsikan Akpan and our reporter Gwynne Hogan, who's got an article on Gothamist now and a radio version called Confusion, conflicting info for commuters after federal mask mandate ruling. Nsikan, first of all, thanks for your patience. It took us a long time to get you in the segment today.

Nsikan Akpan: Yes, no worries.

Brian Lehrer: Also, I think the city is assessing the BA.2 spread right now to see if we're about to raise the threat level from what they call Code Green to Code Yellow. It's interesting timing just as these mandates are coming off in some cases. Do you know anything about where that stands or the standards for making that change?

Nsikan Akpan: Yes. The CDC's community COVID levels, they go county by county, raking risk by the number of cases per 100,000, the number of hospitalizations, hospital bed capacity. Based off just cases alone, Manhattan went from low to medium risk a couple of weeks ago. Brooklyn is almost there. I would actually expect us to cross that threshold probably this week. I think Staten Island is also approaching that. If you average it city-wide, we are moving closer and closer to going from low to medium risk, essentially, everywhere.

Brian Lehrer: Are there very clear metrics for moving from Green to Yellow?

Nsikan Akpan: Yes, there are. It's based off of cases, the number of new hospitalizations, and the hospital bed capacity over the past week. Manhattan has been above that level for about two to three weeks now. Brooklyn is almost there. Staten Island is almost there, but to be honest, if we were going based off the old metrics of looking at community transmission or positivity, we would say pretty much every borough and our surrounding counties are medium to high risk, just in terms of the number of infections, the amount of Coronavirus that's actually out there, spreading around.

Brian Lehrer: How are the hospitals as far as you know?

Nsikan Akpan: They look pretty good right now, but hospitalizations are up. They're up about 40% from a month ago statewide and they're up 30% in New York City. We've gone from a low number to a higher low number, but we're definitely seeing a steady increase in hospitalizations.

Brian Lehrer: Of course, people may still choose to wear masks to protect themselves even in places where masks have now become optional. I want to ask you about the effectiveness of masking yourself when others around you are not, and let me set this up with a clip from the very controversial appearance here last week of Dr. Leana Wen Washington Post columnist, CNN medical contributor, George Washington University professor, and former health commissioner of Baltimore. The question was if the partiers at the Gridiron Club super spreader event this month, Nancy Pelosi, Eric Adams, Merrick Garland, others, were not required to mask or even test before the event, that's their choice to attend, but what about the workers at the Gridiron Club? Here's what she said.

Dr. Leana Wen: If you're working around the Gridiron Dinner or something else where there are a lot of people who are unmasked around you, you should still be wearing a mask if protecting from infection is important to you. That's different from smoking. People are smoking around so you can't really wear a mask to block out the smoke, but it actually is different in the case of COVID-19. I don't want to take away this idea of autonomy, people deciding for themselves how much protection they want.

Brian Lehrer: Nsikan, what's the science of how protective one-way masking is? Dr. Wen said extremely effective and assuming as she does, and as she recommends, that the mask is an N95 level mask.

Nsikan Akpan: Yes. The New York Times has this great article that they update from time to time, whenever masks are back in the news. It's called Does my mask protect me if nobody else is wearing one? From a lot of studies, we know that protecting the wear, it depends on the mask, it depends on the fit, but medical masks are probably going to protect the wearer from Coronavirus particles about 50% of the time so we're talking about 50% protection. If you have a loose-fitting N95, it's about 60% to 85%, so better. Then if you have a tightly sealed N95, it's 79% to 90% so that's great.

If you're wearing a mask, you're getting some protection from Coronavirus particles that are just floating in the air. If you listen to those percentages, masks aren't foolproof. If you're sitting really close to somebody who is positive, and they're just spewing virus, spewing the virus, there is a chance that some of that virus could squeeze around the sides of your mask and expose you. I think the way to think of that is what happens if two people are positive. Like say, you and I are positive and we're in a studio, and we're huffing and puffing, and we're filling the air with an equal share of Coronavirus. Well, we know that a tightly sealed N95 traps about 90% of particles.

If you and I were sitting in the studio and we don't have masks, 100% of it is full of particles. If you're not wearing a mask, and I am wearing that tightly fitting N95, only 10% of my particles are really getting through and so that drops the amount of particles in the studio down to 55%. From 100% to 55%. If you and I were both wearing tightly fitting N95 masks, you go from 100% of the air being full of particles down to 10% of the air being full of particles.

