Mugs of hot cocoa, falling leaves, and—for those in northern climates—an approaching end to warm evenings outside with friends, 6 feet apart but still together. 

In the COVID-19 debates, one topic manages simultaneously to be the most and least controversial: “herd immunity.” The concept of herd immunity is uncontroversial, and simply states that when enough members of a population develop immunity to a virus, the bug will fizzle out for lack of people to infect. The controversy, though, echoes every child’s favorite road-trip question: Are we almost there yet?

Several readers have written to inform us about Richard Bartlett, a Texas doctor and onetime congressional candidate who says he has discovered a “silver bullet” for COVID-19. His proposed cure? Inhaled steroids.

This would be world-changing news, probably deserving a Nobel Prize, if true. It would save thousands of lives, end the economic and social upheaval caused by preventive measures, and save billions of dollars on hospital treatments.

As the ancient Spartans famously said: “If.”

An Alaskan reader challenged us to share 10 reasons to take the coronavirus pandemic seriously—to believe that it is “not a hoax,” as she put it. Her state’s experience with the coronavirus has encouraged its residents to see it as a faraway problem: The entire state has suffered only 17 deaths so far, whereas a single nursing home in my area saw a higher death toll. 

In the race to defeat the coronavirus, the finish line is the mass production of a safe, effective vaccine.

Just as Jonas Salk’s vaccine helped transform polio from feared menace to historical curiosity in most countries, a good vaccine against today’s coronavirus would restore the world’s confidence, both socially (potlucks! concerts! sports!) and economically. So where does the vaccine race stand now?

In March, a study in Wuhan, China, suggested that coronavirus patients might benefit from a potent steroid called methylprednisolone.

The Lancet and The New England Journal of Medicine—among the world’s most prestigious science journals—each retracted a headlining study about COVID-19 on Thursday. The implications extend beyond those journals, though, and threaten to erode public trust in medical research at a time when it is most needed.