Health
@article{katwala2023myopia,
Author={Katwala, Amit},
url={https://www.wired.com/story/taiwan-epicenter-of-world-myopia-epidemic/},
Title={The World Is Going Blind. Taiwan Offers a Warning, and a Cure},
journal={Wired},
date={2023-08-22},
comment={In China, South Korea, and Taiwan something like 90 percent of people have myopia/nearsightedness. Years of research into the cause suggested it could not be attributed to genetics or any other cause typically suggested over the last few hundred years. More recent research has understood that the cause is not spending enough time outside. Changes to schooling practices in Taiwan to make kids spend a couple of hours a day outside has drastically decreased myopia.},
category={Health, myopia, nearsightedness, taiwan}
}
@article{tabuchi2024pfas,
Author={Tabuchi, Hiroko},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/31/climate/pfas-fertilizer-sludge-farm.html},
Title={Something’s Poisoning America’s Land. Farmers Fear ‘Forever’ Chemicals.},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2024-08-31},
comment={PFAS “forever chemicals”, for which there’s no safe level for human consumption, are ending up in sewage from cities that gets processed into fertilizer and spread on farmland. The EPA has been pushing this process for decades. Only now are people testing farmland and finding extremely high levels of PFAS that are killing livestock and getting into the foodchain. One farm in Michigan was shut down and the land banned from ever being used for agriculture again (a modern-day salting of the land).},
category={Health, Criticality, Urbanism, forever chemicals pfas}
}
@article{gammon2024heat,
Author={Gammon, Katharine},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/28/well/heat-stress-body-temperature.html},
Title={How Our Bodies Can Adapt to Heat},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2024-07-28},
comment={Doing half an hour of exercise in intense heat will begin to build up your tolerance for heat. Your body adapts by increasing your body’s water and you sweat sooner. The effects kick in after just a few days.},
category={Health, heat}
}
% So…. the advice to avoid strenuous exercise in hot weather is actually 180 degrees wrong.
@article{saslow2024medbeds,
Author={Saslow, Eli},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/28/us/politics/far-right-miracle-cure-medbed.html},
Title={Racked by Pain and Enraptured by a Right-Wing Miracle Cure},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2024-07-28},
comment={Follows a rancher with a penchant for hard-right chat rooms and anti-government conspiracy theories as he tries to deal with his chronic pain by trying out a “medbed” — supposedly secret military technology that can cure anything. According to the far-right conspiracies, the military has these in underground bunkers and if Trump is elected, everyone will be able to use them. It’s only evil leftist billionaires and their ties to the mainstream medical industry that are holding medbeds back right now.},
category={Health, Criticality, conspiracy theories, medbeds, woo}
}
% unlock by adding: \url{?unlocked_article_code=1.E0.uOwm.RDzQESyMJMEx&smid=url-share}
% By some crazy quirk (of the simulator), the far left and the far right fully ouroboros together in the woo realm.
% Really, reading this it’s almost hard to imagine how the left and the right can’t be joined together into one giant anti-corporation and anti-government party that taps the deepest (and craziest) woo.
@article{sayare2024parkinsons,
Author={Sayare, Scott},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/14/magazine/parkinsons-smell-disease-detection.html?unlocked_article_code=1.200.0hXB.WRHIetHbdpBy&smid=url-share},
Title={The Woman Who Could Smell Parkinson’s},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2024-06-14},
comment={One woman has the ability to smell Parkinson’s (and other diseases) with 100% accuracy. This ability was initially dismissed by scientists because smell was not considered a sense that merited much attention. But from her ability, scientists were able to identify the chemical she was smelling, and discover a whole new way of testing for disease through analysis of sebum (also overlooked by scientists). This is critical for Parkinson’s, which had no early detection method.},
category={Health, Criticality, smell}
}
% This article is a masterpiece of storytelling, including the (spoiler) reversal where her “false positive” turned out the be someone who had Parkinson’s but didn’t know it yet.
% At one point, they figure out that what she is smelling is the death of the brain.
@article{ney2024sleep,
Author={Ney, Jeremy},
url={https://www.businessinsider.com/sleep-loss-deprivation-america-reasons-health-inequality-economic-stress-money-2024-5},
Title={The big lie about sleep},
journal={Business Insider},
date={2024-05-30},
comment={The main cause of lack of sleep in people nationwide is not noise or light pollution, but stress, particularly stress over lack of employment or poverty. And this most affects people iin poor rural areas, while people in richer urban areas are actually getting more and better sleep.},
category={Health, Criticality, sleep, poverty}
}
@article{barry2024mentalhealth,
Author={Barry, Ellen},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/06/health/mental-health-schools.html},
Title={Are We Talking Too Much About Mental Health?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2024-05-06},
comment={Some research suggests that programs that train for mental health and wellness in schools (eg helping kids identify symptoms of depression and how to meditate), might actually be increasing the number of kids who think they are depressed, and since being “diagnosed” as depressed suggests that you just ARE that way, those kids often feel like there is nothing they can do about it. Other researchers argue that the mental health crisis with kids is so bad that it is more important to give them tools to cope than to worry about the percentage that does worse because they know they are depressed.},
category={Health, Criticality}
}
@article{covidshotschildren2024leonhardt,
Author={David Leonhardt},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/13/briefing/covid-boosters-children-cdc.html},
Title={Covid Shots for Children},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2024-02-13},
comment={The US is one of the few countries that urges covid vaccines and boosters for children 6 months and older. Most other countries have decided that the risks outweigh the benefits, mostly because the benefits are extremely small because children are very unlikely to get seriously ill from covid, an unlikely to spread the virus.},
category={Health, Criticality, covid}
}
% This is interesting because of the public health implications. Even if you believe the benefits outweighed the risks, the recommendation by the CDC is not working as most Americans are choosing to not booster their children. In addition this is contributing to the lack of trust in the CDC and public health.
% “During the pandemic, as Galea told me, health experts sometimes adopted “an illiberal ideology.” This ideology imagined people as robots who existed merely to minimize the chances of contracting a virus.”
% This article also uses the example for risks we know but take of how people wearing helmets in a car would be much safer, but we don’t do that (culturally).
@article{sangerkatz2023medicare,
Author={Sanger-Katz, Margot and Parlapiano, Alicia and Katz, Josh},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/09/05/upshot/medicare-budget-threat-receded.html},
Title={A Huge Threat to the U.S. Budget Has Receded. And No One Is Sure Why.},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2023-09-04},
comment={Medicare spending has more of less flatlined in a completely unexpected way. Seems that it is the result of a complex set of interacting reasons that nobody is able to pin down. The amount saved over what was predicted 10 years ago amounts to multiple trillions of dollars — a huge chunk of the Federal budget. Also, it’s possible that medicare will save quite a lot of money because so many elderly people with complex expensive medical needs died from Covid.},
category={Health, Criticality, medicare, covid}
}
@article{ortiz2023kidependence,
Author={Ortiz, Camilo and Skenazy, Lenore},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/04/opinion/anxiety-depression-teens.html},
Title={This Simple Fix Could Help Anxious Kids},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2023-09-04},
comment={Research suggests that the idea that kids have more anxiety and worse mental health because they are hovered over, watched, and assisted by adults in everything they do now may have much merit. These researchers are trying to put together empirical evidence that simply letting kids do more independent things (things they WANT to do) may reduce anxiety dramatically.},
category={Health, Criticality, anxiety, independence kids}
}
% I suggest that this may apply to adult anxiety too. We think of adults as independent by defininition, but that simply isn’t true. What if the secret to reducing adult anxiety is being willing to take more risks, and experiencing that those risks that even when those risky behaviors result in bad outcomes, mostly they do not result in DIRE and unmanageable outcomes?
@article{kristof2023healthcare,
Author={Kristof, Nicholas},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/16/opinion/health-care-life-expectancy-poverty.html},
Title={How Do We Fix the Scandal That Is American Health Care?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2023-08-16},
comment={Life expectancy in the US is lower than any other rich nation. Some demographic groups have life expectancies lower than the poorest countries on Earth, particularly among men. Meanwhile rich white men in the US have among the highest life expectancies in the world. Yet Hispanic people lack health insurance at high rates, but have longer life expectancies than white people. Kristof calls for changes to individual behaviors as well as societal fixes like expanding Medicaid, extending the child tax credit, and providing drug treatment.},
category={Health, Criticality, life expectancy, health care system}
}
% Kristof’s solution seems to be largely to tackle the low-hanging fruit of expanding Medicaid and the like, with a small dash of personal responsibility for bad behaviors thrown in. But the most interesting part of this piece is the Hispanic paradox. It stronly suggests that both personal responsibility and access to health care are just small treatments to the symptom of the problem, not dealing with the actual cause.
% The Hispanic paradox suggests that the cause of our health care problems is largely cultural — Americans are isolated and simply don’t care about others in their communities. To some extent calling for an expansion of Medicaid is like saying “let the government deal with those people in the community that I don’t personally care about.” (This is hardly Christian.) It seems like what we really need to learn from the Hispanic “paradox” (it’s only a paradox if you are assuming that access to health care is actually a good thing for you) is that the MOST healthy thing you can do is be a part of strong community ties — and notably, (I think) that being part of a strong community can be done without decreasing your machismo. (This is nearly unmentioned in this piece, but I think if you are talking about the health of men, I don’t see how you can not make it front and center.)
% The real solution to the health crisis is to make sure everyone has four things: community (includes family, but not exclusive to family – even a reculse in a mountain hut should feel like they have a particular role in a community), dignity (primarily in the form of a job that pays well enough to live on and comes with no small portion of respect), diet, and exercise.
@article{wingarten2009carchilddeaths,
Author={Weingarten, Gene},
url={https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/fatal-distraction-forgetting-a-child-in-thebackseat-of-a-car-is-a-horrifying-mistake-is-it-a-crime/2014/06/16/8ae0fe3a-f580-11e3-a3a5-42be35962a52_story.html},
Title={Fatal Distraction: Forgetting a Child in the Backseat of a Car Is a Horrifying Mistake. Is It a Crime?},
journal={The Washington Post},
date={2009-03-08},
comment={Pulitzer prize winning story describing the problem of parents causing the death of children by forgetting them in the back seat of cars.},
category={Health, horror, cars, children}
}
% As usual with stories about this subject: no mention of the fact that the real cause of death here is suburban parking sprawl.
% See my own comment in NY Times on the same subject.)
@article{10.1093/pnasnexus/pgad173,
author = {Bor, Jacob and Stokes, Andrew C and Raifman, Julia and Venkataramani, Atheendar and Bassett, Mary T and Himmelstein, David and Woolhandler, Steffie},
title = “{Missing Americans: Early death in the United States—1933–2021}”,
journal = {PNAS Nexus},
volume = {2},
number = {6},
pages = {pgad173},
year = {2023},
month = {05},
abstract = “{We assessed how many US deaths would have been averted each year, 1933–2021, if US age-specific mortality rates had equaled the average of 21 other wealthy nations. We refer to these excess US deaths as “missing Americans.” The United States had lower mortality rates than peer countries in the 1930s–1950s and similar mortality in the 1960s and 1970s. Beginning in the 1980s, however, the United States began experiencing a steady increase in the number of missing Americans, reaching 622,534 in 2019 alone. Excess US deaths surged during the COVID-19 pandemic, reaching 1,009,467 in 2020 and 1,090,103 in 2021. Excess US mortality was particularly pronounced for persons under 65 years. In 2020 and 2021, half of all US deaths under 65 years and 90\% of the increase in under-65 mortality from 2019 to 2021 would have been avoided if the United States had the mortality rates of its peers. In 2021, there were 26.4 million years of life lost due to excess US mortality relative to peer nations, and 49\% of all missing Americans died before age 65. Black and Native Americans made up a disproportionate share of excess US deaths, although the majority of missing Americans were White.}”,
issn = {2752-6542},
doi = {10.1093/pnasnexus/pgad173},
url = {https://doi.org/10.1093/pnasnexus/pgad173},
eprint = {https://academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/article-pdf/2/6/pgad173/51011573/pgad173.pdf},
}
% See also NY Times recap: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/09/opinion/mortality-rate-pandemic.html}
@article{leibowitz2020winter,
title={Winter is coming: wintertime mindset and wellbeing in Norway},
author={Leibowitz, Kari and Vitters{\o}, Joar},
journal={International Journal of Wellbeing},
volume={10},
number={4},
year={2020},
comment={Research on seasonal affective disorder is extremely mixed. This paper finds that positive emotions are correlated with increased latitude (in Norway). Their conclusion is that mindset has more of a role to play in seasonal happiness than has been previously researched.},
category={Health, Criticality, seasonal affective disorder, norway, svalbard}
}
@article{oconnell2023plastic,
Author={O’Connell, Mark},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/20/opinion/microplastics-health-environment.html},
Title={There Is Plastic in Our Flesh},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2023-04-20},
comment={A meditation on the fact that there is plastic in our flesh. We don’t actually KNOW that the plastic is doing us any harm. At the same time it’s difficult to imagine that it isn’t. At the same time there is nothing (nothing even that paranoid parents) can do about it. Quotes Cronenburg: “our bodies are different than human bodies have ever been before in history. This is not going away.”},
category={Health, Criticality, plastic}
}
% Links to this art project that is just photos of dead birds with plastic in their guts from Midway Island: \url{http://www.chrisjordan.com/gallery/midway/}
@article{AlSayyad2022fitness,
Author={AlSayyad, Yasmine},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/30/books/review/fit-nation-natalia-mehlman-petrzela.html},
Title={How America Became Addicted to Exercise},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2022-11-30},
comment={Review of the book “Fit Nation” by Natalia Mehlman Petrzela, which documents the rise of fitness culture in the US.},
category={Health, fitness, conspicuous consumption, Criticality}
}
% Petrzela explains that it was industrious entrepreneurs (Jane Fonda, Equinox, Peloton, LuluLemon, Bikram) who banked on that growing interest in exercise, cunningly capitalizing on its reputation as a “virtuous form of conspicuous consumption.” It’s easier to justify spending hundreds on your “health” than on an expensive handbag.
% This right here is something I’ve always struggled to understand — why do people go so out of their way to make exercising so hard (and indoors) when you could just go outside and play a game of basketball or ride a bike? And the answer, never obvious to me, is: virtuous conspicuous consumption. That’s why all the gyms have glass fronts.
% (but, not a very good or well-written review. The author keeps referencing her own relationship to the fitness industry. It reads like she’s an editor’s niece freshly graduated from an ivy being given a chance at the Times.)
@article{wise2022longcovid,
Author={Wise, Jeff},
url={https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/11/is-long-covid-actually-chronic-fatigue-syndrome.html},
Title={Has Long COVID Always Existed?},
journal={New York Magazine},
date={2022-11-04},
comment={Suggests that Long Covid is likely the same things as Cronic Fatigue Syndrome (and possibly a whole host of other diseases that have nebulous and persistent symptoms.) Goes on to argue that the basis for these diseases is psychiatric. NOT that the diseases aren’t real or should be dismissed – the best current thinking is that the symptoms are triggered by a real traumatic event (which could be a virus, but could also be a traumatic experience that isn’t a disease) and that the inability to recover is based on the mental state of the patient. Nebulous symptoms like this have been around for many years, almost always affecting middle-aged/middle class women. This is not to suggest that the patient needs to “just get over it” but that the best treatments are psychiatric: namely Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Graded Exercise Therapy (slowly increasing exercise). However, there is a huge public backlash against the idea that it is a mental disorder by people insisting the symptoms are biological, despite the fact that scientific evidence keeps piling up for a mental cause. The backlash is causing scientists to refrain from speaking out about the issue.},
category={Health, Criticality, long covid, cronic fatigue syndrome, psychiatry}
}
% See also this piece about all the fascinating non-intuitive features of chronic pain: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/03/opinion/chronic-pain-america-working-class.html}
@article{junod2017massshootings,
Author={Junod, Tom},
url={https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a30024/mass-shooters-1014/},
Title={Why Mass Shootings Keep Happening},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-10-02},
comment={An analysis of the FBI’s experts on “threat assessment” or the discipline of recognizing people on a “pathway to violence” and intervening with them before they commit an act of violence. It is premised on the idea that no one just ‘snaps’, they work their way (mentally) up to a violent event over the course of a long period of time. The method relies on someone close to the person recognizing they might be a threat and reporting them to authorities. Talks about the distinction between the high-priority, heavily-resourced counterterrorism effort, and the low-priority, minimally resourced threat assessment effort by the FBI. The article posits that threat assessment is the ONLY method for tackling the problem of mass shooters.},
category={Criticality, Health, mass shooters}
}
@article{kolata2022vitamind,
Author={Kolata, Gina},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/27/health/vitamin-d-bone-fractures.html},
Title={Study Finds Another Condition That Vitamin D Pills Do Not Help},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2022-07-27},
comment={Despite the limited title, this article covers a massive research study that found there is no benefit at all to taking Vitamin D supplments},
category={Criticality, Health, vitamins}
}
% Later this same year, the Times runs advice to take vitamin D: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/06/well/live/vitamin-d-deficiency-winter.html}
% In the comments, some people pointed out the study listed above, and claim that it is not good science.
% (On the other hand, they don’t address the fact that the above article lists MANY benefits that don’t actually come with vitamin D. It feels to me like once again conventions of medicine and doctor’s are falling behind science and not willing to shift to new information. But that’s just a feeling, not an informed opinion.)
@article{carroll2022costsharing,
Author={Carrolls, Aaron E.},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/07/opinion/medical-debt-health-care-cost.html},
Title={What’s Wrong With Health Insurance? Deductibles Are Ridiculous, for Starters.},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2022-07-07},
comment={The way cost sharing is structured under the Affordable Care Act is killing people who would rather avoid health services that cost them money out of pocket than pay for them. Research shows that the moral-hazard argument doesn’t work here. Cost-sharing and co-pays do not make people better shoppers for health insurance. The insurance reforms of the ACA reduced the cost of medical bills from six figures to five, but that’s not enough.},
category={Criticality, Health, affordable care act, insurance, co-pays, cost-sharing}
}
@article{milov2022smoking,
Author={Milov, Sarah},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/06/opinion/nicotine-smoking-cigarettes.html},
Title={The End of the Illusion That Smoking Is a Choice},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2022-07-06},
comment={The tobacco industry actually embraced warning labels on cigarette packages when they became required because they reinforced the concept that smoking is an individual choice, which protects the tobacco industry from legal liability because the individual CHOSE to use the dangerous product.},
category={Health, Criticality, smoking}
}
% Intertesting stuff here, because what at first seems like common-sense policy — warning labels on the package — actually became a tool for protecting the industry from litigation. The reality of public policy is often not the public image of it. To the cost of the public.
@article{bakalar2021robotsurgeries,
Author={Bakalar, Nicholas},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/16/well/live/robotic-surgery-benefits.html},
Title={Are Robotic Surgeries Really Better?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2021-08-16},
comment={A meta-study finds that there is virtually no difference in outcomes for surgeries performed with a robot versus surgeries performed by hand. And robot surgeries are far more expensive and take much longer.},
category={Health, Criticality, superscience, robots, surgery}
}
@article{oconnor2021alcohol,
Author={O’Connor, Anahad},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/04/well/alcohol-cancer-risk.html},
Title={Should Your Cocktail Carry a Cancer Warning?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2021-08-04},
comment={Alcohol causes cancer. Full stop. “For cancer prevention, there is no safe level of consumption.” It causes cancer at at a slightly higher rate than UV radiation. Scientists have known for decades, but it is still widely assumed a little alcohol is good for you. It isn’t. The liquor industry is, of course, fighting warnings about it.},
category={Health, Criticality, alcohol, cancer}
}
% more recent info: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/13/well/mind/alcohol-health-effects.html}
@article{kolata2021metabolism,
Author={Kolata, Gina},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/12/health/metabolism-weight-aging.html},
Title={What We Think We Know About Metabolism May Be Wrong},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2021-08-12},
comment={New, better, meta-study research shows that nearly all assumptions about the complexity of metabolism are probably wrong. Instead, this new research supports more strongly the old calorie-in, calorie-out idea. There is no difference in metabolism from younger to older adults (up to 60) and no difference between men and women and no difference between women before and after menopause. There are 4 phases in human metabolism: up to 1yo, kids burn calories like crazy, 1-20 metabolism slows by 3 percent per year, 20-60 it holds steady, 60+ is declines by 0.7 percent per year (or 20 percent by 95).},
category={Health, Criticality, metabolism}
}
@article{sgaier2021novaxers,
Author={Sgaier, Sema K.},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/05/18/opinion/covid-19-vaccine-hesitancy.html},
Title={Meet the Four Kinds of People Holding Us Back From Full Vaccination},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2021-05-18},
comment={Using marketing methods, profiles were created that broke people into five groups regarding how they feel about covid vaccines: the Enthusiasts, the Watchful, the Cost-Anxious, the System Distrusters, and the Covid Skeptics. Using groups like these allows health officials to target their strategies in ways that ignore demographic categories like age and race.},
category={Health, marketing, covid, vaccines}
}
% I’ve always said that planners could learn a lot from marketing. And this approach to covid vaccines shows how that could be true. On the other hand, despite the argument that these marketing methods can ignore traditional demographics, clearly the “cost-anxious” are going to be in the traditional demographic category of low-income. And even the copy here acknowledges that most members of system distrusters are people of color. In addition, all of these groups are associated with the traditional demographics category of having a distinct geography. So it’s possible the marketers have mostly just created different (and much cheesier) labels to get at the same ideas.
@article{klasco2020kidssugar,
Author={Klasco, Richard},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/21/well/eat/is-there-such-a-thing-as-a-sugar-high.html},
Title={Is There Such a Thing as a ‘Sugar High’?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2020-02-21},
comment={The theory that children become hyper from eating too much sugar has been thoroughly debunked (more than 20 years ago) by a major extremely-rigorous study, and also a meta study.},
category={Health, Criticality, sugar, kids, sugar high, urban legends}
}
% So, is this a case of an idea that is attractive just spreading too far? Or of many people noticing something that scientists have yet to prove.
% See the hot hands problem.
@article{hutch2020stretching,
Author={Hutchinson, Alex},
url={http://outsideonline.com/2408467/case-against-stretching-flexibility-research},
Title={The Case Against Stretching},
journal={Outside},
date={2020-01-30},
comment={80 percent of personal trainers still recommend stretching as a regular part of people’s workouts. Flexibility is still considered one of the five “major components” of physical fitness, alongside body composition, cardiovascular endurance, muscle endurance, and muscle strength. In reality, studies have repeatedly shown that flexibility does nothing for one’s health and it does not improve one’s sports performance (unless you are a gymnast). It is also not related to non-sports problems like lower back pain. Stretching before, during, or after a workout does nothing to prevent muscle soreness or reduce injury. In fact, there is evidence that holding a stretch DECREASES strength and speed for up to an hour. For some folks who like being flexibile, there’s probably little harm in it. But there is no way it is related to overall health.},
category={Criticality, Health, stretching, workouts}
}
% See also: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/15/well/move/stretching-exercise-workout.html}
@article{horgan2020cancer,
Author={Horgan, John},
url={https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/the-cancer-industry-hype-vs-reality/},
Title={The Cancer Industry: Hype vs. Reality},
journal={Scientific American},
date={2020-02-12},
comment={Despite a quarte of a trillion dollars spent since Nixon declared a ‘war on cancer’ in 1971, and all the hype surrounding cancer research and science, 600,000 people still die every year of the disease. Adjusting for aging populations (that is, putting cancer healthcare in a more favorable light because more people are living longer to die of cancer) mortality rates from cancer have declined 30 percent since 1991. But 1991 follows 60 years of increases — the current mortality rate for all cancers is just under what it was in 1930. The increases came with the increase in smoking. The fall came with the reduction of smoking. We are simply back to where we started, in terms of mortality numbers. “without reductions in smoking there would have been virtually no reduction in overall cancer mortality in either men or women since the early 1990s.” “Clinical cancer trials have the highest failure rate compared with other therapeutic areas,” “72 new anticancer drugs approved by the FDA between 2004 and 2014 prolonged survival for an average of 2.1 months. A 2017 report concluded that most cancer drug approvals have not been shown to, or do not, improve clinically relevant end points, including survival and quality of life. The authors worried that the FDA may be approving many costly, toxic drugs that do not improve overall survival.” “A 2015 meta-analysis by epidemiologist John Ioannidis (renowned for bringing the scientific replication crisis to light) and others found no reductions in all-cause mortality from tests for cancer of the breast, prostate, colon, lung, cervix, mouth or ovaries for asymptomatic patients.” “Studies of tests for a specific cancer generally look at mortality attributed to that cancer. Mammograms are thus deemed effective if women who get mammograms die less often from breast cancer than women who do not get mammograms. This method can overstate the benefits of tests, because it might omit deaths resulting, directly or indirectly, from the diagnosis. After all, surgery, chemotherapy and radiation can have devastating iatrogenic effects, including heart disease, opportunistic infections, other forms of cancer and suicide.” “A 2015 analysis points out, in general people do not live longer as a result of early detection. They simply live longer with a diagnosis of cancer, with all its harmful emotional, economic and physiological consequences.” Solution: “In “The Case for Being a Medical Conservative,” a manifesto published last year, four physicians (including the aforementioned Vinay Prasad) urge colleagues to recognize the human body’s “inherent healing properties” and to acknowledge “how little effect the clinician has on outcomes.” Physicians will thus protect themselves “against our greatest foe—hubris.”},
category={Criticality, Health, Science, cancer}
}
% See also: Azra Raza, an oncologist at Columbia, 2019 book The First Cell: And the Costs of Pursuing Cancer to the Last.
