While some extol the psychological benefits of psychedelics and bemoan their unavailability, at least one FDA-approved agent with psychedelic properties, Ketamine, does exist. The problem is that it is being abused- and oversight is wanting.
Harm Reduction
The FDA’s assault on vaping has yielded devastating consequences. Not only have millions of adults been denied legal access to low-risk vaping products they rely on to stay smoke-free, federal regulations are rapidly destroying thousands of jobs and billions of dollars worth of income, depriving ordinary Americans of their livelihoods.
I’m at an age where I see doctors frequently enough that I noticed that the masks are gone. Will a surge in influenza or COVID this fall and winter bring masks back for all, or has COVID given us something other than a one-size-fits-all approach?
Conflict between Japan and China is not new. As the release of contaminated water from Fukushima into the Pacific Ocean has now been approved by the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency, China has issued warnings that this approval is insufficient. ACSH covered the underlying science last year; here is a reprise.
There are many shorthand rules and heuristics used in medicine. One of the classics: “When you hear hoofbeats, you don’t think of zebras.” It is a way of saying that, given a specific clinical presentation, you first look for the most common causes. A new paper in JAMA is concerned about those hoofbeats.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that "the liberty secured by the Constitution of the United States to every person within its jurisdiction does not import an absolute right in each person to be, at all times and in all circumstances, wholly freed from restraint. There are manifold restraints to which every person is necessarily subject for the common good." Mask and vaccine mandates, therefore, are, under some circumstances, constitutional.
The recent fires in Canada that resulted in a few days of heavy smoke-related air pollution in the Northeast have momentarily grabbed our attention. The very vocal "enviro-fearful" are concerned with more fires to come; the quieter "enviro-fearless" shrug it off as bad forest management. Each side accuses the other of bias in their interpretation of these events. There's another predictor of the future that has no such prejudice, and they're signaling their alarm by getting out.
On February 23, 2023, the World Health Organization released the “Zero Draft” (WHO CA+) of their post-COVID Pandemic Preparedness Proposal, which some have categorized as a treaty. A final document is promised for 2024. Various governments and political factions have already trashed the draft, claiming it encroaches on the sovereignty of member nations. So, is it merely advisory, or is it binding?
Over the last few years, it’s become clear that using a patient’s race as a variable in some predictive models – like those involving kidney function – leads to poorer outcomes. Meanwhile, removing that variable leads to improved prediction of patient risk, more prompt treatment, and presumably better outcomes. A new study shows that by taking the race variable “out of the equation” the predictive model fares worse. Should we consider race as a determinant of health?
Masks were once confined to those celebrating Halloween or as historical notes about historic plagues. But they returned to command our awareness in the Age of COVID. There are differences of opinion on how efficacious they are: the overall benefit versus how much damage they might have done. A new study speaks to their physiologic harms.
With COVID-19’s “public health emergency” barely behind us, lawyers and policymakers are taking advantage of public sensitivity and planning for the next plague. How good their solutions are remains to be seen, but novel suggestions, and attention to new technology and historical practices, are few and far between.
Fast fashion refers to quickly designed clothing, easily produced from low-cost (cheap) materials and offered in trendy stores. Zara might be considered a fast fashion’s model. But what becomes of those no longer desirable clothes when the trend changes and the fashion shifts?