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Hip fractures remain a significant health problem, especially for the elderly, where a fracture can lead to immobility and a downward spiral. Making use of data from the Framingham Osteoporosis Study, a new study looks at the risk factors and incidence of hip fractures over the last several decades. The study focused on recognized risk factors for fracture, in the end singling out two: smoking and drinking. 

Conspiracy theories are like herpes. Once a person is exposed, he's infected for life and cannot be cured. Worse, the patient is vulnerable to more conspiracy theories.

Cardiovascular disease, or CVD, remains one of our biggest killers. And elevated cholesterol is one of CVD’s most influential biomarkers. Twenty-five percent of Americans over 40 take one of these medications, costing $20 billion annually. Are we getting any worthwhile bang for the buck?

A study that found basically no link between hair color or dye use and cancer predictably was sensationalized by the media anyway.

Pop quiz! Who's dumber? Those courting health risks at the Sturgis motorcycle rally or the authors of the "study" making the rounds on the thousands of infections they created? OK, it's a trick question, because both groups have some explaining to do.

Health literacy, or understanding the medical narrative, is a problem for a majority of Americans. When compounded with numeric literacy, understanding numbers, ratios and rates -- the daily litany that has accompanied COVID-19 news conferences -- it's estimated that 8 out of 10 Americans just don’t get it. 

There are crazier ideas than harsh, indefinite lockdowns to fight the coronavirus. One was proposed by a bioethics professor: Put mind-controlling hormones in the water supply to make people more cooperative.

The most recent workshop of the Beyond Science and Decisions series was conducted at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) in Cincinnati, Ohio, in February of this year.

"I disagree with @CDCgov on their very tough & expensive guidelines for opening schools. While they want them open, they are asking schools to do very impractical things. I will be meeting with them!!!"
That, of course, is President Trump's summary of the CDC guidelines for opening schools. It ignited a predictable political back and forth fueled more by politics than facts. Let's take a minute to see what they recommended. You decide how tough they are. 

A European study found that 44% of "antibiotic-free" animal feed samples tested contained antibiotics.

Instapot braises, steams, fries, makes yougurt, and despite no special spot on the dial, can now safely sterilize your precious N-95 masks.

Even innovative-sounding equipment cannot stop concussions in contact sports. Unfortunately, we may not know if long-term brain damage can actually be limited by new technologies until it is too late.

An Australian group has examined how long coronavirus can exist on different surfaces and at different temperatures. What does this really mean?

In 2020, empirically determined knowledge is only considered true if it first passes a litmus test -- not the geeky pH variety but the obnoxious political one. The results are as absurd and dangerous as you'd imagine, particularly when it involves COVID and cable news.

In this month's round-up, you'll find that we've been writing about and discussing a range of topics, from the ever-present dangers and complexities of the coronavirus to the need for accurate scientific journalism. And not only are we laser-focused on the deadly force of the tiny microbe, we've also got our eye on that big, wandering moose. What do we mean by that? Read on.

Science and democracy, when museums were the source of scientific education, and what's the real deal with Prevagen?

More than six months after the hype of repurposed COVID drugs, we have nothing. But this wasn't at all unexpected. Here's why.

People with lower levels of antibodies against mumps -- the second "M" in the MMR vaccine -- are likelier to have a severe case of COVID.

The day before Thanksgiving, "[t]he US reported more than 2,100 deaths in a single day [and] things are projected to get worse," especially with the December holidays plus New Year's coming up. We've got a season of merry-making ahead of us – which used to include family travel, vacations, and partying – all behaviors associated with COVID-19- spread. Things were looking gloomy – until three vaccine manufacturers recently reported promising and exciting vaccine trial results, which should be ready by spring. If we can just hang on till then, we'll be OK …., that is, if we can motivate the vaccine-hesitant.

Well, not a picture so much as a block of text. Operation Warp Speed moves closer to results. The discussion of who is first in line, who may skip the line altogether, or who will wait until there is no longer a line is heating up. Health and Human Services has a plan. 

There are about 2,000 drugs and vaccines (mostly the former) now in clinical trials. ACSH advisor Dr. Henry Miller argues that to get COVID-19 under control we will need therapeutics no matter how effective vaccines are. Here's why.

America is now facing its second lockdown. Other countries are verging on a third. Repeated efforts at COVID-19 containment seem elusive. No respite seems in sight – other than hope of a vaccine. Along with concerted efforts in this direction, the vexing incidence of escalating vaccine resistance is raising its ugly head – yet again, stoked by a growlingly effective anti-vax movement and false prophets of vaccine doom. This trend seems to have hit the Black community particularly hard.  

With the press flooded with futuristic phantasms of using CRISPR-Cas 9 to genetically engineer "designer" children -- by creating human-induced hereditable mutations -- it's easy to lose sight of ethical, legal, and moral issues arising from currently existing technology. Will we be tempted to "improve" our genetic destiny, and who decides which improvements to make? And who gets them? Are we mature enough as a society to eschew decisions leading to claims of eugenic determinism? And what about the social justice concerns?

One of the concerns frequently raised by our readers -- and by the public, in general -- is the accuracy and reliability of hospitalizations caused by COVID-19. A new study provides some much-needed clarity (with a bit of misdirection on the side).

What happens when you freeze, and then thaw, milk? Visible evidence suggests that it turns into spit-up. But is that what's going on? And why would anyone care? Read on, but only if you have nothing better to do.