@article{lopez2020foodexp,
Author={López-Alt, Kenji},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/article/expiration-dates-coronavirus.html},
Title={The Food Expiration Dates You Should Actually Follow},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2020-04-15},
comment={Food expiration dates are not mandated or regulated by anyone. In almost all cases they are just a guess by the manufacturer. Except baby food, which has some minor federal requirements. Instead, this article hands out a lot of guidelines for food spoilage: whiter flours and rice last longer than brown. Fats go rancid if not refrigerated (think nuts), eggs stay good for months.},
category={Health, Criticality, food expiration dates}
}
@article{frakt2020aa,
Author={Frakt, Austin and Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/11/upshot/alcoholics-anonymous-new-evidence.html},
Title={Alcoholics Anonymous vs. Other Approaches: The Evidence Is Now In},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2020-03-11},
comment={Better research and bigger studies have found definitively that Alcoholics Anonmyous is both effect and cost-effective. It even beat out Cognitive Behavior Therapy. So previous doubts and criticisms about the program should be left behind.},
category={Criticality, Health, alcoholics anonymous}
}
% So instead of the long-held critical belief that science suggest aa is hippie feelgood bullshit, in fact it is another thing like hot-hands where scientists should have been giving more credence to the wisdom of large quantities of people recognizing a pattern.
@article{allen2020buildinghealth,
Author={Allen, Joseph G.},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/04/opinion/coronavirus-buildings.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage},
Title={Your Building Can Make You Sick or Keep You Well},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2020-03-04},
comment={Argues that one of the key things for promoting health is to make sure buildings DON’T use recirculated air — which is very common in modern buildings because of HVAC systems and the effort to conserve heat/cold and energy.},
category={Health, Criticality, disease, buildings, architecture, air recirculation}
}
% He doesn’t talk about, but it’s implied, that this is a major issue with MODERN buildings, but not with old buildings.
% Very simply – opening windows is healthy. In the future, they will look back at this time as crazy for sealing up buildings.
% He does talk about how it is very likely that the CORVID-19 virus is airborne, even though the CDC isn’t saying that.
% See this study which found similar coronaviruses (SARS and MERS) were found in the lower respiratory tract, which can only happen if they are airborne:
% \url{https://bmcinfectdis.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12879-019-3707-y}
% Virus that only spread via droplets can be filtered by plain surgical masks. Viruses spread airborne require N95 (regular, not surgical N95) masks.
% The fact that they are telling people that surgical masks don’t work so don’t bother, and that health care workers need N95s suggests they KNOW it’s airborne.
% So the safest way to avoid coronavirus is to avoid crowds and especially avoid buildings and transportation that recirculates air over a large number of people.
@article{reynolds2019barefoot,
Author={Reynolds. Gretchen},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/17/well/move/born-to-walk-barefoot.html},
Title={Born to Walk Barefoot},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2019-07-17},
comment={Walking in shoes changes the form of people’s stride. Calluses make walking barefoot more comfortable, but do not reduce the sensation of the ground or our feeling of what we are walking on.},
category={Health, Criticality, barefoot}
}
% On the opposite end of the spectrum, the maximal super-padded sneakers cause people to run in ways that are likely to cause injuries:
% \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/19/well/move/super-cushioned-running-shoes-maximalist-pronation-injuries.html}
% Yet, they DO make runners faster, seems like people are now willing to trade health for speed (thanks to marketing, mostly):
% \url{https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/12/13/upshot/nike-vaporfly-next-percent-shoe-estimates.html}
@article{hutchinson2024running,
Author={Hutchinson, Alex},
url={https://www.outsideonline.com/health/training-performance/persistence-hunting-and-evolution/},
Title={Why You (Yes, You) Were Born to Run},
journal={Outside},
date={2024-06-06},
comment={The evidence is stacking up that humans worldwide were persistence hunters, and so evolved to run all day.},
category={Health, running, Criticality, persistence hunting, Humanity}
}
@article{mcginty2020temp,
Author={McGinty, Jo Craven},
url={https://www.wsj.com/articles/98-6-degrees-fahrenheit-isnt-the-average-any-more-11579257001},
Title={98.6 Degrees Fahrenheit Isn’t the Average Anymore},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2020-02-17},
comment={New research shows that the temperature of the average human body has dropped to 97.5 degrees from the 98.6 average when it was studied 150 years ago.},
category={Health, Criticality, body temperature}
}
% See also: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/12/well/live/fever-normal-body-temperature.html}
@article{ofri2020nonprofithospitals,
Author={Ofri, Danielle},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/20/opinion/nonprofit-hospitals.html},
Title={Why Are Nonprofit Hospitals So Highly Profitable?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2020-02-20},
comment={Many nonprofit hospitals are extremely profitable, causing communities to start asking if it is worth giving up taxes to hospitals that are getting rich and can afford heavy compensation for top executives. To be nonprofit these hospitals have to show they benefit the community. Part of doing that is to include the underpayments they get from medicaid – even though medicaide acts as an insurance pool for high-risks patients that would otherwise be unable to afford any care at all. It’s also complex because many rural nonprofit hospitals are critical to the health of communities and struggling to barely get by. Seven out of ten of the most profitable hospitals in America are private nonprofit hospitals.},
category={Health, Criticality, nonprofits, hospitals}
}
@article{frakt2019healthspending,
Author={Frakt, Austin},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/07/upshot/health-care-waste-study.html},
Title={The Huge Waste in the U.S. Health System},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2019-10-07},
comment={20-25 percent of American health care spending is totally wasted money. That’s more than 760 billion a year — more than the government spends on the military. The largest source of the waste is administrative costs — that is, time and resources devoted to billing and reporting to insurers.},
category={Health, health care spending, waste, Economics}
}
@article{kolata2019meat,
Author={Kolata, Gina},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/30/health/red-meat-heart-cancer.html},
Title={Eat Less Red Meat, Scientists Said. Now Some Believe That Was Bad Advice.},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2019-09-30},
comment={A large-scale study finds that there is little to no scientific evidence that eating meat is bad for you.},
category={Health, Science, meat}
}
% See also Aaron Carrol’s comments on this:
% \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/01/upshot/beef-health-climate-impact.html}
% Where he points out that 30% of the ice-free land on earth is used for livestock production.
% (He got that wrong, following his link for it, it was actually 23%.)
% Also that since ground beef is made of leftover parts and dairy cattle, switching to soy alternatives does nothing to reduce the number of cattle.
% Only reducing steaks eaten would do that.
@article{carey2019pedophiles,
Author={Carey},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/29/us/pedophiles-online-sex-abuse.html},
Title={Preying on Children: The Emerging Psychology of Pedophiles},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2019-09-29},
comment={Most pedophiles remain attracted to the same-age boys or girls who first attracted them at the start of puberty, and their attractions fail to mature. “People don’t choose what arouses them — they discover it.” 1 to 4 percent of men and women are attracted to children. The origin of pedophilia appears to be biological — there’s subtle physical traits found among pedophiles, which indicates that the causes is prenatal — a problem with development in the womb (not genetics). The idea that pedophiles were themselves abused as children now has less support, but child victims are at risk of more chaotic adulthood. “A chaotic childhood of any kind increases the likelihood of a choatic adulthood.” Whether viewing images leads to abuse is under debate, with the current evidence suggesting that a large portion of people who seek out images have already commited abuse.},
category={Health, pedophilia, crime, psychology}
}
@article{hurley2019cuba,
Author={DAN HURLEY},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/05/15/magazine/diplomat-disorder.html},
Title={Was It an Invisible Attack on U.S. Diplomats, or Something Stranger?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2019-05-15},
comment={The latest theory on the “unknown energy attacks” on US Diplomats in Cuba in 2016 is that it was not an attack at all, but mass “function disorder.” This is when something goes wrong with the software in the brain - often triggered by a traumatic event - that causes the sufferer to experience adverse physical effects (like crippling or neurological damage) not because of a physical injury, but because of a neurological mis-wiring. This is actually a very common disorder, but little understood or known. Also covers some of this history of how in the 19th Century it was widely accepted that physical issues could have a neurological basis, and this had to kinda be rediscovered after Freud derailed the idea for 100 years.},
category={Health, neurology, functional disorder}
}
@article{owen2019noisepollution,
Author={Owen, David},
url={https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/05/13/is-noise-pollution-the-next-big-public-health-crisis},
Title={Is Noise Pollution the Next Big Public-Health Crisis?},
journal={The New Yorker},
date={2019-05-06},
comment={A number of scientists and citizen scientists have been tracking the noise levels in cities for years and finding that the levels are consistently damaging to people. Cites research showing that loud rock concerts are pleasurable (see todd2000vestibular). Discusses how hard it is to understand the decible scale and references the Harmonica index which uses a simpler graph. Talks about how the train on the Manhattan bridge is the equivalent of using a lawnmower in loudness. More recent research shows that damage begins at levels much lower than previously though, at shorter exposure times, and results in a permanent reduction in neural response. Also discusses damage to other animals, particularly in the ocean. Also discusses an experiment with a fake road built in the wilderness that showed that animals immediately were affected when traffic noise was played, even at moderate volume. We were evolved for noise levels that are just far far lower (quiet woods) than we have now.},
category={Health, sound, noise, Urbanism}
}
% Noise is a poison that we catastrophically evolved to enjoy, just like sugar.
% Once again, the problem is, effectively, cars (and other motor vehicles).
@article{daw2019healthcare,
Author={Daw, Jamie},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/20/opinion/health-care-germany.html},
Title={A Better Path to Universal Health Care},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2019-02-20},
comment={Argues that we should look to Germany for a model of universal health care, where everyone is required to have health care, but people get to choose among many nonprofit healthcare providers.},
category={Health, healthcare}
}
@article{minick2018leadbullets,
Author={Minick, Jim},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/01/opinion/get-the-lead-out-of-bullets.html},
Title={Get the Lead Out of Bullets},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-11-dd},
comment={Argues that lead in bullets poisons hunters who eat animals killed with lead, and more importantly poisons carrion-feeding birds that eat carcasses killed by hunters with lead bullets.},
category={Health, lead, hunting, bullets}
}
@article{asher2018heat,
Author={Asher, Jeff},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/21/upshot/a-rise-in-murder-lets-talk-about-the-weather.html},
Title={A Rise in Murder? Let’s Talk About the Weather},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-09-21},
comment={The murder rate really does go up with hotter weather. Nobody knows why. (The idea that people are just grumpier in hotter weather has only inconclusive science supporting it.) But some people worry we’re in for more murders with climate change.},
category ={Health, heat, murder rate, climate change}
}
% all the science about this is “correlation not causation” and then they list all the possible causes, one of the most likely being that people are just outside more
% the funny thing about that is, if it’s true that’s the reason, the murder rate will likely go DOWN as it gets hotter, because people will spend more hot days inside in the AC
% UNLESS, even while the AC days increase, the more moderate hot days do too, so people spend MORE time outside… this is where science kinda breaksdown and it becomes a really good example of how trying to do science in the face of human behavior and sociology is incredibly complicated and nearly impossible to get anyting predictive out of.
@article{HARTMANN2018,
title = “Calculating the contribution of sleep problems to undergraduates’ academic success”,
journal = “Sleep Health”,
year = “2018”,
issn = “2352-7218”,
doi = “https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sleh.2018.07.002”,
url = “http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352721818301190”,
author = “Monica E. Hartmann and J. Roxanne Prichard”,
keywords = “Sleep, Higher education, Academic success, Regression analysis, GPA”,
abstract = “Sleep disturbances were found to be a significant independent predictor of academic problems; on average, each additional day per week that a student experienced sleep problems raised the probability of dropping a course by 10 percent and lowered the cumulative GPA by 0.02. Factors such as stress, binge drinking, marijuana and other illicit drug use, which typically receive more attention by university administrators, had similar or relatively smaller negative associations with academic success as compared to disturbed sleep. Approximately three quarters of students surveyed reported never receiving information about sleep from their university.”,
comment = {College students who don’t get enough sleep have worse academic outcomes than those who drink or take drugs, but colleges rarely talk about this problem.},
category = {Health, Criticality, sleep, college}
}
@article{oconnor2018whentoeat,
Author={O’Connor, Anahad},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/24/well/when-we-eat-or-dont-eat-may-be-critical-for-health.html},
Title={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/24/well/when-we-eat-or-dont-eat-may-be-critical-for-health.html},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-07-24},
comment={The latest recap of the research showing that our bodies have circadian rhythms just like our minds do. Organs turn on and off at different times of the day. Many studies are showing that our bodies respond best to eating in a 8-10 hour window, and not eating outside of that. Most people eat over a 15 hour period, potentially stressing our organs, or tricking them into working like it’s the middle of the day when it’s the middle of the night. Also covers research suggesting that its best to eat more in the morning and smaller amounts in the evening.},
category={Health, food, eating, circadian rhythms}
}
% This is similar to the stuff I was reading about how it’s best to stop eating before 9pm because being upright helps you digest. I can’t remember where I read that.
@article{Velasquez-Manoff2018meatallergy,
Author={Velasquez-Manoff, Moises},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/24/magazine/what-the-mystery-of-the-tick-borne-meat-allergy-could-reveal.html},
Title={What the Mystery of the Tick-Borne Meat Allergy Could Reveal},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-07-24},
comment={Tick bites in the south eastern US appear to be behind a mysterious allergy to meat, but nobody can explain why all of a sudden this is a thing that is happening. It is hoped that the unique character of this allergy can expose why we have been in an allergy crisis for the last few decades.},
category={Health, meat allergy, ticks, hygiene hypothesis, allergies}
}
% This is one of those irony-of-the-gods things: the biggest meat-eating region of the country is afflicted with an allergy to meat.
@article{carroll2018pragmatictrials,
Author={Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/23/upshot/what-if-a-study-showed-opioids-werent-usually-needed.html},
Title={What if a Study Showed Opioids Weren’t Usually Needed? },
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-07-23},
comment={Randomized and blind trials of drugs test “efficacy” — whether they work or not in optimal conditions. But there is also a concept in medicine of “effectiveness” which tests whether a drug works in the real world. To test this requires a “pragmatic trial” which tests the drug as part of real-world practice (with imperfect test subjects, mixed with other drugs, and adjustments to reflect treatment). Carroll’s describes here a pragmatic trial of treatment for pain with opiates that found in the real world pain could be treated equally well with non-opiates as with opiates (and without the risk of opiate addiction).},
category={Health, pragmatic trials, randomized trials, opiates}
}
% Includes links to both a reflective piece about pragmatic trials, and a classic paper about pragmatic trials, both of which are probably worth reading.
% This kind of thing makes me wonder about the relationship between this idea and planning, or with wicked problems.
% It might be worth reading that classic paper on pragmatic trials with the context of how it might be applied to planning in mind.
@article{schaaff2012comparative,
title={A comparative examination of suicide rates among hetero-and homosexual adolescents and young adults},
author={Schaaff, Arianna},
url={https://cola.unh.edu/sites/cola.unh.edu/files/student-journals/P12_Schaaff.pdf},
journal={Perspectives, Spring 2012},
pages={18–27},
year={2012},
comment={Homosexual youth are at higher risk of suicide than Heterosexual youth. But that risk statistically disappears as they enter adulthood.},
category={Health, suicide, lgbtq youth}
}
% It is somewhat disturbing to me that by far the group with the highest risk
% of suicide is middle-aged white males. But I don’t think I have ever seen an
% article calling for outreach specifically to that group, presumably because
% it might not seem politically correct. But other than American Indians and
% the mentally ill, the demographic of middle-aged white males is frighteningly
% higher as a group than any other way you slice the data.
% Even while lgbtq youth are at 2-3x the risk of suicide, white males over 65 are
% at 3-4x the risk:
% \url{https://ok.gov/odmhsas/documents/suicide%20infographic.pdf}
% (See “Those at higherst risk” section.)
% When the rate among women rises rapidly, it’s news:
% \url{https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/06/14/619338703/u-s-suicides-rates-are-rising-faster-among-women-than-men}
% But while they mention that the rate is higher among men, where are articles talk about how we need to focus on and reach older white males to save them from suicide?
% Of course the old dudes might be offing themselves more often just because they have more guns…
% See also this Times article about suicide rates increasing with gun ownership:
% \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/11/opinion/coronavirus-gun-deaths-suicide.html}
@article{rabin2018lasik,
Author={Rabin, Roni Caryn},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/11/well/lasik-complications-vision.html},
Title={Lasik’s Risks Are Coming Into Sharper Focus},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-06-11},
comment={There is more and more evidence that there are real risks to getting LASIK surgery to correct vision quality. About 50 percent of patients have negative side effects. Some not-quite-determined percentage have dramatic long term side effects like blurry vision or pain. Some people deem this unacceptable since it is an optional procedure. Especially since the LASIK industry promotes it as one of the safest surgeries. Loss of ability to distinguish contrast is common.},
category={Health, Science, eyes, laser surgery, lasers, lasik}
}
@article{edboard2018asylums,
Author={Editorial Board, NY Times},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/02/opinion/trump-asylum-mental-health-guns.html},
Title={The Crazy Talk About Bringing Back Asylums},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-06-02},
comment={Talks about the history of, and problems with, the old “insane asylums” and why returning to those would be a bad idea. But also lays out a set of reform ideas to help address the drastic need for mental health care in the US without the asylums.},
category={Health, mental health, asylums}
}
@article{victor2018sneeze,
Author={Victor, Daniel},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/27/health/how-to-sneeze.html},
Title={Sneeze Into Your Elbow, Not Your Hand. Please.},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-02-27},
comment={Reinterates the now-established advice to sneeze into the crook of your elbow rather than into your hands to prevent the spread of disease.},
category={Health, sneezing, public health, germs}
}
% This article says that many people do not know about this advice yet.
% But to me, the amazing thing is how many people DO this. It’s a real public health victory.
% In exactly the opposite to how it is so difficult to get people to change behavior, for some
% reason this one totally caught on an amazing pace. It’s a public health victory, not a failing.
@article{sacks2018mommybrain,
Author={Sacks, Alexandra},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/11/well/family/reframing-mommy-brain.html},
Title={Reframing ‘Mommy Brain’},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-05-11},
comment={Argues that “mommy brain” or “baby brain” is a myth. That there might be some cognitive loss from having a baby, but those might reflect the brain changing to adapt to having a child — with priorities on emotional attachment and defense. Or it’s possible cognitive changes are simply a result of the added stress of raising a kid.},
category={Health, mommy brain, baby brain, urban legends, Criticality, Science}
}
% This op-ed is pretty unconvincing because it is just proposing a bunch of poorly-evidenced theories as to why baby brain might not be a decline, just a change in brain function.
% Since the science is so weak, it seems to me that sure, it MIGHT not be, but it also MIGHT be the case that something that the culture has instinctively latched onto might have some merit worth considering, even if it’s not politically the correct thing to do — once again see the revised research on “hot hands” in basketball.
% The science does pretty strongly suggest there is SOME kind of change to mothers’ thinking because of pregnancy. Assuming that’s a GOOD thing because you want it to be is bad science. Also assuming that the changes which may have been good in the context of cavewomen (increased vigilance about threats for example) might not be something that in the context of modern culture people actually want to gain in exchange for potentially lowered memory and quickness of rational thinking.
% See also this article about current science on mommy brain: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/19/health/pregnancy-brain-change.html}
% Which DOES find brain matter loss during pregnancy — though this is not an indicator of declining function, and may just be an indicator of increased brain plasticity.
% While it found CLEAR evidence of brain change in mothers during pregnancy, it did NOT find any evidence of brain change in fathers.
% See more updated research here: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/05/parenting/mommy-brain-science.html}
@article{teynolds2018immunesystem,
Author={Reynolds, Gretchen},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/25/well/move/how-strenuous-exercise-affects-our-immune-system.html},
Title={How Strenuous Exercise Affects Our Immune System},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-04-25},
comment={For decades there was a myth, supported by weak science, that strenuous exercise lowered the body’s immune system response. There is a new review of research now that suggests this is wrong, and in fact strenuous execise may increase immune system response. It is at least known to be generally good for immune sytem response.},
category={Health, exercise, Crticiality}
}
@article{Kruszelnick2008mussels,
Author={Kruszelnick, Karl S.},
url={http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2008/10/29/2404364.htm},
Title={Mussel myth an open and shut case},
journal={ABC Science},
date={2008-10-29},
comment={Research shows that some mussels will open early when boiled — before all bacteria would be killed — and closed mussels are perfectly safe to eat. So the myth that it isn’t safe to eat closed mussels is wrong in both directions.},
category={Health, food, mussels, shellfish, cooking, urban legends, myths}
}
@techreport{NBERw24445,
title = “Saving Lives by Tying Hands: The Unexpected Effects of Constraining Health Care Providers”,
author = “Jonathan Gruber and Thomas P. Hoe and George Stoye”,
institution = “National Bureau of Economic Research”,
type = “Working Paper”,
series = “Working Paper Series”,
number = “24445”,
year = “2018”,
month = “March”,
doi = {10.3386/w24445},
URL = “http://www.nber.org/papers/w24445”,
abstract = {The emergency department (ED) is a complex node of healthcare delivery that is facing market and regulatory pressure across developed economies to reduce wait times. In this paper we study how ED doctors respond to such incentives, by focussing on a landmark policy in England that imposed strong incentives to treat ED patients within four hours. Using bunching techniques, we estimate that the policy reduced affected patients’ wait times by 19 minutes, yet distorted a number of medical decisions. In response to the policy, doctors increased the intensity of ED treatment and admitted more patients for costly inpatient care. We also find a striking 14% reduction in mortality. To determine the mechanism behind these health improvements, we exploit heterogeneity in patient severity and hospital crowding, and find strongly suggestive evidence that it is the reduced wait times, rather than the additional admits, that saves lives. Overall we conclude that, despite distorting medical decisions, constraining ED doctors can induce cost-effective reductions in mortality.},
comment={Patients get better results from being treated faster, even if the doctor’s decision-making is poorer.},
category={Health, Economics, hospitals}
}
@article{newman2012neurosurgeon,
Author={Newman, Andy},
url={https://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/18/saving-an-officers-life-with-running-clothes-beneath-his-scrubs/},
Title={Saving an Officer’s Life, With Running Clothes Beneath His Scrubs},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2012-04-18},
comment={The story of a neurosurgeon saving the life of a cop stabbed in the head. He expresses dismay that the knife was pulled out, and claims that is why Steve Irwin died too — when he pulled the barb out of his heart himself.},
category={Health, neurosurgery, steve irwin}
}
% This is the neurosurgeon who will work on my aunt Linda.
@article{doi:10.1001/jama.2018.1150,
author = {Papanicolas I and Woskie LR and Jha AK},
title = {Health care spending in the united states and other high-income countries},
journal = {JAMA},
volume = {319},
number = {10},
pages = {1024-1039},
year = {2018},
doi = {10.1001/jama.2018.1150},
URL = { + http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/jama.2018.1150},
eprint = {/data/journals/jama/936804/jama_papanicolas_2018_sc_180001.pdf},
comment = {The United States spent approximately twice as much as other high-income countries on medical care, yet utilization rates in the United States were largely similar to those in other nations. Prices of labor and goods, including pharmaceuticals, and administrative costs appeared to be the major drivers of the difference in overall cost between the United States and other high-income countries. As patients, physicians, policy makers, and legislators actively debate the future of the US health system, data such as these are needed to inform policy decisions.},
category = {Health, health care, health care cost, health care spending}
}
% see NY Times coverage: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/13/upshot/united-states-health-care-resembles-rest-of-world.html}
% While health care in the US is more expensive than everywhere else, it functions pretty simiarly to comparable countries, even those with radically different systems like single-payer. Patients use similar amounts of health care, and there is a similar number of general practitioners vs specialists. The extra cost seems to be mostly administrative. It’s insanely complicated to pay for health care in the US.
@Article{Ding2014,
author={Ding, Ding
and Gebel, Klaus
and Phongsavan, Philayrath
and Bauman, Adrian E.
and Merom, Dafna},
editor={Adams, Marc A.},
title={Driving: A Road to Unhealthy Lifestyles and Poor Health Outcomes},
journal={PLoS One},
year={2014},
month={Jun},
day={09},
publisher={Public Library of Science},
address={San Francisco, USA},
volume={9},
number={6},
pages={e94602},
abstract={BACKGROUND: Driving is a common part of modern society, but its potential effects on health are not well understood. PURPOSE: The present cross-sectional study (n = 37,570) examined the associations of driving time with a series of health behaviors and outcomes in a large population sample of middle-aged and older adults using data from the Social, Economic, and Environmental Factor Study conducted in New South Wales, Australia, in 2010. METHODS: Multiple logistic regression was used in 2013 to examine the associations of usual daily driving time with health-related behaviors (smoking, alcohol use, diet, physical activity, sedentary behavior, sleep) and outcomes (obesity, general health, quality of life, psychological distress, time stress, social functioning), adjusted for socio-demographic characteristics. RESULTS: Findings suggested that longer driving time was associated with higher odds for smoking, insufficient physical activity, short sleep, obesity, and worse physical and mental health. The associations consistently showed a dose-response pattern and more than 120 minutes of driving per day had the strongest and most consistent associations with the majority of outcomes. CONCLUSION: This study highlights driving as a potential lifestyle risk factor for public health. More population-level multidisciplinary research is needed to understand the mechanism of how driving affects health.},
note={PONE-D-13-48588[PII]},
note={24911017[pmid]},
issn={1932-6203},
doi={10.1371/journal.pone.0094602},
url={http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4049576/},
comment={What looks like a very high quality study finds an association between driving and all sorts of negative health outcomes. Driving is not just unhealthy because of the direct physical risk, but also because it encourages all kinds of generally unhealthy outcomes.},
category={Health, Transportation, driving}
}
@article{kennedy2018longevity,
Author={Kennedy, Pagan},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/09/opinion/sunday/longevity-pritikin-atkins.html},
Title={The Secret to a Longer Life? Don’t Ask These Dead Longevity Researchers},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-03-09},
comment={An unscientific review of when people with some specific remedy for living into old age died. Turns out most of them died around 70 years of age, including Nathan Pritikin who argued for a low-fat diet and Robert Atkins who argued for the exact opposite. Includes the story of Jerome Rodale who the NY Times called the “guru of the organic food cult” and then sat down next to Dick Cavett on his TV show at the age of 72, proclaimed he would live to be 100, and died. While all of the stuff about longevity gurus is fluff, the article moves into a great place by the end, arguing that the best gains in health are not choices you can make individually, but public health choices, particularly around pollution. Thus longevity and health are things that people need to be fighting for OTHER people’s health, not their own, in order to see better outcomes. (That is, after an individual stops smoking and starts walking, of course.)},
category={Health, longevity, public health, individualism}
}
% The problems with health are societal. The exploitation of people’s feeling that they can make individual choices that result in better health outcomes is based on the American cultural value of rugged individualism.
