This is The New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker.

Welcome to The New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick. For a few brief moments this summer,

you could imagine life after COVID. In places where the vaccination rate was especially high and cases

were falling, some of us were even getting back to some version of the old life, seeing friends

indoors and out, eating in restaurants, and a great deal more. We didn't forget COVID, far from it,

but the fear was lifting. It felt amazing. Then in recent weeks,

the story changed. At the New Yorker, we're lucky to have on our staff, Atul Gawande.

Atul is not only a staff writer, he's a professor of medicine and an expert on public health.

Atul co-founded a company that does COVID testing and vaccination, and he advised President Biden's

transition team on how to deal with the pandemic.

Atul, I don't want to accuse you of anything, but what the hell?

I mean, we thought we were just about out of the woods, at least if you were vaccinated,

and now we're hearing about breakthrough cases,

and we're hearing about the Delta variant really changing the picture in the United States,

the way it had in Britain and elsewhere. Yes. You know, it's interesting that people are

almost angry about the reality of where we are. We've been discussing this

for a while, right? We talked when the vaccines first came out about we're going to have to wait

and see what we know about transmission. We are very concerned about variants. And there's lots of

ways in which, you know, you had poo-pooing of the public health

folks who would say, we see variants, and they are coming, and they're of great concern.

And now they're here. So here's where we are. We have a new surge, and it's Delta, And right now, it's almost all of the infections in the country are essentially Delta.

It is surging to the point that in the southeast, you have, for example, in Florida, the number of cases and hospitalizations now exceed the peak of their prior outbreaks.

...