December 7, 2023
(The Washington Times) – U.S. national security officials say they have made significant changes to their experiments on human subjects since a botched research project in 1953 led to the death of an LSD-drugged CIA scientist who fell from a … Read More
December 6, 2023
(STAT News) – Trading her chances of having children naturally for a chance at freedom from a debilitating genetic disease was a difficult choice. But at least Tornyenu was presented with the option of preserving the possibility of having biological … Read More
December 5, 2023
(STAT News) – Given the widespread acceptance that the current flu vaccines could use improvement, are mRNA shots the answer? As the scientific world waits for published data on which to formulate conclusions, STAT spoke to influenza and vaccine experts … Read More
December 5, 2023
European Journal of Human Genetics (vol. 31, no. 11, 2023) is available online by subscription only. Articles include: “Participant Perspective on the Recall-by-Genotype Research Approach: A mixed-Method embedded Study with Participants of the CHRIS Study” by Roberta Biasiotto, et al. … Read More
December 4, 2023
(JAMA News) – Dozens of businesses selling unapproved stem cell treatments and exosome therapies for COVID-19 have pivoted toward targeting people with post–COVID-19 condition, or long COVID, according to an analysis of the businesses’ marketing practices. (Read More)
December 4, 2023
(New York Times) – Traumatic brain injuries have left more than five million Americans permanently disabled. They have trouble focusing on even simple tasks and often have to quit jobs or drop out of school. A study published on Monday … Read More
December 4, 2023
(BBC) – Australia’s prime minister has given a national apology to survivors of the thalidomide scandal and their families. It comes over 60 years after the morning sickness drug started causing birth defects in babies globally. (Read More)
December 4, 2023
(MIT Technology Review) – On a picturesque fall day a few years ago, I opened the mailbox and took out an envelope as thick as a Bible that would change my life. The package was from Vertex Pharmaceuticals, and it … Read More
December 4, 2023
BMC Medical Ethics has new articles available online. Articles include: “UK Health Researchers’ Considerations of the environmental Impacts of their Data-Intensive Practices and its Relevance to Health Inequities” by Gabrielle Samuel “Non-Invasive Prenatal Testing (NIPT): Is Routinization Problematic?” by Christoph … Read More
December 1, 2023
(MIT Technology Review) – By the middle of December, Vertex Pharmaceuticals, based in Boston, is expected to receive FDA approval to sell a revolutionary new treatment for sickle-cell disease that’s the first to use CRISPR to alter the DNA inside … Read More
November 30, 2023
(Wall Street Journal) – In the quest to help people live longer, scientists and companies are turning to dogs. Humans have greater genetic similarities to dogs than other common subjects of aging research, like mice. Our species get many of … Read More
November 30, 2023
(Wall Street Journal) – Johnson & Johnson is making one of the biggest bets in the healthcare industry on using data science and artificial intelligence to bolster its work. The 137-year-old pharmaceutical and medical-device company has hired 6,000 data scientists … Read More
November 30, 2023
(MIT Technology Review) – Money can’t buy happiness, but X Prize founder Peter Diamandis hopes it might be able to buy better health. Today the X Prize Foundation, which funds global competitions to spark development of breakthrough technologies, announced a … Read More
November 29, 2023
Research Ethics (vol. 19, no. 4, 2023) is available online by subscription only. Articles include: “Shifting Attitudes on Animal ‘Ownership’: Ethical Implications for Welfare Research and Practice Terminology” by Julia Sophie Lyn Henning, Ana Goncalves Costa, and Eduardo Jose Fernandez … Read More
November 28, 2023
(Nature) – Scholl is not alone in his altruism. He was among thousands of people who answered a global call for challenge-trial volunteers during the COVID-19 pandemic. The effort was spearheaded by an advocacy group called 1Day Sooner, which aimed … Read More
November 28, 2023
(STAT News) – I want to empower my patients and their families to make the most appropriate and evidence-based decisions about their care. It is therefore concerning to me that while the modest benefit of Leqembi in slowing the progression … Read More
November 28, 2023
(The Atlantic) – The results are so astounding that this therapy, from Vertex Pharmaceuticals and CRISPR Therapeutics, became the first CRISPR medicine ever approved, with U.K. regulators giving the green light earlier this month; the FDA appears prepared to follow … Read More
November 27, 2023
(Wall Street Journal) – At healthcare conferences, someone always asks, “What if there was a magic pill?” One that could cure major diseases. What would the healthcare industry look like? Some emergency rooms and hospitals but less doctors and spending? … Read More
November 27, 2023
Journal of Medical Ethics (vol. 49, no. 11, 2023) is available online by subscription only. Articles include: “Epistemic Problems with Mental Health Legislation in the Doctor–Patient Relationship” by Giles Newton-Howes, Simon Walker and Neil John Pickering “Patients, Doctors and Risk Attitudes” by … Read More
November 24, 2023
(Nature) – Microbiologist Siouxsie Wiles is suing her employer, the University of Auckland, in New Zealand’s employment court. She alleges that the university’s management “failed in their duty to keep her safe in her employment” while, as a high-profile scientist … Read More
November 21, 2023
(Undark) – Each year, hundreds of thousands of Americans volunteer for clinical trials. They swallow doses of experimental drugs and undergo novel surgeries. Some allow doctors to implant unproven devices into their bodies. Most trials end up being perfectly safe, … Read More
November 21, 2023
(STAT News) – They have roots in 50 countries that cover more than half of the globe’s surface. They make up more than 60% of the world’s population. They speak more than 100 different languages. Yet in medical research and … Read More
November 21, 2023
Ethics, Medicine, and Public Health (vol. 30, 2023) is available online by subscription only. Articles include: “Evaluation of Causes of Death among Danish Men with initial non-malignant Histopathology of the Prostate” by H.V. Stroomberg, A. Røder, J.T. Helgstrand and K. … Read More
November 17, 2023
(Wall Street Journal) – But wearable brain-sensing devices—as opposed to implanted—could offer a broader swath of consumers cognitive feedback and other brain enhancements. That’s already happening in university and company labs. Several recent studies using simulators have shown that wearable … Read More
November 16, 2023
(Slate) – When I arrived at the Child Study Center for the first day of preschool in the fall of 1972, I became one of a cohort of over 100 Berkeley children whose parents had enrolled us in a groundbreaking, … Read More
