Here's what's on tap this week: Why are seatbelts and airbags designed based on male morphology? Banning plastics is gaining traction, so are unintended consequences. Mosquitos can impact us culturally, as you need to look no further than a gin and tonic. Finally, a bit of eye candy: What those tiny holes in medicine capsules really do.
mosquitos
Roughly 200 million people contract the malarial parasite annually, and in 2013 malaria was the cause of 500,000 deaths worldwide. According to a recent study, a new genetic engineering technique is showing great promise in eliminating the mosquitos that carry the deadly disease.
Malaria is one of the worst medical scourges in the world today. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), there were about 207 million cases worldwide in 2012, and the disease was responsible for over 600,000 deaths mostly in children under 5 years old.
An article in this week s New York Times could not possibly do a better job of summarizing our mission here at ACSH: Science-based public health policy rather than one based on fear and ignorance. Because in the Florida Keys there is no shortage of either.
Every so often you can make a difference. When ACSH s Dr. Josh Bloom, a long time resident of Ocean Beach on Fire Island, learned that his close friend Jim Capuano a six year survivor of stage-4 colon cancer