This is the science podcast for January 31st, 2025.

I'm Sarah Crespi.

First up this week, we catch up with the editor of our policy section, Science Insider.

That's Jocelyn Kaiser.

She talks about changes at the major science agencies that are coming about with the transition

to the second Trump administration. Next, producer Kevin McLean talks with researcher Dan Kaplan

about why it sometimes pays to scratch that itch. Turns out, scratching may be our bodies

end run around pests and pathogens stealthily attempting to steal blood or invade the body.

We're just wrapping up the first week of President Trump being back in office.

We're recording on January 27th, which is a Monday. And there's just this tsunami of

science news to get to. Jocelyn Kaiser is the editor for Science Insider, our policy and government

news section. She and Science News staff have been furiously gathering news about policy and government

in the past week. And hopefully not too much will change by the time this releases on Thursday.

Hi, Jocelyn. So glad you

could join us. Hey, Sarah. Okay, so I think we should start with the last few pieces of news that have

come out on Science Insider and then we'll talk about the intersection of science and government that

you'll be keeping an eye on in the future. Sure. First, I think this story was kind of very early,

which is the United States leaving the WHO, the World Health Organization, which I found from the news article could take a whole year to do. Is that right?

That's my understanding. And Congress could block it. So has this happened before? Has the U.S. departed from W.H.O. before? Oh, gosh, I believe they did. We started to during the previous

Trump administration, but I think Biden overturned it pretty quickly. What are some of the likely

consequences of this departure? One big consequence is that the United States contributes one-fifth

of the budget of the World Health Organization, so that will be a big blow to lose that funding.

...