"Bigness, scariness, awfulness" - How bad is the Coronavirus?

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By Skylar Wolfe

 Conducting successful, meaningful interviews is one of the most important skills a journalist can have.

 Michael Barbaro interviewed Donald G. McNeil Jr., a science and health reporter for The New York Times, on The Daily's episode Thursday, titled "The Coronavirus Goes Global."

 Barbaro did an excellent job in the interview of crafting questions at the level of knowledge possessed by the general public in regards to the latest coronavirus, COVID-19.

 This allowed McNeil to lay out all of the important facts of the virus in a way that could be understood by anyone.

Barbaro began by asking about the "bigness, scariness, awfulness" of the coronavirus, which is truly the big question that everyone wants an answer to.

This was a very successful way to begin the interview because it lets the listener know right away that Barbaro is asking questions that they want to know the answers to.

Barbaro then asks about specific facts of the virus, such as transmissibility, the vaccine in development, and the virus's potential impact.

If I were to conduct an interview on such a topic, I would follow Barbaro's example of asking any question he wants to know, whether or not it seems like a dumb question.

The conversational nature of the interview also allows McNeil to give his opinions and predictions.

Overall, the interview was very successful at providing more information about the science of the virus to the general public due to Barbaro's interviewing skills.

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