% Of course, people could just start riding their bikes instead of driving around. But even with that you could argue that in order to get far MORE people riding bikes - to the point where you would see positive health outcomes, requires planning that reduces cars and makes riding bikes easier. It’s STILL not an individual decision. But is ANYTHING an individual decison really?
% Rugged individualism has to be the greatest myth of them all.
@article{haas2018psychedelics,
Author={Haas, Lidija},
url={https://harpers.org/archive/2018/02/new-books-194/3/},
Title={BLUE DREAMS: THE SCIENCE AND THE STORY OF THE DRUGS THAT CHANGED OUR MINDS},
journal={Harper’s Magazine},
year={2018},
month={02},
comment={A brief review of Blue Dreams: the science and the story of the drugs that changed our minds by Lauren Slater. Which looks at the history of anti-depressants, and argues that while there have been great advances and they are necessary, the pharmaceutical industry is actively ignoring more promising older treatments. Cites research showing that therapy by amateurs who are empathetic is just as effective as trained psychiatrists. And that therapy combined with psychedelics might prove to be the most effective treatment for mental disorders — because breakthroughs come from dream analysis and shifting rigid thinking.},
category={Health, psychedelics, anti-depressants, depression, pharmaceutical companies}
}
% If these ideas that psychedelics plus therapy lead to new narratives is true, it raises an interesting question about all the successful artists who have done heavy drugs.
% Maybe they were simply onto something early on - they tapped drugs to shift the narrative of themselves to, say, rockstar,
% (And, hopefully, got lucky enough that the drugs didn’t kill them in the process.)
% Maybe there IS something to the idea that drugs can lead to successful creative lives.
% See this argument by Aaron Carroll that psychedelics should be made easier to study: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/17/upshot/can-psychedelics-be-therapy-allow-research-to-find-out.html}
% And this not-very-good article about the benefits of psychedelic therapy: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/05/15/magazine/health-issue-my-adventures-with-hallucinogenic-drugs-medicine.html}
% This review of Michael Pollan’s new book adds some details about how the spread of psychedelics may have been a CIA or some spy agency’s plot:
% \url{https://harpers.org/archive/2018/06/revolution-in-the-head/}
% It’s hard to imagine what is suggested here: that the CIA was trying to undermine the radical left with drugs. (Though… not totally impossible.) It does seem likely, based on what was said here, that there was SOME coordinated effort to spread psychedelics. Possibly to have a larger human population to test the drugs on.
% It’s possible psychedelics open “critical periods” in humans (and mice) where people are suddenly capable of learning new things quickly: \url{https://www.wired.com/story/the-psychedelic-scientist-who-sends-brains-back-to-childhood/}
% And now the pendulum swimgs the other way. It seems that pschedelics are once again being pushed by crazy people, and real benefits (if any) may be obscured by bad science and hippie agendas: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/23/opinion/psychedelics-mdma-mental-health.html}
@article{carey2018homelessness,
Author={Carey, Benedict},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/06/health/nakesha-williams-involuntary-commitment.html},
Title={Nakesha Williams Died Homeless on a Manhattan Street. Should She Have Been Forced Into Treatment?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-03-06},
comment={An interview with Sam Tsemberis, founder of Pathways to Housing, in the context of a Times article on the death of a homeless woman who actively refused treatment. Tsemberis argues that “radical acceptance of another person’s point of view” is necessary for a positive outcome in a case like this. There needs to be other options for treatment beyond involuntary commitment: for obvious reasons — homelessness is caused by an entire spectrum of human issues, and therefore needs and entire spectrum of humanity-based solutions.},
category={Health, Humanity, Politics, homelessness}
}
@article{kristof2018poisons,
Author={Kristof, Nicholas},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/02/23/opinion/columnists/poisons-in-our-bodies.html},
Title={What Poisons Are in Your Body?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-02-23},
comment={Kristof discusses how endocrine disruptors are poisons that are in everything: fire retardents for foam, ATM receipts, plastic bottles. Poison permeate our environment because chemical companies lobby hard for a minimum of restrictions. And when a certain chemical gets a bad reputation it is often swapped out for an even worse, but lesser-known one.},
category={Health, chemicals, poisons, endocrine disruptors}
}
@article{oconnor2018diet,
Author={O’Connor, Anahad},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/20/well/eat/counting-calories-weight-loss-diet-dieting-low-carb-low-fat.html},
Title={The Key to Weight Loss Is Diet Quality, Not Quantity, a New Study Finds},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-02-20},
comment={A rigorous study finds that focussing on a quality diet high in fruits and vegetables and whole foods and low in sugar, processed carbohydrates, and junk food leads to weight loss in many individuals even if calories are not counted, and restrictions are not placed on quantity of food. Most participants actually DID reduce their calorie intake, but by focusing on the quality of the food they didn’t have to feel hungry, and didn’t have to worry about how much they were eating. They also tested the DNA background of participants and found that genetic heritage has little if anything to do with weight loss compared to simply focusing on quality of food. They authors suggest public health officials (finally) start shifting away from warning people about the number of calories they eat, and encourage them to simply eat better quality diets.},
category={Health, diet, calories, calorie counting, weight loss, public health}
}
% See further analysis here: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/26/upshot/what-we-know-and-dont-know-about-how-to-lose-weight.html}
% Aaron Carroll suggests that the thing this study really proves is neither a diet low in carbs OR low in fat changes ability to lose weight.
% The biggest thing (to my mind) that is NOT covered here, is that BOTH diets tested told people to avoid added sugars. Carbs might not make you fat, but sugars are still on the strong-possibility list. And processed foods in general, of course.
@techreport{NBERw24340,
title = “Sunlight and Protection Against Influenza”,
author = “David Slusky and Richard J. Zeckhauser”,
institution = “National Bureau of Economic Research”,
type = “Working Paper”,
series = “Working Paper Series”,
number = “24340”,
year = “2018”,
month = “February”,
doi = {10.3386/w24340},
URL = “http://www.nber.org/papers/w24340”,
abstract = {Recent medical literature suggests that vitamin D supplementation protects against acute respiratory tract infection. Humans exposed to sunlight produce vitamin D directly. This paper investigates how differences in sunlight, as measured over several years within states and during the same calendar month, affect influenza incidence. We find that sunlight strongly protects against influenza. This relationship is driven by sunlight in late summer and early fall, when there are sufficient quantities of both sunlight and influenza activity. A 10% increase in relative sunlight decreases the influenza index in September by 3 points on a 10-point scale. This effect is far greater than the effect of vitamin D supplementation in randomized trials, a differential due to broad exposure to sunlight, hence herd immunity. We also find suggestive evidence, consistent with herd immunity theory, that the protective sunlight effect is strongest with a middle level of population density.},
category = {Health, vitamin d, flu, influenza, sunlight}
}
@article{khullar2018responsibility,
Author={Khullar, Dhruv},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/10/upshot/youre-sick-whose-fault-is-that.html},
Title={You’re Sick. Whose Fault Is That?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-01-10},
comment={While personal responsibility is an important part of health care, it is only a small part of effective and cost conscious treatment. Cites a paper that finds, for instance, that quiting smoking actually INCREASES lifetime health costs. It is not clear that the push for more individual responsibility in health reduces costs, or simply shifts costs from insurance companies to individuals. And emphasizing indivisual responsibility undermines the fact that even people who made bad choices and can’t afford health care, still have a fundamental right to it.},
category={Health, Criticality, smoking, health costs}
}
@article{martin2017maternalfatalities,
Author={Martin, Nina and Montagne, Renee},
url={https://www.propublica.org/article/die-in-childbirth-maternal-death-rate-health-care-system},
Title={The Last Person You’d Expect to Die in Childbirth},
journal={ProPublica},
date={2017-05-12},
comment={THE ABILITY TO PROTECT the health of mothers and babies in childbirth is a basic measure of a society’s development. Yet every year in the U.S., 700 to 900 women die from pregnancy or childbirth-related causes, and some 65,000 nearly die — by many measures, the worst record in the developed world. American women are more than three times as likely as Canadian women to die in the maternal period (defined by the Centers for Disease Control as the start of pregnancy to one year after delivery or termination), six times as likely to die as Scandinavians. In every other wealthy country, and many less affluent ones, maternal mortality rates have been falling; in Great Britain, the journal Lancet recently noted, the rate has declined so dramatically that “a man is more likely to die while his partner is pregnant than she is.” But in the U.S., maternal deaths increased from 2000 to 2014. In a recent analysis by the CDC Foundation, nearly 60 percent of such deaths were preventable. While maternal mortality is significantly more common among African Americans, low-income women and in rural areas, pregnancy and childbirth complications kill women of every race and ethnicity, education and income level, in every part of the U.S.''}, category={Health, maternal mortality, pregnancy, childbirth} } % See also this follow up article about how for African-Americans the statistics are even worse, and no social factor except race (not income, health care, or education) increases liklihood of safety: \url{https://www.propublica.org/article/nothing-protects-black-women-from-dying-in-pregnancy-and-childbirth} % It tells you that you can’t educate your way out of this problem. You can’t health-care-access your way out of this problem. There’s something inherently wrong with the system that’s not valuing the lives of black women equally to white women.’’
@article{fisher2017americanguns,
Author={Fischer, Max and Keller, Josh},
url={https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/11/07/world/americas/mass-shootings-us-international.html},
Title={What Explains U.S. Mass Shootings? International Comparisons Suggest an Answer},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-11-07},
comment={After adjusting for other factors, like mental health, cultural violence, crime rates, video game playing, or race, (the US is well within bounds on all these factors for an industrialized country) the only factor that predicts mass shootings is the number of guns available in a nation. This applies even if the US is removed from the equation. But the US has far more privately owned guns than any other country; Americans make up about 4.4 percent of the global population but own 42 percent of the world’s guns. You have a similar chance of getting robbed in NYC as in London, but you are much more likely to die from the robbery in NYC. The US is the only country that continues to experience these tragedies without cracking down the availability of guns. ``“In retrospect Sandy Hook marked the end of the US gun control debate,” Dan Hodges, a British journalist, wrote in a post on Twitter two years ago, referring to the 2012 attack that killed 20 young students at an elementary school in Connecticut. “Once America decided killing children was bearable, it was over.”’’},
category={Health, guns, mass shootings, gun ownership}
}
% This research doesn’t break out what TYPE of guns are owned. If handguns were eliminated it would VASTLY reduce the death rate, but maybe not the number of mass shootings (since those guns are rarely used in mass shooting.) Alternatively eliminating long guns probably wouldn’t stop mass shootings either - those shooters would switch to hand guns. It’s clear from this research that cutting down access to ALL guns is the only reasonable way forward. compromises don’t work.
% This article includes data on 2017 handgun death percentage (64 percent).
% \url{https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/08/16/what-the-data-says-about-gun-deaths-in-the-u-s/}
@article{katz2019bullets,
Author={Sanger-Katz, Margot and Bui, Quoctrung},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/03/27/upshot/deadly-bullets-guns.html},
Title={People Kill People. But the Bullets Seem to Matter.},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2019-03-27},
comment={A study of the caliber of bullets used in homicides in Boston found that larger bullets were more lethal. Nicely details the history of increasing bullet sizes in crime. And as a side bonus is a very clear explanation of what a .22 9mm and .45 caliber are, and their use benefits and tradeoffs. References a classic study from 1972 on the same subject called “The Medium is the Message.” Argues that a criminal who choses a larger caliber weapon is showing more intent to kill.},
category={Health, guns, bullets, caliber, homicide}
}
@article{doi:10.1001/jamainternmed.2017.2449,
author = {Volpp KG and Troxel AB and Mehta SJ and et al},
title = {Effect of electronic reminders, financial incentives, and social support on outcomes after myocardial infarction: The heartstrong randomized clinical trial},
journal = {JAMA Internal Medicine},
volume = {177},
number = {8},
pages = {1093-1101},
year = {2017},
doi = {10.1001/jamainternmed.2017.2449},
URL = { + http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/jamainternmed.2017.2449},
eprint = {/data/journals/intemed/936414/jamainternal_volpp_2017_oi_170046.pdf},
comment = {Looks at whether using multiple behavioral economic nudges could get people who recently had a heart attack to take their medicine as prescribed. They found that they did not.},
category = {Health, Science, Economics, behavioral economics}
}
% Covered in this piece in the Times: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/06/upshot/dont-nudge-me-the-limits-of-behavioral-economics-in-medicine.html}
% ``Experts caution that the interventions that achieve success are often very intensive. They demand a great deal of attention, and can be quite expensive. Moreover, they are very focused, usually on a single issue or condition.’’
@article{kristof2017drugs,
Author={Kristof, Nicholas},
url={https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/09/22/opinion/sunday/portugal-drug-decriminalization.html},
Title={How to Win a War on Drugs},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-09-22},
comment={The U.S. and Portugal took almost diametrically opposite approaches to tackling drug abuse. The US criminalized it, Portugal turned it into a health issue. And while Portugal is far from having solved drug abuse, they have drastically reduced drug related deaths.Points out that Portugal didn’t just decriminalize drugs, but turned them into a public health issue, with public health tactics and treatments. Decriminalization makes it easier to treat people.},
category={Health, drug abuse, portugal, war on drugs}
}
@article{reynolds2017exercise,
Author={Reynolds, Gretchen},
url={https://mobile.nytimes.com/blogs/well/2016/11/28/why-do-i-gain-weight-when-i-exercise/},
Title={Why Do I Gain Weight When I Exercise?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-11-28},
comment={Exercise alone is actually not a good way to lose weight. In fact most people who start exercising gain weight because they compensate by consuming more calories. Losing weight requires both exercise and changes to diet.},
category={Health, exercise, diet, weight}
}
@article{mukherjee2017seedandsoil,
Author={Mukherjee, Siddhartha},
url={https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/09/11/cancers-invasion-equation},
Title={Cancer’s Invasion Equation},
journal={The New Yorker},
date={2017-09-11},
comment={Mikherjee reviews the current state of research suggesting that the way to understand cancer is as a disease that can only flourish in certain environments — the soil and seed model. There is more and more research that suggests that this understanding, similar to ecological understandings of invasive species on environments (like zebra mussels in the great lakes) is a far more accurate way to understand cancer (and any disease, really). Experiments show that the same cancer injected into different mice strains will have different results. But doctors are in a mindset of focussing on cancer cells alone. They don’t want to be told its even more complex than it already is. The medical industry likes results that are black and white, good and bad cells, on and off, positive and negative tests.},
category={Health, cancer, zebra mussels, great lakes, invasive species, doctors}
}
@article{jacobs2017junkfood,
Author={Jacobs, Andrew and Richtel, Matt},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/09/16/health/brazil-obesity-nestle.html},
Title={How Big Business Got Brazil Hooked on Junk Food},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-09-16},
comment={“Across the world, more people are now obese than underweight. At the same time, scientists say, the growing availability of high-calorie, nutrient-poor foods is generating a new type of malnutrition, one in which a growing number of people are both overweight and undernourished.’’ “The story is as much about economics as it is nutrition. As multinational companies push deeper into the developing world, they are transforming local agriculture, spurring farmers to abandon subsistence crops in favor of cash commodities like sugar cane, corn and soybeans — the building blocks for many industrial food products.” “The company’s door-to-door program fulfills a concept that Nestlé articulated in its 1976 annual shareholder report, which noted that “integration with the host country is a basic aim of our company.”},
category={Health, food, junk food, developing countries, nestle}
}
% sugar isn’t JUST a health issue - it’s the foodstuff of the capitalists, or the
% food equivalent to oil. It comes with developing economies, it brings some
% benefits in terms of making sure people have enough calories to survive, and
% because it is cheap to make, addictive, and makes other cheaply produced
% ingredients taste good, it’s added to everything. Heck, it’s even “refined”
% like oil.
% Oil and sugar are fundamental commodoties at the heart of capitalism.
@article{patterson2007truffleoil,
Author={Patterson, Daniel},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/16/dining/16truf.html},
Title={Hocus-Pocus, and a Beaker of Truffles},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2007-05-16},
comment={Most truffle oils are a mixture of olive oil and 2,4-dithiapentane — a one-dimensional flavor that is actually affecting people’s expectations of real truffle taste. “That truffle oil is chemically enhanced is not news. It has been common knowledge among most chefs for some time, and in 2003 Jeffrey Steingarten wrote an article in Vogue about the artificiality of the oils that by all rights should have shorn the industry of its “natural” fig leaf. Instead, the use of truffle oil continued apace. The question is, Why are so many chefs at all price points — who wouldn’t dream of using vanillin instead of vanilla bean and who source their organic baby vegetables and humanely raised meats with exquisite care — using a synthetic flavoring agent?”},
category={Health, food, truffles}
}
@article{gilchrist2014racial,
title={Racial/ethnic disparities in fatal unintentional drowning among persons aged≤ 29 years—United States, 1999–2010},
author={Gilchrist, Julie and Parker, Erin M and others},
journal={MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep},
volume={63},
number={19},
pages={421–6},
year={2014},
url={https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm6319a2.htm?s_cid=mm6319a2_w},
comment={In the United States, almost 4,000 persons die from drowning each year. Drowning is responsible for more deaths among children aged 1–4 years than any other cause except congenital anomalies. For persons aged ≤29 years, drowning is one of the top three causes of unintentional injury death. Previous research has identified racial/ethnic disparities in drowning rates. To describe these differences by age of decedent and drowning setting, CDC analyzed 12 years of combined mortality data from 1999–2010 for those aged ≤29 years. Among non-Hispanics, the overall drowning rate for American Indians/Alaska Natives (AI/AN) was twice the rate for whites, and the rate for blacks was 1.4 times the rate for whites. Disparities were greatest in swimming pools, with swimming pool drowning rates among blacks aged 5–19 years 5.5 times higher than those among whites in the same age group. This disparity was greatest at ages 11–12 years; at these ages, blacks drown in swimming pools at 10 times the rate of whites. Drowning prevention strategies include using barriers (e.g., fencing) and life jackets, actively supervising or lifeguarding, teaching basic swimming skills and performing bystander cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). The practicality and effectiveness of these strategies varies by setting; however, basic swimming skills can be beneficial across all settings.},
category={Health, Science, deaths, drowning, swimming, pools, race}
}
% See NY Times article saying all the same things still apply in 2023: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/08/health/children-drowning-deaths.html}
% And again: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/27/opinion/drowning-public-pools-america.html}
@article{bellafanteswimmingpools,
Author={Bellafante, Ginia},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/13/nyregion/heat-waves-are-not-egalitarian-in-new-york.html},
Title={For New York’s Pools, It’s Not the Heat, It’s the Politics},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-09-11},
comment = {Argues that heat waves impact lower-income people more. Particularly ones without the resources to get to the beach. And argues for that reason swimming pools should be funded and maintained.},
category = {heat waves, swimming pools}
}
@article{doi:10.1001/jamainternmed.2017.2773,
author = {Califf RM and McCall J and Mark DB},
title = {Cosmetics, regulations, and the public health: Understanding the safety of medical and other products},
journal = {JAMA Internal Medicine},
volume = {177},
number = {8},
pages = {1080-1082},
year = {2017},
doi = {10.1001/jamainternmed.2017.2773},
URL = { + http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/jamainternmed.2017.2773},
eprint = {/data/journals/intemed/936414/jamainternal_califf_2017_ed_170012.pdf},
comment = {There are no federal regulations for cosmetics.},
category = {Health, cosmetics, personal care products, toxic chemicals, CUP}
}
% See NY Times coverage here: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/07/well/for-cosmetics-let-the-buyer-beware.html}
@article{wong2017cursing,
Author={Wong, Kristin},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/27/smarter-living/the-case-for-cursing.html},
Title={The Case for Cursing},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-07-27},
comment={Some new research shows that cursing can reduce stress and increase your ability to withstand pain - but it only works BECAUSE there’s a taboo on cursing. Also talks about how cursing doesn’t mean you have a more limited vocabulary.},
category={Health, Criticality, cursing, swearing, stress, pain}
}
@article {Llewelynj3418,
author = {Llewelyn, Martin J and Fitzpatrick, Jennifer M and Darwin, Elizabeth and SarahTonkin-Crine, and Gorton, Cliff and Paul, John and Peto, Tim E A and Yardley, Lucy and Hopkins, Susan and Walker, Ann Sarah},
title = {The antibiotic course has had its day},
volume = {358},
year = {2017},
doi = {10.1136/bmj.j3418},
publisher = {BMJ Publishing Group Ltd},
issn = {0959-8138},
URL = {http://www.bmj.com/content/358/bmj.j3418},
eprint = {http://www.bmj.com/content/358/bmj.j3418.full.pdf},
journal = {BMJ},
comment = {In what is sure to become a classic paper, these guys point out that despite being widely accepted, there is no actual evidence that finishing an antibiotics course helps prevent selection for resistance. Calls for research into it. But also suggests that antibiotics are a limited, nonrenewable natural resource that we need to conserve. Simply finding any way to reduce the amount of antibiotics used (including fewer and smaller prescriptions) is probably the best for us as a culture. And also it’s possible that minimal use of antibiotics is the best for the individual as well.},
category = {Health, Criticality, antibiotics, antibiotic resistant bacteria, bacteria}
}
@article{Whillans24072017,
author = {Whillans, Ashley V. and Dunn, Elizabeth W. and Smeets, Paul and Bekkers, Rene and Norton, Michael I.},
title = {Buying time promotes happiness},
year = {2017},
doi = {10.1073/pnas.1706541114},
abstract ={Around the world, increases in wealth have produced an unintended consequence: a rising sense of time scarcity. We provide evidence that using money to buy time can provide a buffer against this time famine, thereby promoting happiness. Using large, diverse samples from the United States, Canada, Denmark, and The Netherlands (n = 6,271), we show that individuals who spend money on time-saving services report greater life satisfaction. A field experiment provides causal evidence that working adults report greater happiness after spending money on a time-saving purchase than on a material purchase. Together, these results suggest that using money to buy time can protect people from the detrimental effects of time pressure on life satisfaction.},
URL = {http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2017/07/18/1706541114.abstract},
eprint = {http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2017/07/18/1706541114.full.pdf},
journal = {Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences}
comment = {Argues that things like paying someone to clean your bathroom and ordering takeout - things that you can pay to give yourself more time - will make you happier than doing those things yourself. The Protestant work ethic is making people unhappy.},
category = {Health, Criticality, time, time famine, work, protestant work ethic},
}
% See Times coverage here: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/27/science/study-happy-save-money-time.html}
% there’s a huge political/class element that I’m not sure could actually be separated out - if nobody wants to clean bathrooms and everyone would be happier paying someone else to do it, then those people who ARE cleaning bathrooms would clearly be the highest-paid people in our culture because they have to be paid enough to do something they don’t want to do. See? Kinda doesn’t work. On the other hand I do think the world would be a better place if there were more and better takeout.
% In Dwarf Fortress you designate one dwarf to be the cook, and that dwarf becomes a master cook through practice, and the master quality food makes all the other dwarves happy. But ALL dwarves help clean the fortress by default.
@article{murphy2017foodpoisoning,
Author={Murphy, Kate},
url={https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/06/29/well/live/what-to-blame-for-your-stomach-bug-not-always-the-last-thing-you-ate.html},
Title={What to Blame for Your Stomach Bug? Not Always the Last Thing You Ate},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-07-29},
comment={“Acute gastrointestinal events” (or food poisoning, or stomach flu or stomach bugs) happen to all of us at least once a year. Generally people blame the last thing they ate, but it’s probably the thing BEFORE the last thing they ate since (for most people - it varies widely) it takes about 12 hours for food to reach the colon (and once there it can remain there for 1 - 3 days). It is likely a germ that causes the events, but could also be an overdose of FODMAPS - certain carbohydrates that your body only has a limited ability to digest, included in things like broccoli, brussels sprouts, radicchio, asparagus, avocados, mushrooms, peaches, whole grains and legumes.},
category={digestion, Health, food poisoning}
}
@article{frank2017singlepayer,
Author={Frank, Robert H.},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/07/upshot/why-single-payer-health-care-saves-money.html},
Title={Why Single-Payer Health Care Saves Money},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-07-07},
comment={Covers how single-payer health plans might raise taxes, but overall save everyone money. The data shows they are simply cost less. This is partly because administrative costs are simply lower, and also single-payer plans pay nothing on competitive advertising, which private insurers pay more than 15 percent of total expenses for.},
category={Health, Economics, insurance, single-payer}
}
@article{katz2017drugdeaths,
Author={Katz, Josh},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/06/05/upshot/opioid-epidemic-drug-overdose-deaths-are-rising-faster-than-ever.html},
Title={Drug Deaths in America Are Rising Faster Than Ever},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-06-05},
comment={Drug overdoses are now the leading cause of death among Americans under 50. This is largely due not to heroin by to fentanyl, the most deadly version of which is an elephant tranquilizer 5000 times stronger than heroin. It is mixed with various drugs, but mostly heroin. Because heroin in the East is usually in a white powder form, it is much more often mixed in than in the west where heroin is a black tar form. Also discusses the problems with consistency in filling out death certificates.},
category={Health, public health, drug overdoses, drug deaths, fentanyl, heroin, death certificates}
}
@article{peskin2017dying,
Author={Peskin, Sara Manning},
url={https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/06/20/well/live/the-symptoms-of-dying.html},
Title={The Symptoms of Dying},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-06-20},
comment={Discusses three “symptoms” that dying people have: the death rattle, air hunger, and terminal agitation. Mostly these symptoms affect the people who care about the dying person more than the dying.},
category={Health, death}
}
@article{richards2015imposter,
Author={Richards, Carl},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/26/your-money/learning-to-deal-with-the-impostor-syndrome.html},
Title={Learning to Deal With the Impostor Syndrome},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-10-26},
comment={Briefly introduces the concept of Imposter Syndrome, described by psychologists as people who are highly motivated to achieve, and successful fear that they will be found out as imposters.},
category={Health, imposter syndrome, fraud, achievement}
}
% Richards found out about this from a “business coach” and the research by psychologists cited was from the late 1970s. I have see 1970s research many times that was pretty much straight-up quackery in business self-help seminars (Maslow’s hierarchy, personality tests, etc). Seems like this might fall entirely into that category, without seeing some more current research.
