Hospitals
News Desk
A Family Survives in Gaza, Barely
Mohamed Hwaihi and Ruba Al Kurd, both doctors, have had to balance their duty to patients and their desire to protect their children.
Q. & A.
A Pediatrician’s Two Weeks Inside a Hospital in Gaza
No space, no supplies, and harrowing life-and-death decisions.
Annals of a Warming Planet
What a Heat Wave Does to Your Body
The human body is a remarkably effective cooling machine—but it has a limit.
Annals of Medicine
Reinventing the E.R. for America’s Mental-Health Crisis
EmPATH units are advancing a radically new approach to psychiatric emergencies. It seems to be working.
This Week in Fiction
Olga Ravn on the Eerie Side of Childbirth
The author discusses “Maintenance, Hvidovre,” her story from the latest issue of the magazine.
Dispatch
In the Post-Roe Era, Letting Pregnant Patients Get Sicker—by Design
Fearing legal repercussions, doctors in Texas say they are risking grave patient harm to comply with new abortion restrictions.
Persons of Interest
Lars von Trier Behind the Curtain
The Danish director’s new installation of his sci-fi hospital soap opera “The Kingdom” arrives in conjunction with unfortunate medical news of his own.
Annals of Medicine
Waiting at a Texas Hospital for Children Who Never Arrive
We wanted to have never heard of them, but then we wanted them here.
Letter from Ecuador
A Pandemic Tragedy in Guayaquil
How Ecuador’s largest city endured one of the world’s most lethal outbreaks of COVID-19.
Medical Dispatch
When COVID Means Not Enough Beds in a Children’s Hospital Unit
The main problem is not pediatric coronavirus infections—it’s staff shortages.
Medical Dispatch
How a Milder COVID Variant Is Creating a Health-Care Crisis
Omicron may be less dangerous on an individual level, but hospitals are still overwhelmed, with dire ripple effects.
Archive
Sunday Reading: Hospitals and the New Surge
From the magazine’s archive: a selection of pieces about the crucial role that hospitals and health workers continue to occupy in our lives.
Medical Dispatch
In New Mexico, the Pandemic Rages On
As unvaccinated patients overwhelm hospitals, health-care workers are being pushed to the edge.
Books
Understanding the Body Electric
Strong current can kill us, but electrical impulses let us live—a power even the ancients may have attempted to exploit.
Medical Dispatch
The Complex Business of Vaccine Mandates
Tougher mandates may be necessary—but we shouldn’t ignore the harm that they can cause.
Medical Dispatch
When a Child Is Hospitalized with COVID
The Delta variant created a relative surge in coronavirus cases among kids. But the over-all risk to children remains low.
Personal History
Finding a Way Back from Suicide
A journey of recovery through electroconvulsive therapy.
Culture Desk
What Should Hang on the Walls of a Hospital?
Patient advocates agree on the palliative effects of art. But they differ on what that art should look like.
Q. & A.
Life in a Half-Vaccinated Country
A public-health expert discusses breakthrough infections, mask and vaccine mandates, and what the Delta variant means for Americans.
Best Medicine
The de Kooning in the Surgical Ward
The Amway magnate Bill Nicholson and his wife, Sandi, tour Lenox Hill Hospital, to which they’ve loaned a trove of works by women artists (plus audio narrations by Katy Perry and Carol Burnett) to pep up the anxious waiting-room crowd.