If we're wearing masks and we're stopping Coronavirus from entering the room when Gwynne or somebody else comes into the studio, do they want to be in a situation where it's 100% full of Coronavirus, or do they want to be in a situation where it's 10% full of Coronavirus? I think that's the way to think about the social responsibility around wearing masks.

I think also what's interesting about Dr. Wen's comments is a year ago, we were facing a similar decision around being fully vaccinated, but the Delta variant was rising, and on Democracy Now, she said that no one really has the right to infect another person with the virus. I think that's where a lot of the pushback is coming to some of her comments. A lot of people also agree with her comments that it has turned into a situation of individual responsibility.

Brian Lehrer: Yes. That, I guess, gets us to this other clip that I want to play, which is of Governor Murphy. This is, I guess, both scientific and political, legal too, I guess, because the bottom line policy question here is, even with the mask mandate gone for now from the federal government, the state and local governments, as we talked about with Gwynne at the beginning of the segment, have the choice to keep it on for their jurisdictions or not. That's why we have this patchwork. Here is Governor Murphy from I think this is from last night as Governor Murphy call in with our Nancy Solomon, explaining why he chose to lift the mandate for transit in New Jersey.

Murphy: The reason why we lifted the mandate was very simply the Feds decided not to challenge the ruling. That tells me that the Biden administration was within a very short amount of time of lifting this themselves. I believe based on all the tea leaves were reading, this was a matter of a couple of weeks. The answer at the end of the day, you don't want to have anything in place that you can't enforce. New York has kept this in place in the MTA. It's the reason why the PATH train has that right now because that's part of jurisdictional both New York and New Jersey, even they have admitted they're not going to be able to really enforce this. I think if you can't enforce something, it's a path you should not go down.

Brian Lehrer: Gwynne, the premise there that he removed it because the Biden administration wasn't appealing the ruling, as well as that it's not enforceable anyway, we'll get to the not enforceable part, but is that a political dodge from the Governor, from making his own decision about what's actually needed in New Jersey?

Gwynne Hogan: It does seem like a little bit of a dodge. The DOJ has said it might appeal this. It's waiting for the CDC to weigh in. I think that they're weighing a lot of political factors about what an appeal might mean versus what not appealing might mean. There is the risk that if it runs up to the Supreme Court, that it could overturn this and curb CDC's powers for the next pandemic. I think that they're weighing a lot of really complex legal questions here. You've seen in New York-- [crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: How much do we want to risk the standards for future pandemics by putting them in the hands of Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett like that, right?

Gwynne Hogan: Exactly. Exactly. If Murphy insinuates here, they were planning on lifting this within a matter of weeks anyway, maybe it's a question of saving that appeal for the next surge next winter. In terms of New York, has couched its continued implementation of the mask mandate on the New York Health Department's decision, which has not been deemed unconstitutional. It seems like Murphy could have taken a different stance here.

Brian Lehrer: Right. If we had a legal analyst on this panel, we would add probably something like I heard CNN's legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin say on that network the other night, which is that the anti-mask mandate folks after losing in court, in one state, I think California, shopped around for another judge, and they found this Trump appointee in Florida, who I think gave them more than their wildest dreams was the implication.

The judge didn't just lift it for Florida, or that southeast region of the country, the judge lifted the mandate nationwide. That's why we are where we are legally, but, of course, there are other steps up the chain that they could appeal too if they choose to. On this question of it being unenforceable anyway, Richard in the East Village is calling in. Richard, you're on WNYC. Hi, there.

Richard: Hi. [chuckles] It's great to talk to you. Very interesting segment and I really feel for the flight attendants. I was on a flight myself just, well, last week and earlier this week, and on one of the legs, the guy sitting in the aisle across from me, an aisle one row forward, had his mask on, but it was a good two or three inches away from his face so it was just an ill-fitting mask, and no one said anything to him. They might have a few months ago, but not anymore. It would have bothered me maybe also a few months ago, but I just had my N95 on and just you roll with it.

Another flight guy next to me in my aisle the two people had their masks off. One of them fell asleep with it off, and at the end of the flight, they were harassing this passenger who was a few rows ahead of me about he was non-compliant with putting the mask back on or something. To me, it was because he was African American, whereas the guy next to me wasn't. It's just a perception thing, but it's just this odd in-between of what's happening.

Brian Lehrer: Because it seemed like a lot of hygiene theater anyway, like people keeping it on but below their nose, things like that, then you're like, okay, you might as well lift it anyway because I'm already breathing their air.