@article{reynolds2017coffee,
Author={Reynolds, Gretchen},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/31/well/move/boost-your-workouts-with-caffeine-even-if-you-chug-coffee-daily.html},
Title={Boost Your Workouts With Caffeine, Even if You Chug Coffee Daily},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-05-31},
comment={Coffee has a noticable positive effect of 2-3% on athletic performance. In the past, it was assumed that you had to abstain from coffee in the weeks coming up to the performance to get the most from that effect. But a new study suggests that even heavy coffee drinkers get the caffiene benefit.},
category={Health, coffee, athletics}
}
@article{egan2017wine,
Author={Egan, Sophie},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/26/well/eat/how-much-sugar-is-in-a-glass-of-wine.html},
Title={How Much Sugar Is in a Glass of Wine?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-05-26},
comment={More than 60 additives can be added to wine without being put on the label. (The only exception being sulfites because people might be allergic to them.) In California wine, sugar can’t be added, instead they have to use grape juice. (Which is, of course, basically just sugar anyway.) Most 5oz glasses of wine have about a gram of sugar added, while dessert wines might have 7 grams in a 3oz glass.},
category={Health, food, wine}
}
% So… wine is basically a total bullshit concocted drink of fermented grapes and a bunch of additives. Of course, beer is no better.
@article{depaulo2017marriage,
Author={DePaulo, Bella},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/25/opinion/marriage-health-study.html},
Title={Get Married, Get Healthy? Maybe Not},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-05-25},
comment={The most robust research on the topic suggests that marriage has only temporary benefits to health and happiness, if that. In the long run married couples may actually end up unhealthier and unhappier than their single counterparts. Divorce, however, is worse than being married.},
category={Health, marriage, happiness}
}
@article{bakalar2013procedures,
Author={Bakalar, Nicholas},
url={https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/07/26/medical-procedures-may-be-useless-or-worse/},
Title={Medical Procedures May Be Useless, or Worse},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2013-07-26},
comment={New research shows that from 2001 to 2010 shows that most currently used drugs and procedures were found to be no better, or even worse than, the ones previously used. Practices that don’t work don’t go away immediately, there’s inertia that lasts for 10 years or so. Devices are particularly bad because companies are allowed to bring new ones out that are similar to ones already on the market. That means that useless new bells and whistles are being added all the time. ``Patients, too, like to talk about mechanisms, Dr. Prasad added. “They tend to gravitate toward the nuts and bolts — what does it do, how does it work?” he said. “But the real question is: Does it work? What evidence is there that it does what you say it does? What trials show that it actually works? You shouldn’t ask how does it work, but whether it works at all.”’’},
category={Health, Criticality}
}
@article{carroll2017marathons,
Author={Carroll, Aaron, E.},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/15/upshot/why-marathons-are-more-dangerous-for-nearby-residents-than-runners.html},
Title={Why Marathons Are More Dangerous for Nearby Residents Than Runners},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-05-15},
comment={Some new research shows that big public events like marathons slow down emergency services like ambulances, resulting in more deaths from people NOT running the marathon than from people in the marathon. Something to consider for cities planning big public events and worried about health and safety.},
category={Health, marathons, emergency services}
}
@article{carroll2015basichealthcare,
Author={Carroll, Aaron, E.},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/13/upshot/doing-more-for-patients-often-does-no-good-.html},
Title={Doing More for Patients Often Does No Good},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-01-12},
comment={Research shows that EMTs offering advanced life support have worse outcomes than those offering only basic life support. Carroll uses this and other examples to argue that there are many places in health care where doing less results in better outcomes. But service providers find it hard to opt to do less.},
category={Health, life support}
}
% And likely they don’t have much economic incentive to do less.
@article{kolata2017salt,
Author={Kolata, Gina},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/08/health/salt-health-effects.html},
Title={Why Everything We Know About Salt May Be Wrong},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-05-08},
comment={New studies suggest that the way the body processes salt could be much more complex than we thought. Eating large amounts of salt does raise blood pressure, but it also makes us \emph{less} thirsty because with more salt the body starts breaking down fat and releasing water. But it also makes us hungrier, so it’s probably not a good weight loss strategy.},
category={Health, salt, thirst, hunger}
}
@article{carrolldietaryguidelines,
Author={Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/24/upshot/behind-new-dietary-guidelines-better-science.html},
Title={Behind New Dietary Guidelines, Better Science},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-02-23},
comment = {New dietary guidelines are more closely based on randomized controlled studies. Unlike the recommendations to eat less salt and fat. ``It is frustrating enough when we over-read the results of epidemiologic studies and make the mistake of believing that correlation is the same as causation. It’s maddening, however, when we ignore the results of randomized controlled trials, which can prove causation, to continue down the wrong path. In reviewing the literature, it’s hard to come away with a sense that anyone knows for sure what diet should be recommended to all Americans.’’},
category = {diet, dietary guidelines, salt, fat, health}
}
% This modern review finds the research on whether salt is good or bad for you “truly heterogenous”: https://doi.org/10.3390%2Fmedicina58091175
% (See also notes on Bryson’s Body in Science bib category)
@article {CEA:CEA3221,
author = {Williams, A. N. and Woessner, K. M.},
title = {Monosodium glutamate ‘allergy’: menace or myth?},
journal = {Clinical & Experimental Allergy},
volume = {39},
number = {5},
publisher = {Blackwell Publishing Ltd},
issn = {1365-2222},
url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2222.2009.03221.x},
doi = {10.1111/j.1365-2222.2009.03221.x},
pages = {640–646},
year = {2009},
abstract = {Monosodium glutamate (MSG) is a salt form of a non-essential amino acid commonly used as a food additive for its unique flavour enhancing qualities. Since the first description of the ‘Monosodium glutamate symptom complex’, originally described in 1968 as the ‘Chinese restaurant syndrome’, a number of anecdotal reports and small clinical studies of variable quality have attributed a variety of symptoms to the dietary ingestion of MSG. Descriptions of MSG-induced asthma, urticaria, angio-oedema, and rhinitis have prompted some to suggest that MSG should be an aetiologic consideration in patients presenting with these conditions. This review prevents a critical review of the available literature related to the possible role of MSG in the so-called ‘Chinese restaurant syndrome’ and in eliciting asthmatic bronchospasm, urticaria, angio-oedema, and rhinitis. Despite concerns raised by early reports, decades of research have failed to demonstrate a clear and consistent relationship between MSG ingestion and the development of these conditions.},
comment= {There’s no good scientific evidence that there’s such thing as an MSG allergy.},
category={Health, monosodium glutamate, msg, allergies}
}
@article{ives2017streetfood,
Author={Ives, Mike},
url={https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/04/29/world/asia/sidewalk-food-vendors-hanoi-bangkok-jakarta.html},
Title={Efforts to Ease Congestion Threaten Street Food Culture in Southeast Asia},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-04-29},
comment={In Southeast Asia, Thailand Vietnam and Indonesia, are enforcing food safety rules and trying to push street food vendors off the streets due to complaings about sidewalk congestion and vermin. But it is also killing off a critical culture of street food. In Singapore their street food vendors have already been pushed into sanatized indoor food markets. Scientists say that as long as food is hot, it’s just as sanitary at a street vendor as indoors.},
category={Health, food, street food, street vendors, southeast asia}
}
@article{doi:10.1177/1757913916650225,
author = {Sally F Bloomfield and Graham AW Rook and Elizabeth A Scott and Fergus Shanahan and Rosalind Stanwell-Smith and Paul Turner},
title = {Time to abandon the hygiene hypothesis: new perspectives on allergic disease, the human microbiome, infectious disease prevention and the role of targeted hygiene},
journal = {Perspectives in Public Health},
volume = {136},
number = {4},
pages = {213-224},
year = {2016},
doi = {10.1177/1757913916650225},
note ={PMID: 27354505},
URL = { http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1757913916650225 },
eprint = { http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1757913916650225 },
abstract = { Aims:To review the burden of allergic and infectious diseases and the evidence for a link to microbial exposure, the human microbiome and immune system, and to assess whether we could develop lifestyles which reconnect us with exposures which could reduce the risk of allergic disease while also protecting against infectious disease.Methods:Using methodology based on the Delphi technique, six experts in infectious and allergic disease were surveyed to allow for elicitation of group judgement and consensus view on issues pertinent to the aim.Results:Key themes emerged where evidence shows that interaction with microbes that inhabit the natural environment and human microbiome plays an essential role in immune regulation. Changes in lifestyle and environmental exposure, rapid urbanisation, altered diet and antibiotic use have had profound effects on the human microbiome, leading to failure of immunotolerance and increased risk of allergic disease. Although evidence supports the concept of immune regulation driven by microbe–host interactions, the term ‘hygiene hypothesis’ is a misleading misnomer. There is no good evidence that hygiene, as the public understands, is responsible for the clinically relevant changes to microbial exposures.Conclusion:Evidence suggests a combination of strategies, including natural childbirth, breast feeding, increased social exposure through sport, other outdoor activities, less time spent indoors, diet and appropriate antibiotic use, may help restore the microbiome and perhaps reduce risks of allergic disease. Preventive efforts must focus on early life. The term ‘hygiene hypothesis’ must be abandoned. Promotion of a risk assessment approach (targeted hygiene) provides a framework for maximising protection against pathogen exposure while allowing spread of essential microbes between family members. To build on these findings, we must change public, public health and professional perceptions about the microbiome and about hygiene. We need to restore public understanding of hygiene as a means to prevent infectious disease. },
comment={Argues that the “hygiene hypothesis” is undermining healthy behaviors by reinforcing an idea that “hygiene” isn’t good for you. Doesn’t quibble with the fact that the basic tenents: more exposure, more time outdoors, etc, are healthy.},
category={Health, hygiene hypothesis, Criticality}
}
% This explainer about autoimmute disease from the Washington Post describes the hygiene hyphothesis as “and older theory” now. It also makes a distinction between the “hygiene hypothessis” as being about the decline of infectious diseases and a rise in antibiotic use, while more modern thinking is that it’s about exposure to day-to-day microbes rather than true infectous pathogens. (And this is not considered “the Hygiene Hypothesis” — I think I was conflating those things in the past.) Most of the factors now suspected in the rise of auto-immune disease are things like ultra-processed food, air pollution, gut health, and stress. So individual action like not washing your hands probably doesn’t help.
% https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2024/08/12/autoimmune-disease-risks-treatments/
@article{zernike2017medicaid,
Author={ZERNIKE, KATE and GOODNOUGH, ABBY and BELLUCK, PAM},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/27/health/medicaid-obamacare.html},
Title={In Health Bill’s Defeat, Medicaid Comes of Age},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-03-27},
comment={About the history of Medicaid and how it rose from a small addendum to Medicare to become a huge and culturally critical program. Medicaid covers the care of four out of 10 children, and half of all the births in th US. It covers 16% of all health care nationwide, and is 9% of federal domestic spending. The percentage of people who support cutting Medicaid has never exceeded 13%. People with disabilities make up just 15 percent of all Medicaid recipients but account for 42 percent of spending, making them particularly vulnerable to cuts. Medicaid covers more people than Medicare, covering one in five people - 74 million Americans. This from a program tacked onto Medicare, which was developed only because the government was worried that employer-provided insurance wasn’t covering retired people.},
category={Health, medicaid, medicare}
}
@article{gale2013crabs,
Author={Gale, Jason and Pettypiece, Shannon},
url={https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2013-01-13/brazilian-bikini-waxes-make-crab-lice-endangered-species-health},
Title={
Brazilian Bikini Waxes Make Crab Lice Endangered Species},
journal={Bloomberg},
date={2017-03-13},
comment={An article about how the trend to remove pubic hair is lowering the number of cases of pubic lice. It is suggested the lice are at risk of going extinct through habitat destruction.'' Claims 80\% of colleges students remove some or all of their pubic hair.}, category={Health, pubic lice, parasites, crabs, stds} } % This article is pretty in-depth, but reads like an April Fools joke. % Wikipedia says: Because the World Health Organization and other authorities do not record statistics for pubic louse infestation, there is virtually no hard data to support this supposition.’’
% See an actual journal paper here: \url{https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2564756/}
% See also this article about how pubc grooming should not be seen as something to be done for “health” reasons:
% \url{https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/06/29/most-women-prefer-to-go-bare-citing-hygiene-and-baffling-doctors/}
@article{domenech2017healthcare,
Author={Domenech, Benjamin},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/21/opinion/how-trump-can-fix-health-care.html},
Title={How Trump Can Fix Health Care},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-03-21},
comment={A conservative writer (publisher of The Federalist) argues for universal catastrophic health coverage, claiming that it is simpler, would cover everyone, and still more ideologically acceptable to conservatives.},
category={Health, aca, obamacare, catastrophic health coverage}
}
% Of course the devil is in the details of a proposal like this, particularly what counts as “catastrophic.”
% But it’s a good idea in that even if a poor number of things qualified under Trump, it could be expanded lated when the Democrats are back in power to become something more like universal single-payer.
% The other thing I like about this is it would encourage young people to start small businesses, or work for small businesses that can’t afford health benefits. They could take the risk of working for themselves, (and not getting sick) without worrying about some accident bankrupting them.
% Conservatives SHOULD like that about universal coverage too, though you never see them argue it (including in this op-ed).
@article{tamura2017rawmilk,
Author={Freytas-Tamura, Kimiko de},
url={https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/03/10/nyregion/two-people-die-after-eating-raw-milk-cheese-made-in-new-york.html},
Title={Two People Die after Eating Raw-Milk Cheese Made in New York State},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-03-10},
comment={Eating unpastuerized cheese made in NY State killed two people when it was contaiminated with Listeria. The cheese was Ouleout, created by a crazy cheesemaker in NYC who first made the stuff in his apartment. Europeans eat raw milk cheese all the time, but have much more stringent regulations on its production.},
category={Health, cheese, raw milk. listeria, cheesemaking}
}
@article{kristof2017sperm,
Author={Kristof Nicholas},
url={https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/03/11/opinion/sunday/are-your-sperm-in-trouble.html},
Title={Are Your Sperm in Trouble?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-03-11},
comment={Apparently the spread of endochrine-disrupters found in plastic has caused an steady increase in the number of malformed and low-energy sperm found in human men. We are steadily becoming less able to conceive because of bad sperm caused by plastic.},
category={Health, Humanity, sperm, reproduction}
}
% When Children of Men happens, it will because of the men, not the women.
@article{salam2017sperm,
Author={Salam, Maya},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/16/health/male-sperm-count-problem.html},
Title={Sperm Count in Western Men Has Dropped Over 50 Percent Since 1973, Paper Finds},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-08-16},
comment={A large-scale study finds Western men have had a 59.3 percent decline in sperm count over the last 40 years. It is not known why this is, but chemicals are suspected, particularly phthalates (or plasticizers). Non-Western men (though a smaller part of the sample) do not show this same decline, (and similarly, have lower levels of testicular cancer).},
category={Health, sperm count, fertility, men}
}
@article{brody2017alcohol,
Author={Brody, Jane},
url={https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/03/13/well/do-we-need-to-give-up-alcohol-to-lose-weight-not-necessarily.html},
Title={Do We Need to Give Up Alcohol to Lose Weight? Not Necessarily},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-03-13},
comment={Looking into an issue I’ve wondered about for year, Brody finds that the science behind alcohol and weight gain is extremely confused and contentious. The best she can do is alcohol in moderate amounts is probably ok, but might not be. And heavy drinking does increase your chance of obesity.},
category={Health, alcohol, weight gain, obesity}
}
@article{kolata2017backpain,
Author={Kolata, Gina},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/13/health/lower-back-pain-surgery-guidelines.html},
Title={Lower Back Ache? Be Active and Wait It Out, New Guidelines Say},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-02-13},
comment={New guidelines for the best practices on back pain say that only ibuprofen and staying active are useful treatments. They advise looking at back pain like a cold, it happens to nearly everyone, be positive that you’ll get over it. Do not get surgery. Placebos can be effective.},
category={Health, back pain, placebos}
}
@article {Machadoh1225,
author = {Machado, Gustavo C and Maher, Chris G and Ferreira, Paulo H and Pinheiro, Marina B and Lin, Chung-Wei Christine and Day, Richard O and McLachlan, Andrew J and Ferreira, Manuela L},
title = {Efficacy and safety of paracetamol for spinal pain and osteoarthritis: systematic review and meta-analysis of randomised placebo controlled trials},
volume = {350},
year = {2015},
doi = {10.1136/bmj.h1225},
publisher = {BMJ Publishing Group Ltd},
abstract = {Objective To investigate the efficacy and safety of paracetamol (acetaminophen) in the management of spinal pain and osteoarthritis of the hip or knee.Design Systematic review and meta-analysis.Data sources Medline, Embase, AMED, CINAHL, Web of Science, LILACS, International Pharmaceutical Abstracts, and Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials from inception to December 2014.Eligibility criteria for selecting studies Randomised controlled trials comparing the efficacy and safety of paracetamol with placebo for spinal pain (neck or low back pain) and osteoarthritis of the hip or knee.Data extraction Two independent reviewers extracted data on pain, disability, and quality of life. Secondary outcomes were adverse effects, patient adherence, and use of rescue medication. Pain and disability scores were converted to a scale of 0 (no pain or disability) to 100 (worst possible pain or disability). We calculated weighted mean differences or risk ratios and 95% confidence intervals using a random effects model. The Cochrane Collaboration{\textquoteright}s tool was used for assessing risk of bias, and the GRADE approach was used to evaluate the quality of evidence and summarise conclusions.Results 12 reports (13 randomised trials) were included. There was {\textquotedblleft}high quality{\textquotedblright} evidence that paracetamol is ineffective for reducing pain intensity (weighted mean difference -0.5, 95% confidence interval -2.9 to 1.9) and disability (0.4, -1.7 to 2.5) or improving quality of life (0.4, -0.9 to 1.7) in the short term in people with low back pain. For
hip or knee osteoarthritis there was {\textquotedblleft}high quality{\textquotedblright} evidence that paracetamol provides a significant, although not clinically important, effect on pain (-3.7, -5.5 to -1.9) and disability (-2.9, -4.9 to -0.9) in the short term. The number of patients reporting any adverse event (risk ratio 1.0, 95% confidence interval 0.9 to 1.1), any serious adverse event (1.2, 0.7 to 2.1), or withdrawn from the study because of adverse events (1.2, 0.9 to 1.5) was similar in the paracetamol and placebo groups. Patient adherence to treatment (1.0, 0.9 to 1.1) and use of rescue medication (0.7, 0.4 to 1.3) was also similar between groups. {\textquotedblleft}High quality{\textquotedblright} evidence showed that patients taking paracetamol are nearly four times more likely to have abnormal results on liver function tests (3.8, 1.9 to 7.4), but the clinical importance of this effect is uncertain.Conclusions Paracetamol is ineffective in the treatment of low back pain and provides minimal short term benefit for people with osteoarthritis. These results support the reconsideration of recommendations to use paracetamol for patients with low back pain and osteoarthritis of the hip or knee in clinical practice guidelines.Systematic review registration PROSPERO registration number CRD42013006367.},
URL = {http://www.bmj.com/content/350/bmj.h1225},
eprint = {http://www.bmj.com/content/350/bmj.h1225.full.pdf},
journal = {BMJ}
comment = {Meta-review paper that finds Tylenol doesn’t work at all on knee and back pain.},
category = {Health, back pain, knees, tylenol, painkillers}
}
% I think this is one of the studies cited in whatever other source it was that I read that no painkiller actually works, except ibuprofen.
@article{bagley2017antibiotics,
Author={Bagley, Nicholas and Outterson, Kevin},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/18/opinion/how-to-avoid-a-post-antibiotic-world.html},
Title={https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/18/opinion/how-to-avoid-a-post-antibiotic-world.html},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-01-18},
comment={Describes the problem of failing antibiotics and that drug companies are not investing in new anti-biotics because they would be forced to stash new ones on the shelf for when the current antibiotics fail. Proposes the government should fund the companies to develop and store the new antibiotics, at a cost of billions.},
category={Health, antibiotics}
}
@article{van2010training,
title={Training in the fasted state improves glucose tolerance during fat-rich diet},
author={Van Proeyen, Karen and Szlufcik, Karolina and Nielens, Henri and Pelgrim, Koen and Deldicque, Louise and Hesselink, Matthijs and Van Veldhoven, Paul P and Hespel, Peter},
journal={The Journal of physiology},
volume={588},
number={21},
pages={4289–4302},
year={2010},
publisher={Wiley Online Library}
comment = {Paper showing the exercising before breakfast helps prevent gaining weight.},
category = {Health, diet, exercise}
}
% See NY Times coverage: \url{http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/15/phys-ed-the-benefits-of-exercising-before-breakfast/}
@article{doi:10.1001/jama.2016.19627,
author = {Aaron SD and Vandemheen KL and FitzGerald J and et al},
title = {Reevaluation of diagnosis in adults with physician-diagnosed asthma},
journal = {JAMA},
volume = {317},
number = {3},
pages = {269-279},
year = {2017},
doi = {10.1001/jama.2016.19627},
URL = { + http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/jama.2016.19627},
eprint = {/data/journals/jama/935995/jama_aaron_2017_oi_160150.pdf}
comment = {Research that suggests that around 30% of asthma diagnoses may be wrong since many of of the symptoms of asthma are similar to other disorders.}
category = {CUP, Health, asthma, over-treatment}
}
% See this wrap up of the research in Health News Review: \url{http://www.healthnewsreview.org/2017/01/asthma-or-not-misdiagnosis-overdiagnosis-or-simply-tough-diagnosis/}
@article{goldensohn2017oil,
Author={Goldensohn, Rosa},
url={http://www.crainsnewyork.com/reports/the-dirty-secret-in-your-basement/},
Title={The dirty secret in your basement},
journal={Crain’s},
date={},
comment={In-depth look at how waste motor oil is mixed with home heating oil and sold to customers to burn in NYC. Covers the thin margins and corruption of the oil supply business.},
category={Health, motor oil, home heating oil, heat, nyc}
}
@article{rabin2017peanuts,
Author={Rabin, Roni Caryn},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/05/well/eat/feed-your-kids-peanuts-early-and-often-new-guidelines-urge.html},
Title={Feed Your Kids Peanuts, Early and Often, New Guidelines Urge},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-01-05},
comment={Against previous recommendations, the National Institue of Allergy and Infectious Diseases now recommends giving very young children peanut foods in heavy quantities and often to get their bodies used to it during a period when their bodies develop what things the immune system should be used t to get their bodies used to it during a period when their bodies develop what things the immune system should be used too.},
category={Health, peanuts, allergies}
}
% This article mentions the fact that peanut deaths are very rare, but not that we might be overreacting as a culture to peanuts as a threat.
@article{barrett2016superager,
Author={Barrett, Lisa Feldman},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/31/opinion/sunday/how-to-become-a-superager.html},
Title={How to Become a ‘Superager’},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-12-31},
comment={Reviews the latest research on what keeps people smart into old age. Suggests that it is the challenge (which is an unpleasant experience) of doing something hard - mental or physical - that keeps you sharp. Quotes the Marines: Pain is weakness leaving the body. Also includes an explanation of the popular notion of a ``triune brain’’ with three layers of reptile, emotional, and rational thinking. Explains how this theory was long ago discredited, but is still popular in media and business circles.},
category={Health, aging, intelligence, triune brain, reptile brain}
}
@article{kolata2016bariatric,
Author={Kolata, Gina},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/27/health/bariatric-surgery.html},
Title={After Weight-Loss Surgery, a Year of Joys and Disappointments},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-12-27},
comment={People who have bariatric weight-loss surgery often experience a radical change in the way things taste. It isn’t just a mechanical operation on the stomach, it also affects the brain. People who have the surgery tend to settle at a lower weight, they almost never get thin. If they continue to lose weight through dieting, they usually come back up to the new lower weight their body settled at after the surgery. The urge to eat can be as powerful as the urge to breathe when holding your breath. After the surgery people report a total change to not craving sugar.},
category={gastric bypass, Health, weight-loss surgery, eating, food, bariatric surgery, sugar}
}
% There are a bunch of places in this article that imply gastric bypass has a deep relationship with the mind’s craving for sugar. Is it possible that this is yet another major health problem that could be solved by ridding our culture of the excess sugar?
