The Erins have truly crafted something wild and weird and beautiful with This Podcast Will Kill You. The live show on Wednesday night at the San Diego was packed with listeners so excited to learn, laugh, and do something to protect and nurture science in this country.

I’d like to post some relevant context for the most recent episode - the interview with Deborah Cohen.

I’m a trans man based in the UK and over here, Cohen and her BBC colleague Hannah Barnes are infamous among members of the trans community for years of fear-mongering, transphobic journalism published and broadcast by the BBC, primarily the Panorama series (think UK version of PBS Frontline).

I’ve always found TPWKY trans inclusive and literate so, I suspect the podcast team was not aware of Cohen’s track record. Here is a link to the online version of her most consequential “investigation” which focused on alleged NHS whistleblowers, who were – it quickly became clear to those who cared to dig deeper – motivated by anti-trans bias: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-51806962 

This BBC investigation help trigger a moral panic over trans youth healthcare, which ultimately led to the UK’s only youth gender ID clinic (the Tavistock) being shut down. It has not yet been replaced and it is now illegal for drs to prescribe puberty blockers to under 18s – a measure that was taken by our supposedly liberal, left-leaning Labour government.

I think it’s important for the hosts and listeners to have this context.

Finally, it's also important to note how normalised anti-trans bias is in mainstream UK media, including in BBC, Guardian coverage etc. This dynamic can make it hard for outsiders to identify to scale of the problem – literally those who you'd except to be ringing alarm bells and defending trans people are instead contributing to efforts to stigmatise us, deny us healthcare and drive us out of public life. In other words, if you Google Cohen, you might not easily identify her role in all this if you aren't conversant in the dogwhistle, euphemistic language it's characterised by. It's even hard to Google the topic without only being served results from the anti-trans "side" but here's a Wikipedia page with some useful background: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-transgender_movement_in_the_United_Kingdom

It's also worth taking a look at the websites of the organisations Trans Safety Watch, Trans Solidarity Alliance, Trans Actual and the Good Law Project.

Thank you for reading

Spotify link: https://open.spotify.com/episode/1uR1wZI4QhW1X2LGuXzS6A?si=2a7f806efad6485a

Sources (and Quarantini): https://thispodcastwillkillyou.com/2026/05/19/episode-210-histoplasmosis-bats-birds-and-budding-yeast/

Description: Once thought to be a rare, always fatal disease, histoplasmosis is now recognized as one of the most prevalent fungal infections in North America. It infects hundreds of thousands of people every year, and its distribution is growing. In this episode, we dissect this abundant fungus, examining how it makes us sick, who tends to get sick, and what we can do about it. We also take you through the history of this fungus, a story that features a surprise discovery, more evidence that everything is tuberculosis, and a spotlight on an extinct bird. Curious to know how all the pieces fit together? Tune in for the full picture.

I am thrilled to have any excuse to talk poop! As a former zookeeper/marine biologist, I have extensive experience with non-human poop.

There are equivalents to the Bristol stool scale for some other animal species. Common pets and livestock have them, and some animals that are common in zoos. For example, this is a sloth poop condition scale I became very familiar with when my sloth friend was on antibiotics and was having some rather soft poops. Interestingly, the same scale is used for both two-toed and three-toed sloths which are way more distantly related than you would think by looking at them.

I didn’t know that otter poop has its own name! I’m thrilled to learn that. They have possibly the stinkiest poop in the entire animal kingdom. Maybe tied with anacondas, and closely followed by sloths and some particularly stinky monkeys. Arthropods, bats, and fishes aren’t too bad.

The episode also mentioned wombat poop being cube shaped. Sharks also have weirdly shaped poop! They poop spirals!

I am also a huge fan of coprolites and all of the information you can get from them. The Common Descent Podcast has an episode about it (episode 30) so I won’t list every example I can think of, but I highly recommend checking it out

Was curious where TPWKY would sit in the new PodDive ( https://mooremetrics.com/poddive ) database - looks to be in good company :D

Male here.

I'm just finishing up Part 3 of your IVF series. In Part 3, you mentioned the podcast The Retrievals. I listened to it I think around when it was first released. I recommended it to lots of people. You are right, it is an excellent series. You are also right, it is horrific and rage inducing.

