User:KBswing11/sandbox

History
Erin Allmann Updyke has a M.S. in epidemiology from the University of Hawaii, a PhD in entomology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and an MD from UC San Diego.

Erin Welsh has an M.S. in epidemiology from the University of Louisville, and a PhD in ecology, evolution and conservation biology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

History of the Podcast
Dr. Erin Allmann Updyke and Dr. Erin Welsh, ("The Erins," as they call themselves), met in graduate school, studying disease ecology. They teamed up to start their podcast, "This Podcast Will Kill You," in 2017, and their first episode featured the 1918 flu pandemic. The goal of the podcast is to make science more accessible and entertaining for the general public.Their podcast became more relevant during the measles outbreak in 2018-2019, when "the Erins" created a double episode dedicated to the biology and history of vaccines, and again during the global COVID-19 pandemic, beginning in 2019.

Their first episode aired on October 31, 2017. In 2018, prior to launching Season 2, "This Podcast Will Kill You" joined The Exactly Right Network. In doing so, their download rate quadrupled. The show was nominated for a 2019 Webby Award in the Science and Education Podcasts category. In 2020, they started a special series of episodes focusing on the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Episode Structure
Each episode is about an hour in duration and generally starts with a firsthand account of someone affected by the disease. The hosts, Erin Allmann Updyke and Erin Welsh, introduce the disease through a "Quarantini," a cocktail that they create and name appropriately for the episode's subject. They also offer an option for a "Placeborita," or non-alcoholic version of the cocktail. Allman Updyke explains the biology and epidemiology of the disease, and Welsh explains the history of the disease. Allmann Updyke then wraps up the episode by going through current events related to the disease, and the two hosts list the sources they used for the information.