@article{frakt2016healthcosttransparency,
Author={Frakt, Austin},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/19/upshot/price-transparency-is-nice-just-dont-expect-it-to-cut-health-costs.html},
Title={Price Transparency Is Nice. Just Don’t Expect It to Cut Health Costs.},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-12-19},
comment={Economists think that more pricing transparency on health costs will cause the market to behave more efficiently and lower health costs. Research on this shows that people just don’t use tools that help them comparison shop for health care - possibly because it’s just too complicated and easier to take a recommendation from a doctor. Transparency might in some ways help with help costs but it is almost certainly not the solution to high health costs.},
category={Health, transparency, CUP, health care, Economics, insurance}
}
@article{span2016prediabetes,
Author={Span, Paula},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/16/health/youre-prediabetic-join-the-club.html},
Title={You’re ‘Prediabetic’? Join the Club},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-12-16},
comment={Talks about the rise of prediabetes'' as a diagnosis, which wasn't heard of 10 years ago. More than 80\% of people over the age of 60 could qualify as prediabetic. It's an attempt to improve behavior through fear.}, category={Health, public health, diabetes, prediabetes} } % It's interesting to me that the paper-thin seriousness of a prediabetic diagnosis was sort of inherently noticed by both myself and people in my circles. It was a very short time between noticing someone I know had a diagnosis of prediabetes and beginning to think it was overdiagnosed or not a real disease. % While I am no fan of trying to improve behavior through fear, the other possibility here is that 80% of people over 60 ARE sick - they are being poisoned by a culture that just provides too much easy access to sugar, and now public health folks are simply paying attention. % There was a time when maybe 80% of people were smokers too - if doctors had told them well, you smoke, but most people do; your persistent cough is just medical industry over-diagnosis’’, we would would now think of those doctors as criminals.
@article{tierny2011decisionfatigue,
Author={Tierny, John},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/21/magazine/do-you-suffer-from-decision-fatigue.html},
Title={Do You Suffer From Decision Fatigue?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2011-08-17},
comment={An in-depth look at the current research which suggests that you have a limited capability to make decisions throughout a day. The scientists call this ego depletion'' --- though ego depletion more generally refers to the amount of mental’’ energy you have to use throughout the day. The evidence suggests that you have the most ability to make decisions at the beginning of the day, and it goes up for a short while after lunch. This phenomenon can be exploited by salespeople of course. Breaks down the different parts of the decision making process, and finds that ``crossing the Rubicon’’ is the most tiring part. Weirdly, people generally don’t FEEL tired when they have decision fatigue, so it can be confusing to know when to rest. Interestingly, eating food, particularly sugar, restores you mental energy levels (for a short while).},
category={Health, decision fatigue, ego depletion, mental energy, rest}
}
% This research ties in interestingly with the research about how people need rest to do their best work.
% But… see engber2016ego
@article{schwartz2013energy,
Author={Schwartz, Tony},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/opinion/sunday/relax-youll-be-more-productive.html},
Title={Relax! You’ll Be More Productive},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2013-12-09},
comment={Cites a bunch of questionable self-help research to argue for naps, vacations, and breaks. But includes the compelling notion that the body continually runs in 90 minute cycles of expending and renewing energy.},
category={Health, energy, vacation, rest, breaks, naps}
}
@article{herzlinger2016healthinsurance,
Author={Herzlinger, Regina E. and Richman, Barak D. and Boxer, Richard J.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/02/opinion/how-health-care-hurts-your-paycheck.html},
Title={How Health Care Hurts Your Paycheck},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-11-02},
comment={Says that workers pay an average of 18,000 in health insurance each year, that is taken from the income and paid by the employer. This op-ed argues that they should be allowed to take that pay home and buy cheaper insurance (though it would have to meet the requirements of the ACA.)},
category={Health, health insurance, income}
}
% It does not point out the obvious fact that a tax that took that money and paid for health care would go a lot further.
@article{hoffman2016utis,
Author={Hoffman, Jan},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/28/health/cranberry-juice-uti.html},
Title={The Cure for UTIs? It’s Not Cranberries},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-10-27},
comment={There is no legitimate study that shows cranberry juice helps cure urinary tract infections. And now a new study that clearly shows that high doses of cranberry has no effect on utis. Anti-biotics are the only cure for utis. Though some doctors suggest that women should urinate after sex to help reduce utis (being sexually active increases the chance of a uti).},
category={Health, sex, urinary tract infections, cranberries}
}
@article{Newman2016535,
title = “When are natural and urban environments restorative? The impact of environmental compatibility on self-control restoration “,
journal = “Journal of Consumer Psychology “,
volume = “26”,
number = “4”,
pages = “535 - 541”,
year = “2016”,
note = “”,
issn = “1057-7408”,
doi = “http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jcps.2016.02.005”,
url = “http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1057740816300158”,
author = “Kevin P. Newman and Merrie Brucks”,
keywords = “Neuroticism”,
keywords = “Self-control”,
keywords = “Environment”,
keywords = “Attention restoration theory”,
keywords = “Anxiety “,
abstract = “Abstract This research investigates the role of environmental cues found in consumer contexts on the restoration of self-control resources. In doing so, we challenge the often-repeated claim that natural environments benefit consumer well-being more than urban environments by focusing on environmental compatibility: the match between environmental characteristics and an individuals’ motivational orientation. Across three studies, we find that individuals high in neuroticism experience greater self-control restoration when exposed to environmental cues associated with more anxiety while the reverse is true for individual who are low in neuroticism. Importantly, these results occur regardless of whether the environmental cues are inherent in urban consumer contexts, like a bookstore, or natural consumer contexts, like a safari vacation experience. We find preliminary process evidence that consumers low in neuroticism require fewer attentional resources when processing environmentally compatible cues, leading to self-control restoration. “,
comment = “Abstract This research investigates the role of environmental cues found in consumer contexts on the restoration of self-control resources. In doing so, we challenge the often-repeated claim that natural environments benefit consumer well-being more than urban environments by focusing on environmental compatibility: the match between environmental characteristics and an individuals’ motivational orientation. Across three studies, we find that individuals high in neuroticism experience greater self-control restoration when exposed to environmental cues associated with more anxiety while the reverse is true for individual who are low in neuroticism. Importantly, these results occur regardless of whether the environmental cues are inherent in urban consumer contexts, like a bookstore, or natural consumer contexts, like a safari vacation experience. We find preliminary process evidence that consumers low in neuroticism require fewer attentional resources when processing environmentally compatible cues, leading to self-control restoration. “,
category=“Health, Urbanism, Criticality”
}
% Research into how urban environments have a “restorative” affect on some people, the way that greenspaces do on others.
% Interestingly at a workshop I ran in the Bronx this weekend a woman said, “some people don’t like greenspace, they are scared of bugs and weeds and stuff.” Which I happen to agree with.
% The pushing of greenspace is another place where planners just assume their values apply to everyone.
% See this article in mass media format about the research: \url{http://www.citylab.com/navigator/2016/05/why-some-people-find-urban-hustle-invigorating/484412/}
@article{levyayahuasca2016,
Author={Levy, Ariel},
url={http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/09/12/the-ayahuasca-boom-in-the-u-s},
Title={The Drug of Choice for the Age of Kale},
journal={The New Yorker},
date={2016-09-12},
comment={Looks at the history and science of the psychadelic drug ayahuasca, which is fasionable now but might have real benefits for meditation/mindfulness, treating depression, and even the treatment of physical disease. The second part is her first-person account of taking the drug, which isn’t as interesting as the science.},
category={Health, psychodelic drugs, recreational drugs, ayahuasca, vomit, plants}
}
% This article describes the concept of the “default-mode network” which is, I believe what I call daydreaming, letting one’s mind wander. This is in contrast to being on task or “flow”. Meditation (and ayahuasca) are about shutting down both of those modes and tapping a different consciousness. Which I am sure is important to our mental health.
(Though I strongly suspect that meditiation is far less necessary if people got more and better sleep. Think about it - meditation frees you to connect to your subconscious, but while awake, to try and make connections and achieve deeper realizations about your life. Is this not exactly what sleep scientists think sleep does?)
I’m not so much interested in the point where you shut down daydreaming and task orientation both. I’m interested in the point where those two things intersect. For example, daydreaming is very strong while riding my bicycle, but then when I sit down to write about my daydreaming thoughts, (in task/flow mode) I often lose critical details. Is it possible that the reason so many great writers and creators were doing drugs has less to do with tapping subconscious, and more to do with connecting daydreaming to flow? If you are on heroine, maybe it allows you to be in task mode AND daydream at the same time. Or connects the two together into one.
How could I achieve that? Heroine, maybe. But perhaps it’s the ability to record thoughts while in daydream mode? (A tape recorder on a bicycle?) Or a space where you can be in task mode, writing, but stand up and walk in daydream mode?
@article{whippman2016mindfulness,
Author={Whippman, Ruth},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/26/opinion/sunday/actually-lets-not-be-in-the-moment.html},
Title={Actually, Let’s Not Be in the Moment},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-11-26},
comment={Argues that it’s a benefit of human brains that they can NOT be ``in the moment’’. Argues that the push for mindfulness is kind of like neoliberalism — the problem is not the system that makes you miserable, the problem is you aren’t working hard enough to improve yourself in the right way. So instead of building a social safety net, we put kids in cities into mindfulness training. Also claims current research on mindfulness is not any better than any other relaxation technique.},
category={Health, mindfulness, meditation}
}
% It would be worth looking up the research she cites here about how mindfulness doesn’t work any better than other relaxation techniques.
@article{brooksobamacare2016,
Author={Brooks, David},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/06/opinion/the-incredible-shrinking-obamacare.html},
Title={The Incredible Shrinking Obamacare},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-09-06},
comment={Brooks points out that even though Obamacare is succeeding, it is mostly due to increased coverage of medicaid and programs on the exchange becoming more like medicaid - narrow networks with no frills. It is reaching a point where it predominantly serves low-income populations. Not necessarily a bad thing, but not a revolution in health care, and similar to other safety net programs. ``There are also lessons for people who think about policy making. First designing technocratic systems that will actually work is really hard. Second, designing effective technocratic systems that can pass politically is really, really hard. Third, designing politically plausible technocratic systems in a country divided on fundamental philosophy is hardness on stilts. Philosophically, Obamacare tried to split the difference between European-style government coercion (the individual mandates) with a traditionally American respect for competition and freedom of choice (the exchanges).’’},
category={Health, obamacare, aca, affordable care act, medicaid, technocrats, policy, Politics}
}
@article{oconnorgranola2016,
Author={O’Connor, Anahad},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/30/well/eat/why-your-granola-is-really-a-dessert.html},
Title={Why Your Granola Is Really a Dessert},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-08-30},
comment={Most granola has more sugar than chocolate cake. Also, granola was invented in Dansville, NY!},
category={Health, granola, dansville, sugar}
}
@article{resnickmelatonin2016,
Author={Resnick, Brian},
url={http://www.vox.com/2016/4/25/11425856/what-is-melatonin-sleep},
Title={What is melatonin and can it help me sleep?},
journal={Vox},
date={2016-08-19},
comment={A careful look at the current research on sleep and melatonin finds that it can be effective for adjusting circadian ryhthms, but isn’t really an effective sleeping pill.},
category={Health, melatonin, sleep, circadians ryhthms}
}
@article{friedman2017sleep,
Author={Friedman, Richard A.},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/10/opinion/sunday/can-sleep-deprivation-cure-depression.html},
Title={Yes, Your Sleep Schedule Is Making You Sick},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-03-10},
comment={Overview of the current state of sleep research. Concludes that chronotherapy can be useful for all kinds of disorders, particularly depression.},
category={Health, melatonin, sleep, circadians ryhthms, chronotherapy}
}
@article{murphyfriends2016,
Author={Murphy, Kate},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/07/opinion/sunday/do-your-friends-actually-like-you.html},
Title={Do Your Friends Actually Like You?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-08-06},
comment={What seems like a trite report on a small scale study at first, turns out to be a pretty compelling article about how friendship impacts health, how to maintain friendships, and the difficulty in defining what friendship actually is.},
category={Health, friendship, friends}
}
@article{saintlouisflossing2016,
Author={Saint Louis, Catherine},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/03/health/flossing-teeth-cavities.html},
Title={Feeling Guilty About Not Flossing? Maybe There’s No Need},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-08-02},
comment = {There is little to no evidence that flossing does anything to prevent tooth decay or gum disease. That may be because we all floss so poorly, but there’s no science to show that. ``Among experts, however, it has been something of an open secret that flossing has not been shown to prevent cavities or severe periodontal disease.’’},
category = {Health, dentists, flossing, gums, gum disease}
}
% This opinion piece argues that the only reason there’s no randomized trials of flossing is because those studies would be hard to do, and not to dismiss the untested opinions of experts who have been suggesting flossing: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/25/opinion/sunday/flossing-and-the-art-of-scientific-investigation.html}
% It is actually an article raising concerns about the recent questioning of expert opinion.
% It sure would be nice to be able to read this paper behind a paywall: \url{https://aap.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/cap.10048}
% Which, reading between the lines of the abstract, seems like it might be suggesting that flossing is not for everyone.
% There does not seem to be any further research since flossgate that shows the effectiveness of flossing. Is it too conspiratorial to wonder if the dental industry actually wants to AVOID reasearching this topic for fear of being called out for decades of bad advice?
% Also, for low-risk people, two visits to the dentist a year does not increase oral health: https://archive.nytimes.com/well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/06/10/rethinking-the-twice-yearly-dentist-visit/
@article{carrolldentalresearch2016,
Author={Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/30/upshot/surprisingly-little-evidence-for-the-usual-wisdom-about-teeth.html},
Title={Surprisingly Little Evidence for the Usual Wisdom About Teeth},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-08-29},
comment={Turns out, dentistry is backed up by very little good science. Brushing (with a rotating electric toothbrush) and flouride toothpaste helps prevent cavaties. Flouride in water, flouride varnishes and sealants all work well. Seeing the detist twice a year is a waste of money and there’s no good research on teeth cleaning at the dentist (scaling and polishing).},
category={Health, dentists, dentistry, flossing}
}
@article{sambunjak2011flossing,
title={Flossing for the management of periodontal diseases and dental caries in adults},
author={Sambunjak, Dario and Nickerson, Jason W and Poklepovic, Tina and Johnson, Trevor M and Imai, Pauline and Tugwell, Peter and Worthington, Helen V},
journal={The Cochrane Library},
year={2011},
publisher={Wiley Online Library},
comment={This is a paper cited in the NY Times article (saintlouisflossing2016) that does a review of randomized trials.},
category = {Health, dentists, flossing, gums, gum disease}
}
@article{oconnorfarmbill2016,
Author={O’Connor, Anahad},
url={http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/07/19/how-the-government-supports-your-junk-food-habit/},
Title={How the Government Supports Your Junk Food Habit},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-07-19},
comment = {The government uses the Farm Bill to heavily subsidize corn, soybeans, wheat, rice, sorghum, milk and meat which are then mostly used to create processed foods that make people overweight. Junk food is cheap and plentiful largely because of these subsidies. Meanwhile very little subsidy goes to small farmers who produce fruit and nuts (regarded by the government as specialty crops''). Federal health researches have just put out a report looking at the link between metabolic disease and federally subsidized foods. The researchers found that those who had the highest consumption of federally subsidized foods had a 37 percent greater risk of being obese. They were also significantly more likely to have belly fat, abnormal cholesterol, and high levels of blood sugar and CRP, a marker of inflammation.’’ This makes it harder for people on low incomes to afford healthy food, and easier to afford junk food.},
category = {Health, farm bill, food subsidies, social justice}
}
% the farm bill IS a social justice issue.
% Sugar plays the same role in the food system as oil does in the transportation system. Yet people who go out of their way to minimize their oil usage will go to a coffee shop every day to load up on pastries.
% Sugar is the fuel of the food component of the capitalist system.
% If you refer to the decision fatigue article (tierny2011decisionfatigue) you could believe that since sugar makes decision making easier, perhaps the capitalists have selectively chosen sugar as a tool to help keep people toiling in their office jobs.
@article{hakim2016geneticfood,
Author={Hakim, Danny},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/30/business/gmo-promise-falls-short.html},
Title={Doubts About the Promised Bounty of Genetically Modified Crops},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-10-29},
comment={The Times did a compilation of the data about production of genetically modified crops and found that there has been no increase in production from genetically modified crops versus Europe’s non-modfied crops. However pesticide and herbicide use are both far higher on genetically modified crop versus their regular counterparts in Europe.},
category={Health, food, genetically modified food, gmos}
}
@article{strom2016foodcoating,
Author={Strom, Stephanie},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/13/business/an-edible-solution-to-extend-produces-shelf-life.html},
Title={An (Edible) Solution to Extend Produce’s Shelf Life},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-12-13},
comment={A company is working on an edible food coating for produce made of organic waste that preserves ripeness for much longer periods of times. Apeel’s products, sold under the brand names Edipeel and Invisipeel, take plant materials and extract all liquids from them to produce tiny pellets. The company then uses molecules from those the pellets to control the rate of water and gases that go in and out of produce, thus slowing down the rate of decay.'' “The answer to feeding the growing world population isn’t just to grow more food, it’s to preserve more of what we already grow and make optimal use of the resources we already have,” said Ira Ehrenpreis, a managing partner at DBL.’’},
category={Health, food, ripeness, Economics, farming}
}
% It’s hard to imagine that this stuff ISN’T genetic engineering.
% It is certainly the product of bio labs, not nature.
% Also funny that this is exactly the job Clark Griswold had in Christmas Vacation.
@article{kolataheat2008,
Author={Kolata, Gina},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/03/health/nutrition/03Best.html},
Title={http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/03/health/nutrition/03Best.html},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2008-07-03},
comment = {Physiologists say that heat impacts your exercise performance. It’s better to exercise in the morning when it is cooler even if the humidity is higher than the evening when it is warmer and the humidity is lower. This article explains the physiological mechanics that make this and how you can acclimate to working in heat. Cycling is easier in the heat because of the wind and not riding upright, which requires your heart to pump blood against gravity.},
category = {Health, exercise, bicycles, heat, cycling, physiology}
}
% This article claims that pouring water over your head doesn’t help because it has to be evaporating to cool you, dripping doesn’t help. This seems at odds with more recent fluff in the Times: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/03/health/nutrition/03Best.html}
@article{gellescagefreeeggs2016,
Author={Gelles, David},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/17/business/eggs-that-clear-the-cages-but-maybe-not-the-conscience.html},
Title={Eggs That Clear the Cages, but Maybe Not the Conscience},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-07-16},
comment = {Cage Free'' eggs are usually raised from chickens in an aviary’’ where indeed they can roam around, but actually have higher mortality rates from the chickens, because they can spread disease and peck each other. Also aviaries have worse air quality for human workers, and the workers have to bend over to collect the eggs. Pasture-raised'' are the only eggs that are something like the ideal of chickens wandering around in a yard eating bugs. But those eggs are far more expensive and would never meet the demand for eggs in the US. The problem may be more fundamental. Producing billions of eggs a year is an inherently messy business. Just 200 or so farmers control almost all of the nearly 300 million egg-laying hens in the United States. Pasture-raising that many hens is not feasible, so big farmers need big industrial systems to meet demand. And while cage-free aviaries may let hens stretch their wings, they’re not necessarily better for the health of the animals, or the workers.’’},
category = {Health, factory farming, eggs, chickens, pasture-raised, cage-free}
}
@article{severson2017eggs,
Author={Severson, Kim},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/13/insider/why-do-americans-refrigerate-their-eggs.html},
Title={‘Why Do Americans Refrigerate Their Eggs?’},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-02-13},
comment={In the US, egg producers wash their eggs to remove salmonella, removing a thin coating that prevents bacteria from entering the shell. As a result, the eggs need to be refrigerated right up until they are cooked. In Europe the eggs are NOT washed in order to preserve the coating, and so do not need to be refrigerated. Not covered in this article: which method works better.},
category={Health, food, cooking, eggs, salmonella}
}
@article{carrollcoldcolds2016,
Author={Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/19/upshot/repeat-after-me-cold-does-not-increase-odds-of-catching-cold.html},
Title={Repeat After Me: Cold Does Not Increase Odds of Catching Cold},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-07-18},
comment = {The idea that being cold increases your chances of getting a cold is a myth.},
category = {Health, colds, urban legends, medical myths}
}
% No word here about the Flu though.
@article{kolatadiseasedecline2016,
Author={Kolata, Gina},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/10/upshot/a-medical-mystery-of-the-best-kind-major-diseases-are-in-decline.html},
Title={A Medical Mystery of the Best Kind: Major Diseases Are in Decline},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-07-08},
comment = {’‘Major diseases, like colon cancer, dementia and heart disease, are waning in wealthy countries, and improved diagnosis and treatment cannot fully explain it.’’ And people are living longer healthier lives.},
category = {Health}
}
@article{moskincastiron2016,
Author={Moskin, Julia},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/29/dining/cast-iron-skillet-finex-field-company.html},
Title={Fashioning Cast-Iron Pans for Today’s Cooks},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-06-28},
comment = {Talks about how new cast iron made in the labor-intensive old ways (for a thinner lighter pan) are gaining in popularity. Also covers the basic benefits of cast iron that are covered in many other places.},
category = {Health, cast iron, pans, cooking, cookware, retro grouch}
}
@article{planningroundtablesdoh2016,
Author={California Planning Roundtable},
url={http://www.cproundtable.org/media/uploads/pub_files/CPR_SDOH_Final_1-26-16.pdf},
Title={The Social Determinants of Health for Planners: Live, Work, Play, Learn!},
journal={California Planning Roundtable},
year={2015},
comment = {Whitepaper making the fairly obvious point that planners should integrate public health factors into their considerations. Lays out the concept of Social Determinants of Health (SDOH) and that only a small part of health is influenced by health care. Much can be achieved in public health with upstream'' interventions.}, category = {Health, sdoh, upstream, downstream, planning, CUP} } % Planners should always approach the solving of a problem by examining its root cause and should furnish recommendations from an upstream perspective.’’
@article{mcmillanskihelmets2013,
Author={McMillan, Kelley},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/01/sports/on-slopes-rise-in-helmet-use-but-no-decline-in-brain-injuries.html},
Title={Ski Helmet Use Isn’t Reducing Brain Injuries},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2013-12-31},
comment = {Despite steadily rising helmet use in snow-sports, brain injuries haven’t gone down for complicated reasons. But the biggest factor is that people take more risks now. Mostly snow-sports are killing young men. Helmet do protect against lacerations and fractures, but not fatality-causing injuries with the risks these dudes are taking.},
category = {Health, helmets, snow-sports, skiing, snowboarding, brain injuries}
}
@article{rosenthalbikehelmets2012,
Author={Rosenthal, Elisabeth},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/30/sunday-review/to-encourage-biking-cities-forget-about-helmets.html},
Title={To Encourage Biking, Cities Lose the Helmets},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2012-09-29},
comment = {While in the US health experts equate riding bicycles without helmets to smoking, in Europe they worry than pushing people to wear helmets causes them to ride less, thus decreasing overall lifetime health. And reduces the number of people riding, which increases risk for all riders. Statistically, if we wear helmets for cycling, maybe we should wear helmets when we climb ladders or get into a bath, because there are lots more injuries during those activities.'' The European Cyclists’ Federation says that bicyclists in its domain have the same risk of serious injury as pedestrians per mile traveled.’’ But bicycling advocates say that the problem with pushing helmets isn’t practicality but that helmets make a basically safe activity seem really dangerous.'' Many European researchers say the test of a mature bike-sharing program is when women outnumber men.’’ ``“Pushing helmets really kills cycling and bike-sharing in particular because it promotes a sense of danger that just isn’t justified — in fact, cycling has many health benefits,” says Piet de Jong, a professor in the department of applied finance and actuarial studies at Macquarie University in Sydney. He studied the issue with mathematical modeling, and concludes that the benefits may outweigh the risks by 20 to 1.’’},
category = {Health, helmets, biking, bicycles, cycling, pedestrians, bike helmets}
}
@article{computervisionsyndrome2016,
Author={Brody, Jane E.},
url={http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/05/30/computer-vision-syndrome-affects-millions/},
Title={Computer Vision Syndrome Affects Millions},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-05-30},
comment = {Apparently people blink less when staring at computers, and strain harder to read. This leads to blurry vision and burning eyes, called Computer Vision syndrome.},
category = {Health, computer vision syndrome, sight}
}
@article{hauserheimlich2016,
Author={Hauser, Christine},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/28/us/dr-heimlich-uses-his-own-maneuver-on-choking-victim.html},
Title={At 96, Dr. Heimlich Uses His Own Maneuver on Choking Victim},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-05-27},
comment = {Henry Heimlich saves a woman’s live using his own maneuver (possibly) for the first time, at 96 years old.},
category = {Health, heimlich maneuver}
}
% Not mentioned in this article is Heimlich’s weird history following the invention of the maneuver, where he tried to solve all sorts of health problems with questionable treatments. See the Radiolab about the topic: \url{http://www.radiolab.org/story/273532-heimlich/}
@article{bernsteinnyucadavers2016,
Author={Bernstein, Nina},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/28/nyregion/bodies-given-to-nyu-ended-up-in-mass-graves-despite-donors-wishes.html},
Title={Bodies Given to N.Y.U. Ended Up in Mass Graves, Despite Donors’ Wishes},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-05-27},
comment = {NYU for years dumped disected bodies in the Hart Island potter’s field. They no longer do, but many see this as an indicator of the problems with body donation in general. the existence of such a long-undetected policy at a major institution underscores the lack of transparency and oversight in donation operations. Nationally, such operations include large for-profit companies supplying a booming demand for human tissue in science and industry, as well as academic programs teaching anatomy to medical students.'' Every time you turn around you’re going to find some people who are taking advantage of their access to the dead, because they know the dead are not going to talk.’’},
category = {Health, cadavers, medical science, dissection, potter’s fields, hart island, nyu, anatomy}
}
@article{rabin2021organs,
Author={Rabin, Roni Caryn},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/07/health/covid-organ-transplants.html},
Title={She Died With Long Covid. Should Her Organs Have Been Donated?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2021-11-07},
comment={It’s not clear that organs donated for transplant are being checked that they are covid positive before they are put into people.},
category={Health, Criticality, covid, organ donors, organ donation}
}
% The thing that really jumps out at me in this article is a single line that the family was not allowed to donate the body to science because the deceeased had indicated they wanted to be an organ donor.
