It’s been a year since John Green’s latest nonfiction book, “Everything Is Tuberculosis,” hit shelves, but the best-selling author has been a vocal supporter of global efforts to eradicate the disease for years.
With World Tuberculosis Day right around the corner on March 24, Green is offering a special gift to people who support the mission to get tuberculosis testing and treatment to the people who need it most.
Green’s online shop, Good Store, which he runs with his brother, Hank, sells everyday goods like coffee, tea, socks and underwear, eco-friendly cleaning products, and soap, with all proceeds going to charities like Partners in Health.
Keats & Co coffee and tea support Partners In Health in the fight against tuberculosis. Photo courtesy of Good Store
“I work in an unpaid capacity for the world’s best coffee and tea company, Keats & Co, which makes amazing coffee and tea, sends it to your home, and then donates 100% of the profit to fight tuberculosis in impoverished communities,” Green said in a recent Instagram video.
Keats & Co, Good Store’s coffee and tea line is named after romantic poet John Keats, who died of tuberculosis at 25, “back when we didn’t know how to cure it,” Green said.
“But now we do know how to cure it, it’s just that we don’t do a good job of getting the cure to people who need it.”
All of this is to say, Green went on to add, those who subscribe to Keats & Co ahead of World Tuberculosis Day will be sent an exclusive video reading of Keats’ poem “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” along with some more information about why it’s Green’s favorite.
Along with this campaign, Green has committed millions of his own money to fund solutions for the world’s deadliest infectious disease, has educated thousands on the subject, and has even worked with his fan community — Nerdfighteria — to demand change from corporate health giants like Danaher and Johnson & Johnson.
World Tuberculosis Day is just one opportunity for his work to continue. And, as Green will often say, the real heroes of this story are the people on the ground supporting low-income communities fighting tuberculosis.
Partners In Health, the organization supported by Good Store, is part of leading the charge.
“PIH has battled this inequity for more than two decades, by treating and preventing TB, its more severe, drug-resistant variants, and co-infections of HIV and TB in some of the poorest and most vulnerable communities in the world,” the nonprofit’s website shares.
“Our community-based approach to care has resulted in some of the highest cure rates and lowest treatment default rates ever recorded.”
And when people shop for tea and coffee through Good Store, they’ll play a poetic part in getting people the care they deserve.
“Check out Keats & Co and get yourself a little John Keats in the process,” Green said.
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Header image by Marina Waters for John Green
