High-profile incidents in which a mentally ill person commits a violent crime has led to the stereotype that these struggling people all pose a dire threat to society. But a team of researchers, studying data from more than 75,000 patients, has developed a model that accurately predicts which patients are unlikely to become violent.
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Immunology studies the way we maintain our body’s integrity – “immunity’s central motif” – as well as our definition of self. Differentiating our self from "other" has many scales, and it's been used to separate tribes, ethnicities, nations. So in addition to cells, can immunology also help us understand the interactions of humans?
Following the multi-year drought in the west and northwest, the question being raised is whether the mighty sequoia – which requires massive amounts of water – has been weakened or otherwise compromised. While there's no precise answer to that now, arborists are seeing signs that water depletion could be a real threat.
By demonizing biotechnology and conventional agriculture, Whole Foods has profited handsomely. But with its recent financial struggles, it would be nice if the sales downturn was the result of Americans waking up to the fact that the chain has been lying to them for years.
For those who want raw fish, such as sushi, freshness is absolutely mandatory. However, old fish is still problematic even if cooked. So a group of Taiwanese researchers developed a semiconductor sensor that detects fish freshness in 60 seconds.
Medical researchers with the Navy in San Diego concluded that young male adults who watched pornography were more likely to be dissatisfied with actual sexual encounters. And the more porn they consumed the more desensitized they became to human interaction – while increasing their risk of experiencing erectile dysfunction.
1. Organic Consumers Association, and the groups it funds, like US Right To Know and the lawyer-run partisan attack site Sourcewatch, may be in a lot of trouble.
NYU physicist Alan Sokal thought very little of the research performed by his colleagues in the social sciences. To prove his point, he wrote a paper that used plenty of trendy buzz words but made absolutely no sense. As he later explained, Dr. Sokal wanted to find out if a humanities journal would "publish an article liberally salted with nonsense if (a) it sounded good and (b) it flattered the editors' ideological preconceptions."
Whole Foods lies 9 different times, and that is just on the landing page of its Organics section.
Here's something encouraging for people who buy pain cream for minor, short-term issues: It actually works.
Soliris is a drug for an orphan disease, one which affects relatively few people. While these types of drugs are inherently more expensive, the market expected a price tag of $100,000 – not the actual cost of $500,000. How did the manufacturer Alexion come up with this astronomical price?
In Part 1, we considered "the spread," which is the difference between the cost of a product or service and the price charged for it. Here it Part 2, we examine the factors and pressures that create this difference.
For smokers who want to quit, nicotine vaping devices are safer alternatives to cigarettes. The use of E-cigarettes has recently been approved, with some common-sense restrictions, in New Zealand.
It glistens, oozes, sometimes sparkles and seems to be everywhere: in homes, schools and offices, and on travel gear and key chains. So it's no wonder that kids are accidentally – and even intentionally – ingesting hand sanitizer. The result can be signs of alcohol toxicity.
How would you feel about unlicensed pilots flying commercial airliners? Or if we allowed every motorist to determine which side of the street to drive on? Council advisor Dr. David Seres ponders why we allow untested supplements to be used as drugs.
Older mothers may be better – or maybe not. But when a study is based on moms' answers to a questionnaire about their own children, it's also possible that older mothers just think their children are more perfect than how younger moms view their kids.
Statistics is difficult, and choosing the proper tools becomes more challenging as experiments become more complex. That's why it's not uncommon for large genetics or epidemiological studies to have a biostatistician as a co-author. Perhaps more biomedical studies should follow suit.
Mental health problems affect almost twice as many Americans as diabetes. Why is Congress declaring that the former is not an essential health benefit?
Turmeric pills are the latest version of snake oil promoted by healers and naturopaths. And although that may be bad, it's not as bad as their latest trick – administering turmeric using an IV and killing an otherwise healthy person.
The key to preventing Alzheimer's Disease may lie in the North Atlantic island of Iceland. Its relatively homogeneous population has been a treasure trove for genetic researchers looking for mutated genes that either increase or decrease the disease's risk.
Dr. Norm Borlaug, a member of our Founder's Circle, was a big believer in advancing an evidence-based, pro-science approach to food production. The Nobel Laureate also saw the need for debunking the fear-inducing myths that a generation of environmental groups began creating in the 1960s.
This egg update isn't about the usual "there's too much cholesterol" or "only eat the white parts" topics (neither of which have any basis in science, by the way). It's about a terrifically lame website lacking factual fitness that ranks ways to prepare an egg from most healthy to most dangerous. Not only is this silly – it's dead wrong.
Researchers at the University of Toronto published a ranking of businesses they believe could move the needle to reduce deaths from sudden cardiac arrest.
Will patients ever shop for health care the way consumers do for an iPhone? Pfizer's Dr. Robert Popovian asks this question in his latest contribution for Morning Consult. The answer? Individuals need much more information to make informed decisions. To that point, here's one way this could work.
America's GDP is shifting from small-town America to the cities, and at the same time the opioid overdose epidemic has hit rural states, like Kentucky and West Virginia, especially hard. As a result, from 1999 to 2015 suicides in rural America have increased over 40%, according to the CDC.
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