% How much power do you lose by being an organ donor?
% Was the family being targeted by corpse traders though? (See cheney2004cadavers)
@article{cheney2004cadavers,
Author={Cheney, Annie},
url={https://harpers.org/archive/2004/03/the-resurrection-men/},
Title={The resurrection men},
journal={Harper’s},
year={2004},
month={03},
comment={Describes the corrupts practices of handling donated bodies, whereby doctors pay large amounts of money to shady companies to practice on corpses donated to “medical science”.},
category={Health, Criticality, cadavers, medical science, death}
}
% “no one keeps track of what happens to corpses before they reach their final destinations”
% “The FDA regulates tissue banks that procure and process cadaveric material for transplat into living people, but no one regulates trade in cadavers. No one knows exactly how many bodies are repurposed along the way to the grave”
% “Corpses enter the supply chain as donations. Families have only the vaguest notion about how the bodies will be used. They are almost never informed that the cadaver might be sold off to middlemen or parceled out to surgical equipment companies. None of them imagines their relative’s torso will end up taped to a gurney at a Trump resort.”
% The law prohibits profiting from the sale of human tissue, but those who deal with it are allowed to recover their costs. Dealers hide profits in inflated transport and handling fees.
% University donor programs make up a very small percentage of suppliers in body trade because they preserve their bodies in strong chemicals. Post-graduate commercial services prefer more lifelike parts. The majority of suppliers are “tissue banks.” New York State is the only state that licences the companies, but does not routinely inspect them.
% The corpse traders focus on people who come in asking about the cost of funeral services. To those poor people they offer a deal where they won’t have to pay for cremation or burial if they donate the body.
% (It seems that organ donation — for living transplants — is kind of a whole other thing.)
@article{mukherjeeepigenticsnewyorker2016,
Author={Mukherjee, Siddhartha},
url={http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/05/02/breakthroughs-in-epigenetics},
Title={Same but Different},
journal={The New Yorker},
date={2016-05-02},
comment = {Covers how the \emph{way} DNA is wrapped actually impacts the function of genes — that is, epigenetics. This means there are all sorts of things that happen to an individual that shape that individual, it’s not all just genes. Includes a description of the famous Minnesota Twins study, and discoveries based on ants.},
category = {Health, epigenetics, genetics, minnesota twins study, ants, histones}
}
@article{carrollbreakfast2016,
Author={Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/24/upshot/sorry-theres-nothing-magical-about-breakfast.html},
Title={Sorry, There’s Nothing Magical About Breakfast},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-05-23},
comment = {Reviewing the (tons of) current research on breakfast yields no consistent results that point towards it being good or bad. But this is a field that suffers exceptionally from publication bias.},
category = {breakfast, Health, publication bias, causality}
}
@article{doi:10.1056/NEJMoa1414850,
author = {Du Toit, George and Roberts, Graham and Sayre, Peter H. and Bahnson, Henry T. and Radulovic, Suzana and Santos, Alexandra F. and Brough, Helen A. and Phippard, Deborah and Basting, Monica and Feeney, Mary and Turcanu, Victor and Sever, Michelle L. and Gomez Lorenzo, Margarita and Plaut, Marshall and Lack, Gideon},
title = {Randomized Trial of Peanut Consumption in Infants at Risk for Peanut Allergy},
journal = {New England Journal of Medicine},
volume = {372},
number = {9},
pages = {803-813},
year = {2015},
doi = {10.1056/NEJMoa1414850},
note ={PMID: 25705822},
URL = { http://dx.doi.org/10.1056/NEJMoa1414850 },
eprint = { http://dx.doi.org/10.1056/NEJMoa1414850 },
comment = {Large scale study that found EXPOSING very young children (under the age of 5) to peanuts decreased the liklihood of their developing a peanut allergy. Further support of the Hygiene Hypothesis.},
category = {peanuts, allergies, Health, hygiene hypothesis}
}
% See also reporting in the Upshot at the Times: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/26/upshot/avoiding-peanuts-to-avoid-an-allergy-is-a-bad-strategy-for-most.html}
@article{kolatabarnyarddust2016,
Author={Kolata, Gina},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/04/health/dust-asthma-children.html},
Title={Barnyard Dust Offers a Clue to Stopping Asthma in Children},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-08-03},
comment={A small but promising study looks at rural traditionalist farming communities (eg Amish), comparing one group that allows their children to play in barns with animals and another that has industrial barns where children do not play. They find that the dust from the barn caused the children who played in the barn to have far lower asthma rates. They then tested the dust on mice with the same result.},
category={Health, hygiene hypothesis, amish, barn dust, asthma}
}
% Does this suggest that it may not be the diesel fumes that cause asthma in low-income urban communities, but in fact their lack of ability to get out to the country?
@article{kolatasurgery2016,
Author={Kolata, Gina},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/04/upshot/the-right-to-know-that-an-operation-is-next-to-useless.html},
Title={Why ‘Useless’ Surgery Is Still Popular},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-08-03},
comment={While drugs have to be approved by the FDA through rigorous testing, surgery does not. As a result there are surgeries that became prevalent just because doctors THOUGHT they would be helpful, and after being tried in random clinical trials, found to be no better than not doing surgery. Since insurance companies still pay, even AFTER they’ve been proven ineffective doctors continue doing these surgeries. Listed here include: meniscus surgery, spinal fusion, and verebroplasty.},
category={Health, uneccesary surgery, insurance, meniscus, knees}
}
@article{irwinpoorgeography2016,
Author={Irwin, Neil and Quoctrung, Bui},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/04/11/upshot/for-the-poor-geography-is-life-and-death.html},
Title={The Rich Live Longer Everywhere. For the Poor, Geography Matters.},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-04-11},
comment = {The poor in some cities — big ones like New York and Los Angeles, and also quite a few smaller ones like Birmingham, Ala. — live nearly as long as their middle-class neighbors or have seen rising life expectancy in the 21st century. But in some other parts of the country, adults with the lowest incomes die on average as young as people in much poorer nations like Rwanda, and their life spans are getting shorter.'' But the fact that some places have increased the life span of their poorest residents suggests that improving public health doesn’t require first fixing the broader, multidecade problem of income inequality. Small-scale, local policies to help the poor adopt and maintain healthier habits may succeed in extending their lives, regardless of what happens with trends in income inequality.’’ ``Research has long established that health care interventions have a much smaller effect on life span than behavioral factors like smoking and exercise.’’},
category = {Health, income inequality, location, geography, city density, city size, health insurance}
}
% See also this follow-up commentary by the Editorial Board: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/18/opinion/geographys-role-in-the-life-expectancy-of-the-poor.html}
% This paper is pretty exciting because it really shows the power of cities to improve people’s lives. Interventions carried out at the city level to improve people’s health seems to work. Even in the face of dramatic income inequality.
@Article{Versini2015,
author={Versini, Mathilde and Jeandel, Pierre-Yves and Bashi, Tomer and Bizzaro, Giorgia and Blank, Miri and Shoenfeld, Yehuda},
title={Unraveling the Hygiene Hypothesis of helminthes and autoimmunity: origins, pathophysiology, and clinical applications},
journal={BMC Medicine},
year={2015},
volume={13},
number={1},
pages={1–16},
abstract={The Hygiene Hypothesis (HH) attributes the dramatic increase in autoimmune and allergic diseases observed in recent decades in Western countries to ence.},
issn={1741-7015},
doi={10.1186/s12916-015-0306-7},
url={http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12916-015-0306-7},
comment={Paper looking in detail at the “Hygiene Hypothesis” which suggests that modern cleanliness has caused our immune systems to become confused and go crazy resulting in a rise of autoimmune conditions.},
category={Health, hygiene hypothesis, autoimmune, parasites}
}
@article{saulniersugar2016,
Author={Saulnier, Beth},
url={http://cornellalumnimagazine.com/sweet-sour/},
Title={Sweet & Sour},
journal={Cornell Alumni Magazine},
year={2016},
month={03},
comment = {A recap of the current state of research on sugar by Robert Lustig, the food scientist who says that ``fructose is a poison.’},
category = {sugar, fructose, Health}
}
% Another sugar recap for 2020: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/30/well/eat/sugar-diet-healthy.html}
% Seems a bit like the “sugar is a poison” theory hasn’t advanced much in the last ten years, yet there’s research like this very rigorous comparison of wartime sugar eating in Brittain that suggests to me that sugar should still be considered a standout candidate for the worst possible single nutrient we eat: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/31/health/sugar-rationing-britain-health-experiment.html}
@article{lesliesugar2016,
Author={Leslie, Ian},
url={http://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/apr/07/the-sugar-conspiracy-robert-lustig-john-yudkin},
Title={The sugar conspiracy},
journal={The Guardian},
date={2016-04-07},
comment = {A long-form article about the history of the nutrition science studying dietary guidelines for sugar versus fat intake. Discusses how science is not a process of convincing people of empirical evidence but in fact a political process. The nutritionists of the 1960s and 1970s lampooned a mild-natured scientist named John Yudkin for saying sugar was what made people fat. We tend to think of heretics as contrarians, individuals with a compulsion to flout conventional wisdom. But sometimes a heretic is simply a mainstream thinker who stays facing the same way while everyone around him turns 180 degrees.'' In a 2015 paper titled Does Science Advance One Funeral at a Time?, a team of scholars at the National Bureau of Economic Research sought an empirical basis for a remark made by the physicist Max Planck: “A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it.”’’ ``A scientist is part of what the Polish philosopher of science Ludwik Fleck called a “thought collective”: a group of people exchanging ideas in a mutually comprehensible idiom. The group, suggested Fleck, inevitably develops a mind of its own, as the individuals in it converge on a way of communicating, thinking and feeling. This makes scientific inquiry prone to the eternal rules of human social life: deference to the charismatic, herding towards majority opinion, punishment for deviance, and intense discomfort with admitting to error. Of course, such tendencies are precisely what the scientific method was invented to correct for, and over the long run, it does a good job of it. In the long run, however, we’re all dead, quite possibly sooner than we would be if we hadn’t been following a diet based on poor advice.’’},
category = {sugar, scientific method, Science, Health}
}
% A lof of articles cover these topics, (see below) but this Guardian article really ties everything together nicely.
% Another article from the Times saying the same things about sugar - it’s all bad except for the stuff from fruit because it has fiber with it: \url{http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/06/08/is-sugar-really-bad-for-you-it-depends/}
% See this article in the Times about Big Sugar getting misleading research published back in the 60’s that steered the government away from sugar as a cause of heart disease: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/13/well/eat/how-the-sugar-industry-shifted-blame-to-fat.html}
% And Gary Taubes now has a game-changing book out about it: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/02/books/review/case-against-sugar-gary-taubes.html}
% This article “Is Sugar Toxic?” by Gary Taubes is the first one I remember coherently arguing against sugar: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/17/magazine/mag-17Sugar-t.html}
% This paper shows that sugar might promote cancer growth: \url{https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-017-01019-z}
% Another article by Anahad O’Connor about how the sugar industry covered up evidence back in the 1960s:
% \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/21/well/eat/sugar-industry-long-downplayed-potential-harms-of-sugar.html}
% Not just sugar, also additives, and artificial sweeteners: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/06/opinion/sunday/germs-microbes-processed-foods.html}
% More on why fruit juice is just sugar water: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/07/opinion/sunday/juice-is-not-healthy-sugar.html}
% Though it’s possible it’s not sugar that makes you FAT, but fat makes you fat: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/25/well/eat/which-kinds-of-foods-make-us-fat.html}
@article{mukherjee2018diethealth,
Author={Mukherjee, Siddhartha},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/05/magazine/its-time-to-study-whether-eating-particular-diets-can-help-heal-us.html},
Title={It’s Time to Study Whether Eating Particular Diets Can Help Heal Us},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-11-05},
comment={Suggests that diet is a key component to health and healing, but is little studied or understood. We may need to reanalyze human diets from scratch in order to understand how they work.},
category={Health, cancer, sugar, diet}
}
% He references some research in this article that suggests sugar “feeds” cancer tumors.
@article{carrollteenagerssleeping2016,
Author={Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/29/upshot/schools-are-slow-to-learn-that-sleep-deprivation-hits-teenagers-hardest.html},
Title={Schools Are Slow to Learn That Sleep Deprivation Hits Teenagers Hardest},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-03-28},
comment = {In 2013, the National Sleep Foundation released the results of a survey on sleep among people 25 to 55 in six countries. Canadians and Mexicans topped the list at 7.1 hours a night, followed by Germans at 7 and residents of Britain at 6.8. Bringing up the rear were Americans at 6.5 hours and Japanese at 6.4.'' Sleeping hours are disproportionate across the socioeconomic spectrum as well. The more you make, the less you sleep. Almost half of people earning less than 30,000 a year sleep at least six hours a night, compared with about a third of those earning at least 75,000.’’ Americans also sleep less than we used to. In 1942, almost 85 percent of us slept at least seven hours a night. Today, less than 60 percent of us do.'' Not getting enough sleep is a big problem. Randomized controlled trials show that people who are sleep-deprived can see decreases in their empathy. More than one such study has shown that sleep deprivation can leave people more sensitive to pain. Sleep deprivation can hurt cognition, and it is associated with many, many car accidents.’’ But serious sleep deprivation in adults is most likely rarer than many think it is\ldots Many news reports that highlight the dangers from too little sleep are assuming that all adults need at least eight hours. There’s just little evidence that’s so.'' (Except for children.) A study published in 2014 examined 9,000 students in eight public schools in three states. It found that in high schools where classes began at 7:30 a.m., about a third of children got at least eight hours of sleep a night. If they started at 8:35 a.m., about 60 percent of children achieved that goal.’’ ``It’s for reasons like these that the American Academy of Pediatrics released a policy statement in 2014 calling for a shift in school start times to 8:30 or later. Few school systems, however, have heeded the call.’’},
category = {Health, sleep, teenagers, car crashes}
}
% Another article in Vox on the same topic: \url{http://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2016/12/17/13981152/school-start-time-teens}
% Yet another article on the topic: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/22/well/family/the-science-of-adolescent-sleep.html}
% This one also points out that “Driving after sleeping only four to five hours a night is associated with a similar crash risk as driving with an alcohol level at the legal limit. Sleeping less than four hours puts you at the same risk as driving with double the legal alcohol limit.”
% also points out that the same patterns are seen in other mammals.
@article{gawande2007checklist,
title={The checklist},
author={Gawande, Atul},
journal={The New Yorker},
volume={83},
number={39},
pages={86–95},
year={2007},
url={http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2007/12/10/the-checklist},
comment={This is the article that led to the book The Checklist Manifesto. Where medicine discovers that the age-old aviation practice of checklists is lifesaving. (Though medicine, unlike aviation, has done the science to back this up.)},
category={checklists, aviation, medicine, Health}
}
% A followup article that includes what works and what doesn’t with checklists (they have to be mandatory) and that they can even help eliminate bias: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/11/opinion/a-fix-for-gender-bias-in-health-care-check.html}
@article{duhigggoogleteams2016,
Author={Duhigg, Charles},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/28/magazine/what-google-learned-from-its-quest-to-build-the-perfect-team.html},
Title={What Google Learned From Its Quest to Build the Perfect Team},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-02-25},
comment = {Google did a bunch of empirical research to discover that effective work teams are need “psychologically safe environments”. People on teams need to listen to eachother in order for the team to be effective, and everyone needs to feel like they can contribute.},
category = {Health, teams, google, psychological safety}
}
@article{strakova2015cancer,
title={The cancer which survived: insights from the genome of an 11000 year-old cancer},
author={Strakova, Andrea and Murchison, Elizabeth P},
journal={Current opinion in genetics & development},
volume={30},
pages={49–55},
year={2015},
publisher={Elsevier},
url = {http://www.tcg.vet.cam.ac.uk/pdfs/strakovacurropingenetdev2015-the-cancer-which.pdf},
comment = {Overview of the research on the ancient sexually-transmitted dog cancer.},
category = {transmissible cancer, Health, dogs, stds, contagious cancer}
}
% referenced in this Times article about transmissible cancers: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/23/science/scientists-ponder-the-prospect-of-contagious-cancer.html}
% one more Times article about transmissible cancer, now found in clams: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/28/science/contagious-cancer-clams.html}
@article{suntanthroughwindows,
Author={Ray, C. Claiborne},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/23/science/can-you-suntan-through-a-window.html},
Title={Can You ‘Suntan’ Through a Window?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-02-22},
comment = {Windows allow the ultraviolet rays that cause cancer through, but not the ones and stimulate you to produce viatmin D. People in the north almost can’t get any of the light that stimulates viatmin D because of the angle of the sun.},
category = {vitamin d, cancer, ultraviolet, windows}
}
@article{sangerkatzhealthcaredeductibles,
Author={Sanger-Katz, Margot},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/07/upshot/the-big-problem-with-high-health-care-deductibles.html},
Title={The Big Problem With High Health Care Deductibles},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-02-05},
comment = {Deductibles work in theory, but in practice have been much more murky. Savings in experiments sometimes are seen, but might be because people are avoiding necessary treatments as well as optional ones.},
category = {health insurance, deductibles, aca, Health}
}
@article{kellett1991effects,
title={Effects of an exercise program on sick leave due to back pain},
author={Kellett, Karin M and Kellett, David A and Nordholm, Lena A},
journal={Physical Therapy},
volume={71},
number={4},
pages={283–291},
year={1991},
publisher={American Physical Therapy Association},
url = {http://ptjournal.apta.org/content/71/4/283.full.pdf},
comment = {According to this NY Times article: \url{http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/01/27/to-prevent-back-pain-orthotics-are-out-exercise-is-in/} this paper contains a list of particular excersizes to help with back pain.},
category = {back pain, health},
}
@article{fraktsuperbowlflushots,
Author={Frakt, Austin},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/02/upshot/super-bowl-denver-broncos-carolina-panthers-flu.html},
Title={Your Team Made the Super Bowl? Better Get a Flu Shot},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-02-01},
comment = {If the team you are a fan of made the super bowl, you are more likely to get the flu (since you are more likely to attend a party with someone with the flu.) Also, any other gathering of people at the right time of year.},
category = {flu, football, superbowl}
}
@techreport{NBERw21604,
title = “Health Effects of Economic Crises”,
author = “Christopher J. Ruhm”,
institution = “National Bureau of Economic Research”,
type = “Working Paper”,
series = “Working Paper Series”,
number = “21604”,
year = “2015”,
month = “October”,
doi = {10.3386/w21604},
URL = “http://www.nber.org/papers/w21604”,
abstract = {This analysis summarizes prior research and uses national, state and county level data from the United States from 1976-2013 to examine whether the mortality effects of economic crises differ in kind from those of the more typical fluctuations. The tentative conclusion is that economic crises affect mortality rates (and presumably other measures of health) in the same way as less severe downturns: namely, they lead to improvements in physical health. The effects of severe national recessions in the United States, appear to have a beneficial effect on mortality that is roughly twice as strong as that predicted due to the elevated unemployment rates alone while the higher predicted rate of suicides during typical periods of economic weakness is approximately offset during severe recessions. No consistent pattern is obtained for more localized economic crises occurring at the state level – some estimates suggest larger protective mortality effects while others indicate offsetting deleterious consequences.},
comment = {At the macroeconomic scale, the data suggests that people are HEALTHIER during an economic crisis or depression.}
category = {economy, health}
}
%Another paper of his suggests that among other causes is less drunk driving, better eating habits, and more physical activity: \url{https://libres.uncg.edu/ir/uncg/f/C_Ruhm_Are_2000.pdf}
@article{friedmanfeardrug,
Author={Friedman, Richard A.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/24/opinion/sunday/a-drug-to-cure-fear.html},
Title={A Drug to Cure Fear},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-01-22},
comment = {Researchers have been able to cure people of anxiety by applying drugs that block their fear reaction when confronted with fear. Also talks about how people with anxiety react more strongly with higher carbon dioxide levels — like during slow-breathing periods at night.},
category = {fear, anxiety, carbon dioxide, superscience}
}
% Of course the same technique will be used to create the super-soldiers of the future.
@article{parkdrugoverdosedeaths,
Author={Park, Haeyoun and Bloch, Matthew},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/01/07/us/drug-overdose-deaths-in-the-us.html},
Title={How the Epidemic of Drug Overdose Deaths Ripples Across America},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-01-19},
comment = {``Deaths from drug overdoses have surged in nearly every county across the United States, driven largely by an explosion in addiction to prescription painkillers and heroin. Some of the largest concentrations of overdose deaths were in Appalachia and the Southwest, according to new county-level estimates released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. H.I.V. deaths rose in a shorter time frame, but their peak in 1995 is similar to the high point of deaths from drug overdoses reached in 2014, Mr. Anderson said. H.I.V., however, was mainly an urban problem. Drug overdoses cut across rural-urban boundaries.’’},
category = {drug overdose, hiv, aids, deathrates}
}
@article{epsteinmusclemutation,
Author={Epstein, David},
url={https://www.propublica.org/article/muscular-dystrophy-patient-olympic-medalist-same-genetic-mutation},
Title={The DIY Scientist, the Olympian, and the Mutated Gene},
journal={ProPublica},
date={2016-01-15},
comment = {A woman with muscular distrophy develops her own research skills and uses Google Images to track down another person with her own rare gene mutation.},
category = {genes, athletics, steroids, google images}
}
@techreport{NBERw21565,
title = “The Price of Responsibility: The Impact of Health Reform on Non-Poor Uninsureds”,
author = “Mark Pauly and Adam Leive and Scott Harrington”,
institution = “National Bureau of Economic Research”,
type = “Working Paper”,
series = “Working Paper Series”,
number = “21565”,
year = “2015”,
month = “September”,
doi = {10.3386/w21565},
URL = “http://www.nber.org/papers/w21565”,
abstract = {This paper estimates the change in net (of subsidy) financial burden (“the price of responsibility”) and in welfare that would be experienced by a large nationally representative sample of the “non-poor” uninsured if they were to purchase Silver or Bronze plans on the ACA exchanges. The sample is the set of full-year uninsured persons represented in the Current Population Survey for the pre-ACA period with incomes above 138 percent of the federal poverty level. The estimated change in financial burden compares out-of-pocket payments by income stratum in the pre-ACA period with the sum of premiums (net of subsidy) and expected cost sharing (net of subsidy) for benchmark Silver and Bronze plans, under various assumptions about the extent of increased spending associated with obtaining coverage. In addition to changes in the financial burden, our welfare estimates incorporate the value of additional care consumed and the change in risk premiums for changes in exposure to out-of-pocket payments associated with coverage, under various assumptions about risk aversion. We find that the average financial burden will increase for all income levels once insured. Subsidy-eligible persons with incomes below 250 percent of the poverty threshold likely experience welfare improvements that offset the higher financial burden, depending on assumptions about risk aversion and the value of additional consumption of medical care. However, even under the most optimistic assumptions, close to half of the formerly uninsured (especially those with higher incomes) experience both higher financial burden and lower estimated welfare; indicating a positive “price of responsibility” for complying with the individual mandate. The percentage of the sample with estimated welfare increases is close to matching observed take-up rates by the previously uninsured in the exchanges.},
comment = {Covered in this article: \url{http://ldi.upenn.edu/price-responsibility-impact-health-reform-non-poor-uninsureds} which says, ``Persons with low incomes may fare better after the ACA, but those formerly uninsured at higher incomes not in poor health consistently are worse off.’’ Low-income in this case is talking about below 138% of the FPL. People above that are not doing better under the ACA according to this paper, and that’s only about 16,000/year.},
category = {aca, fpl, insurance, health}
}
% See also this article in the Times about a study suggesting that the expanded Medicaid part of Obamacare has been effective in helping low-income people become healthier and avoid debt: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/09/upshot/obamacare-appears-to-be-making-people-healthier.html}
@article{aschwandennutritionresearch2016,
Author={Aschwanden, Christie},
url={https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/you-cant-trust-what-you-read-about-nutrition/?ex_cid=538twitter},
Title={You Can’t Trust What You Read About Nutrition},
journal={FiveThirtyEight},
date={2016-01-06},
comment = {Looks at nutrition studies and desconstructs their accuracy. The main tool is food frequency questionnaires, which useful but flawed. Most nutrition research is of very limited usefulness.},
category = {ffq, nutrition research, food}
}
@article{sangerkatzmedicaldebt2016,
Author={Sanger-Katz, Margot},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/06/upshot/lost-jobs-houses-savings-even-insured-often-face-crushing-medical-debt.html},
Title={Even Insured Can Face Crushing Medical Debt, Study Finds},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-01-05},
comment = {In the new poll, conducted by The New York Times and the Kaiser Family Foundation, roughly 20 percent of people under age 65 with health insurance nonetheless reported having problems paying their medical bills over the last year. By comparison, 53 percent of people without insurance said the same.'' One reason, many experts said, is a gradual shift in the norms about the generosity of health insurance. In recent years, health plans have come with growing deductibles and narrowing networks of providers, provisions devised to lower the cost of premiums. Those features have made health insurance accessible to a larger share of the population, but may also be leaving more insured Americans vulnerable.’’},
category = {health insurance, aca, debt, CUP}
}
@article{carrollalcohol2015,
Author={Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/22/upshot/alcohols-effect-on-health-what-the-science-says.html},
Title={Alcohol’s Effect on Health: What the Science Says},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-12-21},
comment = {An overview of the current state of research on the effects on alcohol on your health. Mostly, a small amount of daily drinking is good for you.},
category = {alcohol, health}
}
@article{caughey2014safe,
title={Safe prevention of the primary cesarean delivery},
author={Caughey, Aaron B and Cahill, Alison G and Guise, Jeanne-Marie and Rouse, Dwight J and American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and others},
journal={American journal of obstetrics and gynecology},
volume={210},
number={3},
pages={179–193},
year={2014},
publisher={Elsevier},
url = {https://www.acog.org/-/media/Obstetric-Care-Consensus-Series/oc001.pdf},
abstract = {In 2011, one in three women who gave birth in the United States did so by cesarean delivery. Cesarean birth can be life-saving for the fetus, the mother, or both in certain cases. However, the rapid increase in cesarean birth rates from 1996 to 2011 without clear evidence of concomitant decreases in maternal or neonatal morbidity or mortality raises significant concern that cesarean delivery is overused. Variation in the rates of nulliparous, term, singleton, vertex cesarean births also indicates that clinical practice patterns affect the number of cesarean births performed. The most common indications for primary cesarean delivery include, in order of frequency, labor dystocia, abnormal or indeterminate (formerly, nonreassuring) fetal heart rate tracing, fetal malpresentation, multiple gestation, and suspected fetal macrosomia. Safe reduction of the rate of primary cesarean deliveries will require different approaches for each of these, as well as other, indications. For example, it may be necessary to revisit the definition of labor dystocia because recent data show that contemporary labor progresses at a rate substantially slower than what was historically taught. Additionally, improved and standardized fetal heart rate interpretation and management may have an effect. Increasing women’s access to nonmedical interventions during labor, such as continuous labor and delivery support, also has been shown to reduce cesarean birth rates. External cephalic version for breech presentation and a trial of labor for women with twin gestations when the first twin is in cephalic presentation are other of several examples of interventions that can contribute to the safe lowering of the primary cesarean delivery rate.},
comment = {Best practices recommendations for not having birth with a C-section},
category = {c-section, cesarean, birth, health}
}
@article{quealyhealthcarepricing2015,
Author={Quealy, Kevin and Sanger-Katz, Margot},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/12/15/upshot/the-best-places-for-better-cheaper-health-care-arent-what-experts-thought.html},
Title={The Experts Were Wrong About the Best Places for Better and Cheaper Health Care},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-12-15},
comment = {New research suggest that best practices for health care organization, encouraged by the ACA, have modeled and increased conglomeration of health care facilities into larger hospitals. In most areas where this is true, costs have increased, even while quality of care has increased, and wasteful treatment has declined. Little in health care policies actually considers cost, only quality of care. The new research found that, in general, places that offer patients fewer treatments in Medicare also use fewer medical treatments for privately insured patients. That means that efforts to eliminate wasteful care can save money in both systems. But the high prices sometimes charged to private insurers matter even more.'' Many of the changes pioneered by the Affordable Care Act have been devised to reduce wasteful medical care, but few have been directly concerned about price.’’},
category = {health, insurance, affordable care act, CUP}
}
% Actual paper here: \url{http://www.healthcarepricingproject.org/sites/default/files/pricing_variation_manuscript_0.pdf}
@techreport{NBERw21787,
title = “Air Pollution and Criminal Activity: Evidence from Chicago Microdata”,
author = “Evan Herrnstadt and Erich Muehlegger”,
institution = “National Bureau of Economic Research”,
type = “Working Paper”,
series = “Working Paper Series”,
number = “21787”,
year = “2015”,
month = “December”,
doi = {10.3386/w21787},
URL = “http://www.nber.org/papers/w21787”,
abstract = {A large and growing literature documents the adverse impacts of pollution on health, productivity, educational attainment and socioeconomic outcomes. This paper provides the first quasi-experimental evidence that air pollution causally affects criminal activity. We exploit detailed location data on over two million serious crimes reported to the Chicago police department over a twelve-year period. We identify the causal effect of pollution on criminal activity by comparing crime on opposite sides of major interstates on days when the wind blows orthogonally the direction of the interstate and find that violent crime is 2.2 percent higher on the downwind side. Consistent with evidence from psychology on the relationship between pollution and aggression, the effect is unique to violent crimes – we find no effect of pollution on the commission of property crime.},
comment = {Evidence that air pollution increases violent crime.},
category = {crime, pollution, health}
}
% I don’t have access to, and therefore haven’t read this paper.
