February 7, 2025
A New Edition of The New England Journal of Medicine Is Now Available
The New England Journal of Medicine (vol. 392, no. 1, 2025) is available online by subscription only. Articles include:
Research Ethics
February 6, 2025
Abandoned in the Middle of Clinical Trials, Because of a Trump Order
(New York Times) – The stop-work order on U.S.A.I.D.-funded research has left thousands of people with experimental drugs and devices in their bodies, with no access to monitoring or care. When Ms. Zondi, 22, arrived at the clinic, she learned … Read More
February 5, 2025
The Long Quest for Artificial Blood
(The New Yorker) – One of the most valuable substances in the world has never been replicated. Are we close? Blood is in high demand almost everywhere, but its seemingly endless complexity has confounded scientists for decades. (Read More)
February 4, 2025
US health agency seeks to cut gender-related terms from scientific papers
(Nature) – The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has mandated that all scientific manuscripts produced by its researchers that are under review at a journal be withdrawn so that certain language relating to gender can be stripped … Read More
February 4, 2025
How are researchers using AI? Survey reveals pros and cons for science
(Nature) – Despite strong interest in using artificial intelligence to make research faster, easier and more accessible, researchers say they need more support to navigate its possibilities. The survey asked researchers how they are currently using generative AI tools — … Read More
February 4, 2025
How a Leftist Activist Group Helped Torpedo a Psychedelic Therapy
(New York Times) – The fallout from the F.D.A.’s rejection of MDMA-assisted treatment for PTSD worries researchers and experts who fear other psychedelic drugs in the pipeline could be jeopardized. Dr. Devenot and six others presented themselves as experts in … Read More
February 3, 2025
F.D.A. Approves Studies of Pig Organ Transplants for Kidney Patients
(New York Times) – The research offers hope to tens of thousands of patients with kidney failure who are on a long waiting list for an organ transplant. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has given the green light to … Read More
February 3, 2025
A New Edition of Bioethics Is Now Available
Bioethics (vol. 39, no. 2, 2025) is available online by subscription only. Articles include:
January 31, 2025
Bogus research is undermining good science, slowing lifesaving research
(Ars Technica) – Over the past decade, furtive commercial entities around the world have industrialized the production, sale, and dissemination of bogus scholarly research. These paper mills are profiting by undermining the literature that everyone from doctors to engineers rely … Read More
January 29, 2025
Would You Get Sick in the Name of Science?
(New York Times) – Since the pandemic, drug trials that purposely make people vomit, shiver and ache have become a research area of growing interest. All that’s needed: brave volunteers. “A lot of people say, ‘Doesn’t this violate the Hippocratic … Read More
January 29, 2025
A New Edition of Research Ethics is Now Available
Research Ethics (vol. 21, no. 1, 2025) is available online by subscription only. Articles include:
January 27, 2025
US FDA drops web pages on improving clinical trial diversity
(Reuters via MSN) – The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has pulled draft guidance from its website requiring companies to test medicines and devices in diverse populations as part of a purge of diversity, equity and inclusion efforts at U.S. … Read More
January 27, 2025
Technology for lab-grown eggs or sperm on brink of viability, UK fertility watchdog finds
(The Guardian) – Exclusive: In-vitro gametes are viewed as the holy grail of fertility research Mass-producing eggs and sperm in a laboratory in order to have a baby with yourself or three other people in a “multiplex” parenting arrangement might … Read More
January 27, 2025
New Articles from BMC Medical Ethics Are Now Available
BMC Medical Ethics has new articles available online.
January 24, 2025
The Devastating Legacy of Lies in Alzheimer’s Science
(New York Times) – Yet despite decades of research, no treatment has been created that arrests Alzheimer’s cognitive deterioration, let alone reverses it. That dismal lack of progress is partly because of the infinite complexity of the human brain, which … Read More
January 23, 2025
A Possible Substitute for Mifepristone Is Already on Pharmacy Shelves
(The Atlantic) – Now a preliminary study suggests that using another drug in place of mifepristone may be just as effective for terminating an early pregnancy. The drug, called ulipristal acetate and sold as a 30-milligram pill under the brand … Read More
January 23, 2025
Trump Order Seeks to Stop Virus Research That Critics Have Linked to Covid
(Wall Street Journal) – The Trump administration is preparing an executive order that would halt federal funding, at least temporarily, for a risky and controversial kind of research into viruses that makes the pathogens more dangerous or contagious. The goal … Read More
January 22, 2025
Long-Covid Patients Are Frustrated That Federal Research Hasn’t Found New Treatments
(KFF Health News) – Some doctors and researchers are also critical of the agency’s research initiative, called RECOVER, or Researching COVID to Enhance Recovery. Without clinical trials, physicians specializing in treating long covid must rely on hunches to guide their … Read More
January 22, 2025
The ultra-fast cancer treatments which could replace conventional radiotherapy
(BBC) – A pioneering new treatment promises to tackle a wider range of cancers, with fewer side-effects than conventional radiotherapy. It also takes less than a second. In a series of vast underground caverns on the outskirts of Geneva, Switzerland, … Read More
January 22, 2025
Texas medical school leader resigns after investigation revealed bodies were used without consent
(NBC News) – NBC News reported last year that the University of North Texas Health Science Center chopped up, studied and leased out hundreds of unclaimed bodies. The president of the University of North Texas Health Science Center is stepping … Read More
January 20, 2025
People are bad at reporting what they eat. That’s a problem for dietary research
(Science) – Studies that use surveys to link dietary patterns to human health may be irredeemably biased, new paper suggests With the help of a technique that measures people’s energy expenditure, researchers came up with an equation to assess the … Read More
January 20, 2025
Weight-loss drugs may boost health in many ways
(BBC) – The first study to assess how weight-loss drugs affect the whole of human health has discovered an “eye-opening” impact on the body, researchers say. The analysis, involving about two million people, linked the drugs to better heart health, … Read More
January 20, 2025
A New Edition of Hastings Center Report Is Now Available
Hastings Center Report (vol. 54, Issue S2, 2024) is available online by subscription only. Articles include:
January 17, 2025
OpenAI has created an AI model for longevity science
(MIT Technology Review) – When you think of AI’s contributions to science, you probably think of AlphaFold, the Google DeepMind protein-folding program that earned its creator a Nobel Prize last year. Now OpenAI says it’s getting into the science game … Read More
January 17, 2025
Could Pain Help Test AI for Sentience?
(Scientific American) – A new study shows that large language models make trade-offs to avoid pain, with possible implications for future AI welfare In the quest for a reliable way to detect any stirrings of a sentient “I” in artificial … Read More