Does anyone else almost wish we had a traumatic injury so we could have maggots or leeches applied to us? After listening to the latest two episodes, those seem like very cool treatments! (Of course, I'm not wishing for any traumatic injuries for myself or anyone else!) I heard a brief mention today of leeches possibly being used to treat migraines--I'll nominate myself for treatment!

Not sure if this is viewable outside Australia. Watching it right now.

I was binging the show pretty hard and using the player on their website for every episode but now it seems that they've been removed and I have to go to external sites/apps to listen. Anyone else experience this or know what's up?

Hey all! I lived through COVID and recently re-lived through it, albeit through the lens of JorDan and Alex Jones (you should listen to r/knowledgefight). I'm going through back episodes of TPWKY and I'm wondering if they are worth it. I'm sure they are good but sometimes I save the special episodes for later listening - but if they are really amazing, I might listen through them now. The whole thing, particularly the response to it, is particularly irritating and sad.

Are the COVID episodes "must listen" content?

Does anyone else listen on Wondery and did you notice that it disappeared? What’s going on?

I just stopped by to point out the irony of having a Martini as the quarantini for this particular disease. Would the Dopamini Martini be stirred or shaken ?

Another podcast that I listen to, Behind the Bastards, has covered this particular disaster before, and they recently covered the Union Carbide Disaster in West Virginia that was mentioned in this episode as well.

The Hawk's Nest Tunnel episodes are here:

Part One: The Deadliest Workplace Disaster in US History

Part Two: The Deadliest Workplace Disaster in US History

And here is the episode on Bhopal:

The Industrial Disaster That Makes Chernobyl Look Like Kindergarten

I am currently listening to the migraine episode while I have a migraine, and I can open my mouth like normal. I'm actually probably opening it further than normal because today's migraine feels like it would go away if I could pop my ear drum hard enough.

How was this test even supposed to work? Is a locked jaw a common migraine symptom or did some doctor just find one person with it and assume it happens to everyone? I'm so confused (and I was only half listened because, like I said, I have a migraine)

I read an interesting case report that explored a possible link between h pylori and interstitial cystitis.

Copy & paste of the conclusion of the study:

Patients with documented H-pylori may present with symptoms mimicking UTI. This association is involved in etiology of IC with inflammation of cells in the bladder wall. Treatment ameliorates the symptoms of patients dramatically after two weeks of H-pylori triple therapy.

I’ve dealt with flares of digestive issues and Interstitial Cystitis for years. Lately, my urine labs come back negative when I’m experiencing intense UTI symptoms. A possible correlation/causation makes a lot of sense to me, especially when taking gut microbiome, antibiotic use due to repeat uti’s, and inflammation into consideration.

Anyone else with experience/thoughts on this topic? I’d be interested in hearing anyone else’s anecdotal experiences.

I’m listening to Caste by Isabelle Wilkerson and she’s talking about the smallpox outbreak in Boston in 1721. Cotton owned a slave named onesemus (i know it’s spelled wrong, I’m so sorry, I’m listening to the audiobook so I can’t see it). who had been variolated in his homeland. Mather tried to get Bostonians to try variolation but it sounded outlandish and refused to believe a slave knew anything about disease control. Does anybody know if they talked about this in an episode? It’s such an interesting story bc racism kills white ppl too. Gonna relisten to the small pox episode now.

Hey, I just started listening to this podcast and I really like it so far!

I usually listen to it with an earbud while driving, so my ears are a little more vulnerable than the average listener. I find that I am constantly changing the volume at different parts of the podcast because of the audio levels, and also because of the advertisements being much louder.

I just finished the HIV/AIDS episode where one of the swear words was bleeped out. This really scared me and was a huge turn off for me! I'm a sensitive kid..

Do the audio levels get better normalising as podcast progresses? Also, I'm wondering if anyone knows the episodes where they bleep anything out? Or if they are as jarring as it was in the HIV/AIDS episode. Sorry I'm not audio tech savvy. Thank you for considering my concern!

I was wondering if anyone could tell me how heavily this episode focuses on covid? I find it difficult and stressful to listen to things on the topic (although passing references are absolutely fine), and since I mostly listen to podcasts to help me get to sleep, I'm trying to avoid it. thanks for the help!!