Richard: Yes, I guess in a way, but like I say, I'm the type that I keep my mask on like the second flight attendant. If you're close to other people, it makes sense especially if you don't want to receive in your area or parents or you're going on a cruise and you don't want to test positive and not be able to go.

Brian Lehrer: Richard, thank you very much. That second flight attendant who called in before, said something that I've seen elsewhere in the last few days as well, although I personally didn't know it before, and maybe some of you already did, listeners, which is that the plane is the safest when the engine is turned on and the cabin doors are closed, the filtration system is operating, but it's the most risky in those transitional moments, like when you're boarding the plane but it's not turned on yet so I guess that makes sense, but people don't often think about those transitional moments as a separate thing. Devin in Kew Gardens, you're on WNYC. Hi, Devin.

Devin: Hi there. Can you hear me?

Brian Lehrer: I can hear you. Can you hear me?

Devin: Yes, thank you. Thanks for taking my call. I actually work in public health research. I am very pro-vaccine pro anything we have to do to get through the pandemic. I think where I get a little bit concerned is, thinking about wearing a mask for the rest of my days. I'm wondering at this point in the pandemic what did the public health officials feel is the end goal? I feel like we're in a bit of a species with increasing the vaccination rates so when I hear doctor Gwynne we talking about individual choice, I think what I'm hearing is more we're in a new stage of the pandemic, we need to think about this differently. I would be willing and very enthusiastic about continuing with all these measures, but I feel like I don't know where we're going with this, so-

Brian Lehrer: When [crosstalk] do they end.

Devin: -maybe your guests can address that.

Brian Lehrer: Devin, thank you. That's a good science question for you, Nsikan. If we're now in the endemic phase, as they call it and maybe people were anticipating, oh, good, let's get to the endemic phase because that means we're going to be out of the pandemic phase and the pandemic was horrible, but endemic means it's like always here, right?

Nsikan Akpan: Yes. I think the thing that has been missed when these mandates get rolled out, is the behavioral response. I really wish that a neuroscientist or a psychologist was in the room when these decisions get rolled out and when their messaging gets rolled out, because I think people can't do this forever. They can't go back to lockdowns, they don't want to wear masks so then I think it becomes a question of, okay, then how do we speak to them to A convey risk levels to them and B convey when they might need to wear a mask or when they might want to wear a mask in order to protect the most vulnerable people in our population, because there's just so much coronavirus spreading around, that the collective risk is just that much higher for people who are immunocompromised or people who are older.

I get it I absolutely get the conflict, the push and pull of wanting to put the mask away in a drawer forever [laughs] and just walk away. It's tricky. I think since we started pulling back on some of the policy around vaccines, around the policy of masks like in early March, New York city is seen 360 deaths. It's a lot of people who probably would rather still being around. The US is seen about 30,000 deaths.

We've seen millions of cases and some proportion of those cases they're going to get long COVID, and they're going to be dealing with this for a really long time. I think what we really need from leaders right now is just very clear, precise messaging on and off ramps, descriptions of why we need to do these things when we need to do them and targets so that way people will know that they don't go on forever and ever.

Brian Lehrer: The Biden folk said last night that they will appeal the ruling if the CDC decides that Omicron BA.2 [unintelligible 00:34:11] the CDC is assessing that right now. Do you know scientifically how they're assessing that and what standards they're using?

Nsikan Akpan: I think they're just using their COVID community levels. I think it's about does the risk to hospitals go up over that time? I think the strategy around the CDC taking their time to make the decision is they just recently renewed and extended the mask mandate. I think if they just have a whiplash reaction to this judge's decision, it would look like, "You're not actually following the numbers as the basis for why you think this mask mandate is necessary. It is all politics.

I can see why they're saying, "Actually we made a promise to wait and see what's going to happen with BA.2. Let's let that happen before we challenge this judge's ruling. I think too, like Gwynne said earlier, if they don't challenge this ruling, it really puts into question their authority over any pandemic policy going forward. Something tells me that they're probably not ready to give up that authority.

Brian Lehrer: All right, the legal questions continue to evolve, the political questions continue to evolve. The scientific questions continue to evolve. We thank WNYC Health and Science editor Nsikan Akpan, WNYC reporter Gwynne Hogan, their writings about these in other things are also at Gothamist. Thanks guys.

Gwynne Hogan: Thanks, Brian.

Nsikan Akpan: Thanks a lot.

 

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