@Article{liuhappinessmortalitymillion,
author={Liu, Bette and Floud, Sarah and Pirie, Kirstin and Green, Jane and Peto, Richard and Beral, Valerie},
title={Does happiness itself directly affect mortality?: The prospective UK Million Women Study},
journal={The Lancet},
year={2015},
month={2015/12/11},
publisher={Elsevier},
abstract={BackgroundPoor health can cause unhappiness and poor health increases mortality. Previous reports of reduced mortality associated with happiness could be due to the increased mortality of people who are unhappy because of their poor health. Also, unhappiness might be associated with lifestyle factors that can affect mortality. We aimed to establish whether, after allowing for the poor health and lifestyle of people who are unhappy, any robust evidence remains that happiness or related subjective measures of wellbeing directly reduce mortality.},
doi={10.1016/S0140-6736(15)01087-9},
url={http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(15)01087-9}
comment = {Study of very large data set of British women that suggests there is no link between happiness and health. Covered in this NY Times article, \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/10/health/happiness-health-study.html} NY Times article covers the fact that there is very mixed results across many studies of the relationship between health and happiness.},
category = {health, happiness, women, grumpiness}
}
@article{addofiredepartmentems,
Author={Addo, Mina and Brecher, Charles},
url={http://www.cbcny.org/sites/default/files/REPORT_FDNY_12092015.pdf},
Title={TWENTY YEARS LATER: Integrating Services In The New York City Fire Department},
journal={Citizens Budget Commission},
year = {2015},
month = {12},
comment = {``Medical emergencies have outnumbered fires since the municipal ambulance service, known
as the Emergency Medical Service (EMS), merged with the New York City Fire Department
(FDNY) in 1996. But the merger was not accompanied by a fundamental transformation of
the organization and staffing of the FDNY. As a result, the FDNY does not efficiently address
its most common job: responding to medical emergencies.’’},
category = {fire department, nyc, EMS}
}
@article{gradypenistransplant,
Author={Grady, Denise},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/07/health/penis-transplants-being-planned-to-heal-troops-hidden-wounds.html},
Title={Penis Transplants Being Planned to Help Wounded Troops},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-12-06},
comment = {Remarkable developments in the penis transplant field. Interestingly, the article talks about how recipients care far more about function than how it looks.},
category = {sex, penises, transplants, health}
}
% I don’t think any woman would ever say that she doesn’t care how her breasts look, as long as they work.
@article{carrollcaloriecounts,
Author={Carroll, Aaron, E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/01/upshot/more-menus-have-calorie-labeling-but-obesity-rate-remains-high.html},
Title={The Surprising Failure of Calorie Counts on Menus},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-11-30},
comment = {Calorie counts on menus don’t work. Even though policy makers really like them.},
category = {health, food, calorie counts, menus}
}
@article{Blankarticleentry,
Author={Berreby, David},
url={https://aeon.co/essays/blaming-individuals-for-obesity-may-be-altogether-wrong},
Title={The obesity era},
journal={Aeon},
date={2013-06-19},
comment={The research on obesity is very complex, and continually pointing away from the ‘thermodynamic’ idea that a calorie is a calorie and eating too much causes people to get fat. This article points out we don’t know that causes people to get fat. Could be sugar, could be chemicals, could be virus, could be starvation during gestation, could be light, could be climate comtrol. But it seems to be bigger than just humans – lab animals with very controlled diets are also obese. In the end, this article concludes that it is the sum total of human decisions, the history of capitalism, that causes obesity.},
category={Health, obesity, sugar, capitalism}
}
% This article cites a guy named Jonathan C K Wells who proposes the capitalism is responsible for obesity theory. Look him up.
% Fascinating: our climate controlled environments might be the thing making us fat!
@techreport{NBERw21759,
title = “Information Frictions and Adverse Selection: Policy Interventions in Health Insurance Markets”,
author = “Benjamin R. Handel and Jonathan T. Kolstad and Johannes Spinnewijn”,
institution = “National Bureau of Economic Research”,
type = “Working Paper”,
series = “Working Paper Series”,
number = “21759”,
year = “2015”,
month = “November”,
doi = {10.3386/w21759},
URL = “http://www.nber.org/papers/w21759”,
abstract = {A large literature has analyzed pricing inefficiencies in health insurance markets due to adverse selection, typically assuming informed, active consumers on the demand side of the market. However, recent evidence suggests that many consumers have information frictions that lead to suboptimal health plan choices. As a result, policies such as information provision, plan recommendations, and smart defaults to improve consumer choices are being implemented in many applied contexts. In this paper we develop a general framework to study insurance market equilibrium and evaluate policy interventions in the presence of choice frictions. Friction-reducing policies can increase welfare by facilitating better matches between consumers and plans, but can decrease welfare by increasing the correlation between willingness-to-pay and costs, exacerbating adverse selection. We identify relationships between the underlying distributions of consumer (i) costs (ii) surplus from risk protection and (iii) choice frictions that determine whether friction-reducing policies will be on net welfare increasing or reducing. We extend the analysis to study how policies to improve consumer choices interact with the supply-side policy of risk-adjustment transfers and show that the effectiveness of the latter policy can have important implications for the effectiveness of the former. We implement the model empirically using proprietary data on insurance choices, utilization, and consumer information from a large firm. We leverage structural estimates from prior work with these data and highlight how the model’s micro-foundations can be estimated in practice. In our specific setting, we find that friction-reducing policies exacerbate adverse selection, essentially leading to the market fully unraveling, and reduce welfare. Risk-adjustment transfers are complementary, substantially mitigating the negative impact of friction-reducing policies, but having little effect in their absence.},
comment = {There is a bunch of research showing that consumers are making poor health plan choices because they don’t have good information. This paper runs a model on whether policies that make choosing a plan easier help consumers in the long run, and comes to the conclusion (if I’m reading their insane econo-babble correctly) that in fact the consumer is making worse choices for themselves with policy-choice-helping systems.},
category = {health, insurance, CUP}
}
% downloadable url: \url{http://personal.lse.ac.uk/spinnewi/Frictions_Selection_Policies_WEB.pdf}
@article{sharmanextrememusic2015,
Author={Sharman, Leah and Dingle, Genevieve A.},
url={http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2015.00272},
Title={Extreme metal music and anger processing},
journal={Frontiers in Human Neuroscience},
volume = {21},
date={2015-05-21},
comment = {There is no evidence that listening to extreme music causes anger and expressions of aggression. In this small study in Australia, some evidence is put forward that extreme music actually helps control angry feelings. See this summary article as well: \url{https://www.uq.edu.au/news/article/2015/06/head-banging-tunes-can-have-same-effect-warm-hug}},
category = {extreme music, aggression, heavy metal}
}
@article{pearinsurance2015,
Author={Pear, Robert},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/15/us/politics/many-say-high-deductibles-make-their-health-law-insurance-all-but-useless.html},
Title={Many Say High Deductibles Make Their Health Law Insurance All but Useless },
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-11-14},
comment = {Across the country people are dropping their ACA insurance because, while the premium is reasonable, the deductible makes it useless for anything except an emergency. (Though maybe this isn’t giving enough credit to the fact that preventive care is free?)},
category = {ACA, deductible, premium, CUP, health}
}
@article{betancourtimmigranthealth,
Author={Betancourt, Sarah},
url={http://www.gothamgazette.com/index.php/government/5965-in-new-de-blasio-heath-care-plan-limited-coverage-for-undocumented-immigrants},
Title={Betancourt, Sarah},
journal={Gotham Gazette},
date={2015-11-03},
comment = {Good summary of current state of health care for immigrants. Includes de Blasio’s proposal for Direct Access coverage.},
category = {health insurance, immigrants, ACA, CUP, NYIC}
}
@article{gaffneybeyondobamacare,
Author={Gaffney, A.W.},
url={https://lareviewofbooks.org/review/the-politics-of-health},
Title={The Politics of Health},
journal={Los Angeles Review of Books},
date={2015-10-26},
comment = {Review of \emph{Beyond Obamacare : Life, Death, and Social Policy}. Being of African-American heritage confers worse health metrics in multiple domains, with much of the difference explained by differences in socioeconomic status. This is not to say that racism doesn’t cause poor health, but merely that it does so (in part) through socioeconomic pathways.[6] House argues that we should think about the social determinants of health using the now popular sociological framework of intersectionality, with economic, racial, and gender “axes” together playing a role in the production of health and disease. Indeed, the fact that the socioeconomically advantaged are as healthy as the residents of our peer nations helps buttress the point that, in America, there are indeed two interrelated inequalities at play — one of wealth and income, and the other of health. Emmanuel Saez and Thomas Piketty have outlined the quantitative contours of the former with great clarity, but the latter has received far less attention in the public sphere. And yet, shouldn’t it be the contrary? Isn’t health more fundamental?'' The emerging picture, therefore, is not simply that poverty kills, which is true. Nor is it simply that there is a continuous gradient of health by income or education, which is also true. Both of these dynamics have presumably been at work, at least to some extent, in stratified human societies throughout history. The salient point is that within the past few decades, there seems to be a historic widening in the prospects for healthy living between those at the top of the economic pyramid and those below. Societal gains in both health and wealth are confined to those at the top, causing metrics of population health to experience a relative overall deterioration.’’},
category = {health, inequality, affordable care act}
}
@article {OBY:OBY21371,
author = {Lustig, Robert H. and Mulligan, Kathleen and Noworolski, Susan M. and Tai, Viva W. and Wen, Michael J. and Erkin-Cakmak, Ayca and Gugliucci, Alejandro and Schwarz},
title = {Isocaloric fructose restriction and metabolic improvement in children with obesity and metabolic syndrome},
journal = {Obesity},
issn = {1930-739X},
url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/oby.21371},
doi = {10.1002/oby.21371},
pages = {n/a–n/a},
year = {2015},
abstract = { Objective Dietary fructose is implicated in metabolic syndrome, but intervention studies are confounded by positive caloric balance, changes in adiposity, or artifactually high amountserican (n = 16) children with obesity and metabolic syndrome. Methods Participants consumed a diet for 9 days to deliver comparable percentages of protein, fat, and carbohydrate as their self-reported diet; however, dietary sugar was reduced frrwent dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry and oral glucose tolerance testing on Days 0 and 10. Biochemical analyses were controlled for weight change by repeated measures ANCOVA Results Reductions in diastolic blood pressure (−5 mmHg; P = 0.002), lactate (−0.3 mmol/L; P < 0.001), triglyceride, and LDL-cholesterol (−46% and −0.3 mmol/L; P < 0.001) were noted. Post hoc sensitivity analysis demonstrates that results in the subcohort that did not lose weight (n = 10) were directionally consistent. Conclusions Isocaloric fructose restriction improved surrogate metabolic parameters in children with obesity and metabolic syndrome irrespective of weight change.},
comment = {Sugar is poisonous to you. See Time article about the study: \url{http://time.com/4087775/sugar-is-definitely-toxic-a-new-study-says/}},
category = {sugar, health}
}
@article{carrollsweetners,
Author={Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/28/upshot/the-evidence-supports-artificial-sweeteners-over-sugar.html},
Title={The Evidence Supports Artificial Sweeteners Over Sugar},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-07-27},
comment = {Sugar is bad for you. Artificial sweeteners are not.},
category = {sugar, artificial sweeteners, health}
}
@article{carrollmilk,
Author={Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/18/upshot/got-milk-might-not-be-doing-you-much-good.html},
Title={Got Milk? Might Not Be Doing You Much Good},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2014-11-17},
comment = {Milk is high in calories and doesn’t provide anything you need.},
category = {dairy, milk, Health}
}
% Also see this attempt to clarify the likely-myth that dairy products make you plegmy or increase mucus production:
% \url{https://mobile.nytimes.com/blogs/well/2017/02/24/do-dairy-foods-cause-mucus-production/}
@article{frakthealthplans2015,
Author={Frakt, Austin},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/02/upshot/why-consumers-often-err-in-choosing-health-plans.html},
Title={Why Consumers Often Err in Choosing Health Plans},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-11-01},
comment = {Studies show that do to the complexity of health plan marketplace websites people make irrational economic choices about which plan would be the most cost-effective for them. },
category = {health, economics, ACA, CUP}
}
@article{carrollmamograms,
Author={Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/22/upshot/new-screening-guidelines-wont-assure-fewer-mammograms.html},
Title={New Screening Guidelines Won’t Assure Fewer Mammograms},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-10-21},
comment = {The cancer society now recommends that most women not begin annual screening mammography until age 45. When they turn 55, it recommends that they switch to every-other-year screening. That should continue until a woman is expected to have less than 10 years of life remaining. The society now recommends that no clinical breast exams — where physicians or nurses feel for lumps — be done as a screening procedure at any age.'' It is very hard to get doctors to do less. I have discussed this before in the context of the placebo effect in operations. Once physicians believe they are doing good, it is hard to get them to change their minds. Others think that doing more protects them from lawsuits, although that’s most likely untrue.’’},
category = {health, mamograms, cancer screening, placebos, less health care}
}
% Yet another study on this topic: url{http://dx.doi.org/10.7326/M16-0270}
% Also see recommendations against breast self exams: \url{http://www.healthnewsreview.org/2017/02/a-trick-to-finding-breast-cancer-goes-viral-on-facebook-heres-what-was-missing-from-the-message/}
@article{demicheli2007vaccines,
title={Vaccines for preventing influenza in healthy adults},
author={Demicheli, Vittorio and Di Pietrantonj, Carlo and Jefferson, Tom and Rivetti, Alessandro and Rivetti, Daniela},
journal={Cochrane Database Syst Rev},
volume={2},
year={2007},
publisher={Wiley Online Library},
url = {http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD001269.pub5/pdf/abstract},
comment = {Meta-study looking at the effectiveness of the flu vaccine. Vaccination shows no appreciable effect on working days lost or hospitalisation. Number needed to treat of the flu vaccine averages around 40 (as high as 100 in year with a bad match between the vaccine and the prevalent flu that year.) ``Influenza vaccines have a very modest effect in reducing influenza symptoms and working days lost in the general population, including pregnant women. No evidence of association between influenza vaccination and serious adverse events was found in the comparative studies considered in the review.’’ Also see this coverage in Health News Review: \url{http://www.healthnewsreview.org/2015/10/this-flu-season-lets-immunize-ourselves-from-the-annual-infection-of-exaggerating-relative-risk-reductions/} and this article in Vox: \url{https://www.vox.com/2015/10/14/9521807/flu-shot-vaccine-effectiveness}},
category = {Health, flu, influenza, vaccine, number needed to treat, flu shot}
}
% See this Aaron Carroll explanation of why experts disagree about whether to eat red meat or not:
% \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/01/upshot/health-risks-meat-experts.html}
% In it, he shows exactly why public health people often give annoying advice - they only look at population outcomes, not individual risk.
% Public health people are guilty of almost LYING to individuals - they promote concepts as if they are a risk to individuals (like flu shots)
% even though they are clearly not, and let people believe that only because it gets them closer to their population goals,
% not because it’s the truth.
% Public health people are constantly pushing people to get flu shots early, but that actually undermines any effectiveness flu shots might have: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/13/opinion/when-to-get-your-flu-shot.html}
@article{doi:10.1001/jamainternmed.2014.6016,
author = {Hoffmann TC and Del Mar C},
title = {Patients’ expectations of the benefits and harms of treatments, screening, and tests: A systematic review },
journal = {JAMA Internal Medicine},
volume = {175},
number = {2},
pages = {274-286},
year = {2015},
doi = {10.1001/jamainternmed.2014.6016},
URL = { + http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/jamainternmed.2014.6016},
eprint = {/data/Journals/INTEMED/932716/irv140001.pdf?v=635580609520500000},
comment = {Study that shows people don’t understand how risky medical treatment is. Referred to by this NY Times article: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/03/upshot/if-patients-only-knew-when-more-information-means-less-treatment.html ``The majority of participants overestimated intervention benefit and underestimated harm. Clinicians should discuss accurate and balanced information about intervention benefits and harms with patients, providing the opportunity to develop realistic expectations and make informed decisions.’’}},
category = {science, health}
}
@article{nnt,
Author={Frakt, Austin and Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/27/upshot/can-this-treatment-help-me-theres-a-statistic-for-that.html},
Title={Can This Treatment Help Me? There’s a Statistic for That},
journal={New York Times},
comment = {Article about how the statistic `Number Needed to Treat’ works in health care.},
category = {health, statistics}
}
% See Carroll’s video explanation of NNT: \url{https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHxaDQNyfV4}
@article{ornsteinglesshealthcare,
Author={Ornstein, Charles},
url={https://www.propublica.org/article/mark-cubans-advice-a-recipe-for-making-all-of-us-sick-expert-says},
Title={Mark Cuban’s Advice a `Recipe For Making All Of Us Sick,’ Expert Says},
journal={ProPublica},
date={2015-04-06},
comment = {Regarding the evidence that shows that less testing is good for your health. There are some interesting thoughts that apply to participation in general. Obviously we have to find a balance between something that’s totally on the patient to try to decide \ldots and the doctor simply asserting what the patient should do. I think most patients want to be somewhere in between. They want to participate in the decision and when there really are close calls, they want to participate in the close calls. We should recognize that some patients will want to do that more than others, and some patients will be more capable of doing that than others.'' Ironically, part of health is not being too focused on it. \ldots Much better for people to develop good relationships, have good friends, be outside, eat well, find things that produce meaning in their lives.’’},
category = {health, participation, less health care}
}
@misc{kohn2000err,
title={To err is human: building a safer health system. A report of the Committee on Quality of Health Care in America, Institute of Medicine},
author={Kohn, Linda T and Corrigan, Janet M and Donaldson, Molla S and others},
year={2000},
publisher={Washington, DC: National Academy Press},
comment = {Now classic report on the high number of errors in the American medical system. ``That committee believed it could not address the overall quality of care without first addressing a key, but almost unrecognized component of quality; which was patient safety. The committee’s approach was to emphasize that “error” that resulted in patient harm was not a property of health care professionals’ competence, good intentions, or hard work. Rather, the safety of care—defined as “freedom from accidental injury”3 (p. 16)—is a property of a system of care, whether a hospital, primary care clinic, nursing home, retail pharmacy, or home care, in which specific attention is given to ensuring that well-designed processes of care prevent, recognize, and quickly recover from errors so that patients are not harmed.’’ — From a summary of the report, here: \url{http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK2673/}.},
category = {Health, medical errors}
}
% This is the paper that started the revolution in the realization that less treatment is better for you.
@article {Makaryi2139,
author = {Makary, Martin A and Daniel, Michael},
title = {Medical error{\textemdash}the third leading cause of death in the US},
volume = {353},
year = {2016},
doi = {10.1136/bmj.i2139},
publisher = {BMJ Publishing Group Ltd},
URL = {http://www.bmj.com/content/353/bmj.i2139},
eprint = {http://www.bmj.com/content/353/bmj.i2139.full.pdf},
journal = {BMJ}
comment = {Updated research on medical errors finds that medical mistakes are the third leading cause of death, but that do to tracking methods that is little known.},
category = {Health, medical errors, death certificates}
}
% Also see the ProPublica reporting on this: \url{https://www.propublica.org/article/study-urges-cdc-to-revise-count-of-deaths-from-medical-error}
% Also see Health News Review blog which raises questions about media coverage of this report, and the quality of the research itself: \url{http://www.healthnewsreview.org/2016/05/superficial-coverage-of-medical-errors-could-leave-erroneous-impression-with-readers/} (But notably not the fact that medical errors are a serious problem.)
% See this critical response to medical error reporting in the Times: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/16/upshot/death-by-medical-error-adding-context-to-some-scary-numbers.html}
@article{doi:10.1001/jamainternmed.2014.6781,
author = {Jena AB and Prasad V and Goldman DP and Romley J},
title = {MOrtality and treatment patterns among patients hospitalized with acute cardiovascular conditions during dates of national cardiology meetings},
journal = {JAMA Internal Medicine},
volume = {175},
number = {2},
pages = {237-244},
year = {2015},
doi = {10.1001/jamainternmed.2014.6781},
URL = { + http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/jamainternmed.2014.6781},
eprint = {/data/Journals/INTEMED/932716/ioi140128.pdf},
comment = {Study that showed you have a better change of surviging a heart attack if the senior cardiac specialist was NOT in the hospital at the time you arrived there. Also teaching hospitals have better mortality rates than other hospitals. Referenced by this NY Times article: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/22/opinion/sunday/are-good-doctors-bad-for-your-health.html} See follow-up letters casting doubt on study, \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/30/opinion/when-senior-doctors-arent-around.html}},
category = {health, hospitals, heart attacks, cardiologists, patient safety}
}
% NY Times article Are Good Doctors Bad for Your Health? also advises asking these four questions for any procedures or testing:
% First, what difference will it make? Will the test results change our approach to treatment? Second, how much improvement in terms of prolongation of life, reduction in risk of a heart attack or other problem is the treatment actually going to make? Third, how likely and severe are the side effects? And fourth, is the hospital a teaching hospital?
% See also NY Times piece on how less care during Covid didn’t reduce health outcomes: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/22/opinion/coronavirus-reopen-hospitals.html}
@article{silbermanplaceboswork,
Author={Silberman, Steve},
url={http://archive.wired.com/medtech/drugs/magazine/17-09/ff_placebo_effect},
Title={Placebos Are Getting More Effective. Drugmakers Are Desperate to Know Why.},
journal={Wired},
date={2009-08-24},
comment = {Placebos work, and they are getting better. Why? Probably because clinical tests don’t give the same results in different geographic places, and drug companies have been doing more testing overseas. Two interesting things - 1. There’s an interesting relationship here to the studies that indicate that mental health problems vary widely based on geography. 2. If placebos are \emph{real} and the effects of the \emph{design} of pills are real, then maybe cultural norms should not be dismissed for being relative.},
category = {Health, placebos, Science, marketing}
}
% Also see this article on how the placebo effect works even if you KNOW it’s a placebo: \url{https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/placebo-can-work-even-know-placebo-201607079926}
% See also this article that is CRITICAL of placebos: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/15/us/politics/placebo-effect-clinical-care.html}
% Argues that much science studying placebo effects is poorly executed.
