It's been a pretty ghastly 14 months thanks to COVID. But, let's look on the bright side. Here are four benefits that resulted from the pandemic. Maybe.
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“I wear the chain I forged in life,” replied [Morley’s] Ghost. “I made it link by link, and yard by yard.” Our immune system, like those chains, contains our immunologic memories. Ferrets can teach us, that like Morley’s chains, our immunologic memory is forged by experience. Sometimes, a current viral illness may, later on, protect us from a similar viral infection; but we may not be as protected as we hope.
Can nudging consumers to make more nutritious grocery choices work? Can discounts and coupons alter our choices? A new study looks at personalized grocery shopping, with an eye towards nutrition and a gentle push motivated by savings.
Aging is a failure to communicate? Should we have national sea parks? COVID-19 is not an equal opportunity disease. If a virus is not truly "alive," is this the zombie apocalypse?
When combined, science and religion can be a powerful force for good. Let's use it to vanquish COVID.
Most of the COVID-19 analyses and media report “milestones,” or instead use averaging to “smooth out” daily random variation. Data on single days lack a temporal context. But here we consider two topics of particular interest: systematic variations such as weekend effects; and COVID-19 infections that might have resulted from family gatherings on national holidays.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to evolve in Year 2, so too does ACSH's need to cover it as comprehensively and accurately as possible. Further, we're gratified and appreciative to USA Today, which for the second time in three weeks published one of our Op-Ed columns, allowing another of ACSH's public-health messages to reach millions of Americans. This premier placement highlights the varied media exposure ACSH received during the month of February.
In today's "just when you think it can't get any worse" feature, DEA agents are now seizing counterfeit Adderall pills that contain pure methamphetamine. Although Mexican drug cartels are blamed for making these pills to get young people addicted to meth, the ultimate blame falls on DEA policies. What a mess.
There has for some time been a schism in medicine between the doers and the thinkers. I’m a doer, a surgeon. My friends include a lot of thinkers, oncologists, infectious disease, primary care, pediatrics. I also have “thinker-friends” that are often more like me than their thinker brothers and sisters. They are often referred to as interventionalists – cardiologists in the catheterization laboratory or gastroenterologists with their scopes.
The mainstream media is repeating the unscientific claims of a dishonest book. A deeper dive into the author of the book would have revealed duplicity and enormous conflicts of interest.
Once again, it seems you are what you eat, but only if you consider what your digestive tract’s microbiome is willing to snack on.
Just as restaurants, fast-food or otherwise, are beginning to open up, a new study demonstrates an association between eating out and your mortality. I’ve had a few bad meals in my time, but can they be killing me?
When it comes to medications and advertising, the FDA has a host of regulations designed “to better inform us,” helping to separate fact from hype. The evidence for food labels helping nudge better choices is plus-minus. How about preventative care, like sunscreen? A new study shows that labeling regulation is failing.
COVID-19 has brought racial and gender disparities in healthcare to the forefront, although they have been present for many years. A new article captures the gap in research participation.
The alternative health advocates at Natural News recommend you spend an additional $83,000 on organic food to avoid cancer and the cost of expensive treatments for the disease. You should save your money because eating conventional food, even if it's genetically modified, won't up your cancer risk.
Urgent care centers offer more than first aid, but less than a full-service Emergency Department. It was hoped that they would reduce the number of expensive ED visits, and save money. Well, at least half of that hope has been met.
Fish + bacteria = 25% mortality.
Fish + bacteria + rocks = 5% mortality.
What magic lies within the rocks? What can farm-raised fish teach us?
Google Maps and privacy, mRNA vaccines - an overnight + 40 years sensation, can plants solve our CO2 problem, the cost of subscription services.
It remains a mystery to me why workers in “the business” of healthcare would be hesitant to be vaccinated. After all, they have high-risk exposure daily.
Dr. Jeffrey Singer, a senior fellow at the Cato Institute and ACSH advisor, was asked to submit a statement to the Subcommittee on Health of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which was holding hearings on substance use (and misuse) in the US. Dr. Singer emphasized that illicit fentanyl, not prescription opioids, is responsible for the surge in overdose deaths.
For many of us, over the past year we’ve read like never before. In addition to many more articles, we read from many more sources. Here is a bit of information from a new research letter in the JAMA Network.
When it rains, when a low-pressure system passes by, and when water soaks the soil, it's not a great day to sample for radon. Those conditions force radon out of pore spaces and into basements.
Some 50 years after Martin Caiden wrote "Cyborg" and Lee Majors played "The Six Million Dollar Man" on TV, real life is converging on the once-imagined. Several companies are producing workable, commercially viable prototypes that confer on the user powers and abilities “far beyond those of conventional mortal men.” The Bionic Human, or what is known as a cyborg, has now joined the human race.
In addition to bottled hope, the $168 billion dietary supplement industry furnishes surplus amino acids, vitamins, minerals and enzymes to those who aren’t extracting the necessary requirements from regular food, drink, and life experiences. Now, we can add negative ions to the list, thanks to ionized, or alkalized, water.
Are there methods that can be employed to ensure the commercial success of antibiotic biotech? ACSH advisor Dr. David Shlaes has his doubts.
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