% Most placebos when put up against no treatment at all do not perform better
% Some medical professionals have so latched onto the idea of placebos that they are prescribing them in place of actual effective treatments.
% It only briefly mentions at the end the idea that the effectiveness of placebos might be through the magic of the doctor->patient interaction.
% This is my favorite explanantion of placebos, because it is rational, but still sort of magical
% It also explains why the science is so mixed on placebos
% It also explains why they work even when you are told they are placebos
% It also explains why pre-science historical medicine, no matter how zany, seemed to work better than random chance.
@article{greenberg2018placebos,
Author={Greenberg, Gary},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/07/magazine/placebo-effect-medicine.html},
Title={What if the Placebo Effect Isn’t a Trick?},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2018-11-07},
comment={Covers the history of and the latest in placebo research, which is finding that not only is the placebo effect getting stronger, but it also might be a key part of the healing process in general. It’s included in clinical trials because it is recognized as an important part of every treatment, but it is treated as if it were not important in itself. As a result, although virtually every clinical trial is a study of the placebo effect, it remains underexplored — an outcome that reflects the fact that there is no money in sugar pills and thus no industry interest in the topic as anything other than a hurdle it needs to overcome.'' Science is “designed to get rid of the husks and find the kernels,” he told me. Much can be lost in the threshing — in particular, Kaptchuk sometimes worries, the rituals embedded in the doctor-patient encounter that he thinks are fundamental to the placebo effect, and that he believes embody an aspect of medicine that has disappeared.’’ “I don’t love science,” Kaptchuk told me. “I want to know what heals people.” Science may not be the only way to understand illness and healing, but it is the established way.'' the placebo effect is a biological response to an act of caring; that somehow the encounter itself calls forth healing and that the more intense and focused it is, the more healing it evokes.’’},
category={Health, Science, placebos}
}
%I’ve always struggled with the fact that it seems bad practice to me
%to throw out human behaviors that we have been doing for thousands or
%tens of thousands of years - yet virtually all medicine up to the late
%19th century was totally quackery. The idea that it is the ritual that
%trigger the placebo effect suddenly makes all those ancient approaches
%to medicine much more valid. Which both justifies the use of things that
%may have seemed like quackery before, and it just makes the world feel
%more right to me again.
% see also this overview of research showing nice doctors are more effective:
% \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/22/well/live/can-a-nice-doctor-make-treatments-more-effective.html}
@article{marchantplacebos,
Author={Marchant, Jo},
url={http://www.nature.com/news/strong-placebo-response-thwarts-painkiller-trials-1.18511?WT.mc_id=TWT_NatureNews},
Title={Strong placebo response thwarts painkiller trials},
journal={Nature},
date={2015-10-06},
comment = {"Our data suggest that the longer a trial is and the bigger a trial is, the bigger the placebo is going to be," he says. Longer, bigger US trials probably cost more, and the glamour and gloss of their presentation might indirectly enhance patients’ expectations, Mogil speculates.''Mogil suggests it is also worth investigating the elements that generate the more powerful placebo response in US trials, and then incorporating those elements (such as the relationship between patient and nurse) into patient care. Ted Kaptchuk, director of placebo research at Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts, agrees. “If the major component of a drug in any particular condition is its placebo component, we need to develop non-pharmacological interventions as a first-line response,” he says.’’},
category = {health, placebos, painkillers}
}
@article{carrollplacebosurgery,
Author={Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/07/upshot/the-placebo-effect-doesnt-apply-just-to-pills.html},
Title={The Placebo Effect Doesn’t Apply Just to Pills},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-10-06},
comment = {Fake surgery and medical devices often have just as good an effect as the real thing. But testing those procedures and devices doesn’t have to be better than a placebo (unlike drug testing).``A total of 180 patients who had osteoarthritis of the knee were randomly assigned (with their consent) to one of three groups. The first had a standard arthroscopic procedure, and the second had lavage. The third, however, had sham surgery. They had an incision, and a procedure was faked so that they didn’t know that they actually had nothing done. Then the incision was closed. The results were stunning. Those who had the actual procedures did no better than those who had the sham surgery. They all improved the same amount. The results were all in people’s heads.’’ },
category = {placebos, surgery, medical devices, knee surgery}
}
% Carroll did what is essentially a follow up to this on the specific device of hearth stents: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/12/upshot/heart-stents-are-useless-for-most-stable-patients-theyre-still-widely-used.html}
@article{meier2011medicaldevices,
Author={Meier},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/30/business/study-calls-approval-process-for-medical-devices-flawed.html},
Title={Study Faults Approval Process for Medical Devices},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2011-07-29},
comment={The government’s system for regulating many medical devices like artificial hips should be abandoned and replaced because it fails to examine their safety and effectiveness before sale. The FDA’s review process does not screen out dangerous or ineffective products. The law controlling approval only requires that a new product be ‘substantially equivalent’ to one that is already on the market to be approved.},
category={Health, fda, medical devices, Criticality}
}
% This article was cited in a 2023 article about medical devices leading to amputations: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/15/health/atherectomy-peripheral-artery-disease.html}, suggesting that this remains an issue more than a decade later.
@article{peacenurses,
Author={Peace, William},
url={http://bioethics.northwestern.edu/atrium/articles/issue12/peace.html},
Title={“Head Nurses”},
journal={Atrium},
issue = {12},
year = {2014},
comment = {This story about nurses giving blowjobs to crippled men in the hospital caused a lot of controversy over accusations of censorship when it was pulled from the magazine.},
category = {sex, hospitals, health, nurses}
}
% Winter 2014.
% This article actually DOES read like a Penthouse letter. But more than that is just seems SO unlikely. This is a PRIME candidate for a false memory. Just imagine a horny teenager, in the hospital with other boys, hearing stories about blowjobs given by the nurses in the night — what’s more likely? That this actually happened? Or that he REMEMBERS this happenning, but it actually is just the product of a false memory? See work on unreliability of eyewitnesses.
@article{berlietphonesex,
Author={Berliet, Melanie},
url={http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/10/rise-of-the-stay-at-home-phone-sex-operator/263780/},
Title={Rise of the Stay-at-Home Phone Sex Operator},
journal={The Atlantic},
date={2012-10-18},
comment = {References some sources that suggest auditory stimulation may be even more powerful than visual stimulation. The author experiments with working in phone sex, and decides that maybe the culture should adopted as a retro method of incorporating technology into our sex lives that’s less likely to lead to humiliation.},
category = {phone sex}
}
@article{thomsonfemaleejaculation2016,
Author={Thomson, Helen},
url={https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn26772-female-ejaculation-comes-in-two-forms-scientists-find},
Title={Female ejaculation comes in two forms, scientists find},
journal={New Scientist},
date={2015-01-09},
comment={There are two kinds of female ejaculation: a small milky white excretion from a prostate-like gland, and an emptying of the bladder in large urine-like quantities. The latter is, in fact, uncontrolled peeing.},
category={Health, sex, female ejaculation, peeing, urine}
}
@article{dombekdatingsex,
Author={Dombek, Kristin},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/13/books/review/date-onomics-the-sex-myth-and-modern-romance.html},
Title={Date-Onomics,’ The Sex Myth’ and `Modern Romance’},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-09-09},
comment = {Book review covering research that shows that Americans aren’t having nearly as much sex as they think everyone else does. 5 to 10 percent of male college students are having sex on any given weekend, but they think 80 percent are. Also single college educated straight women vastly outnumber single college educated straight men. (By 33%)},
category = {sex, dating, marriage}
}
@article{victor2016onlinedating,
Author={Victor, Daniel},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/10/style/women-who-make-first-move-in-online-dating-are-rewarded-study-finds.html},
Title={Dating Are Rewarded, Study Finds},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-03-09},
comment={Covers research from OkCupid that shows women who make the first men end up with more dates with more attractive men. ``both men and women are aspirational in whom they approach — men send messages to women 17 percentage points more “attractive” than themselves, while women send messages to men 10 percentage points higher. So a woman who simply sifts through her inbox is most likely fielding entreaties from men less attractive than she is, while she’s most likely to get a response if she contacts a more attractive man.’’},
category={Health, online dating, Humanity, okcupid}
}
@article{bergner2009women,
title={What do women want},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/magazine/25desire-t.html},
author={Bergner, Daniel},
journal={New York Times Magazine},
volume={22},
year={2009},
comment={looks at studies of women and bonobos and discusses the odd things that stimulate women, according to the latest research.},
category ={sex, women}
}
@article{Blair2013women,
Author={Blair, Elaine},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/16/books/review/what-do-women-want-by-daniel-bergner.html},
Title={I’ll Have What She’s Having},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2013-06-13},
comment = {Review of Bergner’s book \emph{What Do Women Want?} (Same name as his previous Times Magazine article), Discusses how women are as promiscuous as men, possibly evolved the female orgasm to have sex with multiple partners in a session, and that monogamous marriage is stifling women’s sex drive. Also an interesting insight towards the end that when many scientists are finding similar things all of a sudden, it’s because they went looking for them. And they went looking for them, because a cultural shift has already occurred.},
category = {sex, science, women}
}
% See also: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/16/opinion/sex-women-feminism-rules.html}
% Which is a really good essay that pleasingly embraces the complexity of what women want rather than offering proscribed rules or solutions.
@article{oppenheimersavage,
Author={Oppenheimer, Mark},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/03/magazine/infidelity-will-keep-us-together.html},
Title={Married, With Infidelities},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2011-06-2011},
comment = {Profile of Dan Savage and his ideas about how infidelity can be good for a relationship, within bounds of honesty and moderation - mostly that the standard we set for monogamy (and letting one sin ruin a marriage) is too high for normal humans. Includes a good definition of GGG. ``“The mistake that straight people made,” Savage told me, “was imposing the monogamous expectation on men. Men were never expected to be monogamous. Men had concubines, mistresses and access to prostitutes, until everybody decided marriage had to be egalitarian and fairsey.” In the feminist revolution, rather than extending to women “the same latitude and license and pressure-release valve that men had always enjoyed,” we extended to men the confines women had always endured. “And it’s been a disaster for marriage.”’’},
category = {ggg, dan savage, sex, infidelity}
}
% Also see this article from the BBC about how even among animals that practice “social monogamy” almost none of them (including humans) practice “sexual monogamy”: \url{http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20160213-why-pairing-up-for-life-is-hardly-ever-a-good-idea}
@article{carrollexercize,
Author={Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/16/upshot/to-lose-weight-eating-less-is-far-more-important-than-exercising-more.html},
Title={To Lose Weight, Eating Less Is Far More Important Than Exercising More},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-06-15},
comment = {Exercise doesn’t burn enough calories to really reduce weight (though it has a number of other health benefits). Statistics show that eating fewer calories is a far more effective way to lose weight.},
category = {exercise, eating, diet, health}
}
@article{PHN:9627964,
author = {Zhao,Yimin and Wu,Kejian and Zheng,Jusheng and Zuo,Ruiting and Li,Duo},
title = {Association of coffee drinking with all-cause mortality: a systematic review and meta-analysis},
journal = {Public Health Nutrition},
volume = {18},
issue = {07},
month = {5},
year = {2015},
issn = {1475-2727},
pages = {1282–1291},
numpages = {10},
doi = {10.1017/S1368980014001438},
URL = {http://journals.cambridge.org/article_S1368980014001438},
comment = {Review of huge studies on health impacts of coffee. Finds that there are no overall negative impacts. Referenced in this article in the NY Times: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/12/upshot/more-consensus-on-coffees-benefits-than-you-might-think.html} Though the Times did a follow up to their own article: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/13/upshot/more-about-coffee-and-health.html} And Slate points out that all coffee research is epidemiological and observational: \url{http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/medical_examiner/2015/06/is_coffee_good_or_bad_for_you_the_answer_is_neither.html} The Times claims that the only takeaway you should have is that there is no evidence that drinking more coffee is bad for you. There is virtually no evidence that it is good for you. Later the Times covered tea as well: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/06/upshot/what-the-evidence-tells-us-about-tea.html}},
category = {coffee, tea, health}
}
% See also, the WHO endorses coffee: \url{http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/06/15/coffee-may-protect-against-cancer-w-h-o-concludes/}
@article{begleycoffee2015,
Author={Begley, Sharon},
url={http://www.statnews.com/2015/11/16/coffee-extend-life/},
Title={Will drinking coffee extend your life?},
journal={STAT},
date={2015-11-16},
comment = {Another overview of the current state of coffee research, and summary of a new analysis of very large reporting by medical professionals. Controlling for smoking shows statistically increased lifespan for coffee drinkers. Though this is an observational study, and the benefit is at the public health statistics level not the individual level.},
category = {coffee, health}
}
@article{Ding16112015,
author = {Ding, Ming and Satija, Ambika and Bhupathiraju, Shilpa N. and Hu, Yang and Sun, Qi and Han, Jiali and Lopez-Garcia, Esther and Willett, Walter and van Dam, Rob M. and Hu, Frank B.},
title = {Association of Coffee Consumption with Total and Cause-Specific Mortality in Three Large Prospective Cohorts},
year = {2015},
doi = {10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.115.017341},
abstract ={Background—The association between consumption of caffeinated and decaffeinated coffee and risk of mortality remains inconclusive. Methods and Results—We examined the associations of consumption of total, caffeinated, and decaffeinated coffee with risk of subsequent total and cause-specific mortality among 74,890 women in the Nurses’ Health Study (NHS), 93,054 women in the NHS 2, and 40,557 men in the Health Professionals Follow-up Study. Coffee consumption was assessed at baseline using a semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire. During 4,690,072 person-years of follow-up, 19,524 women and 12,432 men died. Consumption of total, caffeinated, and decaffeinated coffee were non-linearly associated with mortality. Compared to non-drinkers, coffee consumption one to five cups/d was associated with lower risk of mortality, while coffee consumption more than five cups/d was not associated with risk of mortality. However, when restricting to never smokers, compared to non-drinkers, the HRs of mortality were 0.94 (0.89 to 0.99) for ≤ 1 cup/d, 0.92 (0.87 to 0.97) for 1.1-3 cups/d, 0.85 (0.79 to 0.92) for 3.1-5 cups/d, and 0.88 (0.78 to 0.99) for > 5 cups/d (p for non-linearity = 0.32; p for trend < 0.001). Significant inverse associations were observed for caffeinated (p for trend < 0.001) and decaffeinated coffee (p for trend = 0.022). Significant inverse associations were observed between coffee consumption and deaths due to cardiovascular disease, neurological diseases, and suicide. No significant association between coffee consumption and total cancer mortality was found. Conclusions—Higher consumption of total coffee, caffeinated coffee, and decaffeinated coffee was associated with lower risk of total mortality. },
URL = {http://circ.ahajournals.org/content/early/2015/11/10/CIRCULATIONAHA.115.017341.abstract},
eprint = {http://circ.ahajournals.org/content/early/2015/11/10/CIRCULATIONAHA.115.017341.full.pdf+html},
journal = {Circulation},
comment = {Paper cited in the Begley overview article on STAT.},
category = {coffee, Health}
}
@article{atomicwine,
Author={Kitchen Sisters, The},
url={http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2014/06/03/318241738/how-atomic-particles-became-the-smoking-gun-in-wine-fraud-mystery},
Title={How Atomic Particles Helped Solve A Wine Fraud Mystery},
journal={NPR},
date={2014-06-03},
comment = {Detecting cesium in wine bottles (which was not present in the atmosphere before atomic testing) is a way to tell if the bottle is authentic. Kind of a dumb article (the atomic testing didn’t reveal anything, poorly written) but talks about some interesting stuff.},
category = {fakes, forgery, wine, food, science, fallout, nuclear testing}
}
@article{bosker2017wine,
Author={Bosker, Bianca},
url={https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/17/opinion/sunday/ignore-the-snobs-drink-the-cheap-delicious-wine.html},
Title={Ignore the Snobs, Drink the Cheap, Delicious Wine},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2017-03-17},
comment={Discusses the fact that cheap wines have flavors manufactured by additives to suit the tastes of focus groups and the general public - and that this is a good thing. She says this is part of an effort to make wine an everyday drink like beer or soda. She talks about how even the Romans added weird things to their wine to change the flavors. She also says that the mass-market wines are sweet, low in astringency, bitterness, and complexity. And points out that experts and consumers have completely different opinions about what makes a delicious bottle of wine. But then she also points out that while cheap wines have the biggest price difference from expensive wines that they ever have, they are also much closer in flavor to expensive wines than they ever have been.},
category={Health, wine, additives}
}
% So much to love and hate in this article.
% The fact that experts have a completely different tastes in wine reminds me of Brian’s argument about cigars: people who like cigars like strong cigars that might put off a first time smoker.
% I’m all for anti-snobery. But do we really want to encourage people to drink drinks which are full of chemicals? Particularly when their tastes are for syrupy sweet drinks?
% As a public health thing, it seems like training people to like HEALTHY drinks would be a lot better than encouraging them to drink the sugary swill they like.
% Is that any different than trying to get people off soda?
% Many of the questions I raised here are addressed in this article: \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/15/dining/processed-wines-dont-drink-them.html}
% More hand-wringing by wine experts about how normal people don’t like expensive wine (until they are trained in them - but at the same time let’s not train people with the ridiculous wine vocabulary…)
% \url{https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/16/dining/drinks/wine-populism-critics.html}
@article{doak1996teaching,
title={Teaching patients with low literacy skills},
author={Doak, Cecilia Conrath and Doak, Leonard G and Root, Jane H},
journal={AJN The American Journal of Nursing},
volume={96},
number={12},
pages={16M},
year={1996},
publisher={LWW},
comment = {The classic book on communicating with patients},
category = {Health, CUP}
}
@article{bellusbadmedicine,
Author={Belluz, Julia},
url={http://www.vox.com/2015/3/23/8264355/research-study-hype},
Title={This is why you shouldn’t believe that exciting new medical study},
journal={Vox},
date={2015-03-23},
comment = {Goes over the statistics that show that the vast majority of new medical studies are proved wrong or useless. Argues we should be looking to the pile of \emph{past} studies for truth, not new ones. Related to the famous Why Most Published Research Findings Are False paper.},
category = {health, science}
}
% ioannidis2005most is the research findings are false paper
@article{carrollsurvivalratecancer,
Author={Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/14/upshot/why-survival-rate-is-not-the-best-way-to-judge-cancer-spending.html},
Title={Why Survival Rate Is Not the Best Way to Judge Cancer Spending},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-04-13},
comment = {Why you should trust statistics about health that use mortality rates more than ones that use survival rates. Also gets into how cost-effectiveness analysis in US health care is ignored, undervalued and underused. He has another column on that specific subject: \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/16/upshot/forbidden-topic-in-health-policy-debate-cost-effectiveness.html}},
category = {health, statistics}
}
@article{bohannonchocolate,
Author={Bohannon, John},
url={http://io9.com/i-fooled-millions-into-thinking-chocolate-helps-weight-1707251800},
Title={I Fooled Millions Into Thinking Chocolate Helps Weight Loss. Here’s How.},
journal={io9},
date={2015-05-27},
comment = {Covers a study deliberately done badly that showed chocolate helps improve weight loss. The study is real, but has a very low number of subjects, and tests for many things. Explains how this process is a p-hack (it lowers the p value of the statistics.) And then covers how easy it is to get a paper published, and to encourage media to pick it up and print it.},
category = {health, science, statistics, culture jamming}
}
@article{doi:10.1001/jamainternmed.2014.1359,
author = {Schwitzer G},
title = {A guide to reading health care news stories},
journal = {JAMA Internal Medicine},
volume = {174},
number = {7},
pages = {1183-1186},
year = {2014},
doi = {10.1001/jamainternmed.2014.1359},
URL = { + http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/jamainternmed.2014.1359},
eprint = {/data/Journals/INTEMED/930473/isc140001.pdf},
comment ={Gives guidance on how to read health care news stories critically. Provides some statistics on accuracy of health care news stories. By the people who run \url{http://www.healthnewsreview.org/}},
category = {Health, science}
}
%I haven’t read this paper because it is in a journal I don’t have access to.
@article{schoenfeld2013everything,
title={Is everything we eat associated with cancer? A systematic cookbook review},
author={Schoenfeld, Jonathan D and Ioannidis, John PA},
journal={The American journal of clinical nutrition},
volume={97},
number={1},
pages={127–134},
year={2013},
publisher={Am Soc Nutrition},
comment = {Now classic meta-study that suggests everything we eat both causes and prevents cancer. Referenced in the Julia Belluz Vox article as well.},
category = {Health, science, food}
}
@article{velasquezgluten,
Author={Velasquez-Manoff, Moises},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/05/opinion/sunday/the-myth-of-big-bad-gluten.html},
Title={The Myth of Big, Bad Gluten},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-07-04},
comment = {Humans have been eating Gluten for 10,000 years, and likely have adapted to it. But immune system over responses are on the rise. ``Maybe we should stop asking what’s wrong with wheat, and begin asking what’s wrong with us.’’},
category = {gluten, wheat, immune system, Health}
}
@article{zugergraphicmedicinereview,
Author={Zuger M.D., Abigail},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/30/science/review-the-bad-doctor-graphic-medicine-manifesto.html},
Title={Review: ‘The Bad Doctor’ and ‘Graphic Medicine Manifesto’},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-06-29},
comment = {Review of books by Ian Williams, a pioneer in the field of ``graphic medicine’’ where people involved in medicine (both doctors and patients) use drawings/comics to capture both emotion and technical theory.},
category = {medicine, health, graphics, CUP, comics}
}
@techreport{NBERw21279,
title = “Suicide, Age, and Wellbeing: an Empirical Investigation”,
author = “Anne Case and Angus Deaton”,
institution = “National Bureau of Economic Research”,
type = “Working Paper”,
series = “Working Paper Series”,
number = “21279”,
year = “2015”,
month = “June”,
doi = {10.3386/w21279},
URL = “http://www.nber.org/papers/w21279”,
abstract = {Suicide rates, life evaluation, and measures of affect are all plausible measures of the mental health and wellbeing of populations. Yet in the settings we examine, correlations between suicide and measured wellbeing are at best inconsistent. Differences in suicides between men and women, between Hispanics, blacks, and whites, between age groups for men, between countries or US states, between calendar years, and between days of the week, do not match differences in life evaluation. By contrast, reports of physical pain are strongly predictive of suicide in many contexts. The prevalence of pain is increasing among middle-aged Americans, and is accompanied by a substantial increase in suicides and deaths from drug and alcohol poisoning. Our measure of pain is now highest in middle age—when life evaluation and positive affect are at a minimum. In the absence of the pain epidemic, suicide and life evaluation are likely unrelated, leaving unresolved whether either one is a useful overall measure of population wellbeing.},
category = {suicide, Health, baby boomers},
}
@article{carrollwater,
Author={Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/25/upshot/no-you-do-not-have-to-drink-8-glasses-of-water-a-day.html},
Title={No, You Do Not Have to Drink 8 Glasses of Water a Day},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-07-24},
comment = {There is no evidence that you need to drink 8 glasses of water a day.},
category = {water, health}
}
% Nobody knows anything about hydration: \url{https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2023/08/drinking-water-hydration-amount-importance/674926/}
@article{goodcareymasskillings,
Author={Goode, Erica and Carey, Benedict},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/08/science/mass-killers-often-rely-on-past-perpetrators-blueprints.html},
Title={Mass Killings Are Seen as a Kind of Contagion},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-10-07},
comment = {Experts have come to understand mass shootings less as isolated expressions of rage and more as acts that build on the outlines of previous rampages, and as a result are calling for the media to limit the amount of information about them that gets out.},
category = {mass killings, guns, public health, transparency}
}
% This is a clear case where public health trumps transparency. But is that something we really want as a cultuure?
@article{lafraniereguns2016,
Author={LaFRANIERE, SHARON and PORAT, DANIELA and ARMENDARIZ, AGUSTIN},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/23/us/americas-overlooked-gun-violence.html},
Title={A Drumbeat of Multiple Shootings, but America Isn’t Listening},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-05-22},
comment = {The Times does a review of gun killings last year and concludes that most of the killing is being done to and by black people.},
category = {guns, Health}
}
@article{fessendenchicagomurder2016,
Author={Fessenden, Ford and Park, Haeyoun},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/05/18/us/chicago-murder-problem.html},
Title={Chicago’s Murder Problem},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-05-27},
comment = {Both Chicago and NYC have fewer shootings than they did in the 1990s, but NYC is has far fewer now, and Chicago has been spiking up. Illinois has strict gun control laws, but Indiana does not.},
category = {guns, Health, chicago, nyc, gun control, gangs}
}
% The Times here claims that weakening gun control laws have led to more violence, but the violence leveled out in 2004 before the gun controls were weakened. Weaker gun control might be contributing to recent spikes, but not to the overall sustained violence rate far above NYC.
% It is very conceivable, however, that if close neighboring states have weak gun control the guns will flow in, but the Times only briefly mentions this in this article.
% The Times uses Chicago’s community areas in one of their maps.
@article{Berlingerimmigranthealthcare,
Author={Berlinger, Nancy, and Calhoon, Claudia and Gusmano, Michael K. and Vimo, Jackie},
url={http://www.undocumentedpatients.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Undocumented-Immigrants-and-Access-to-Health-Care-NYC-Report-April-2015.pdf},
Title={Undocumented Immigrants and Access to Health Care in New York City: Identifying Fair, Effective, and Sustainable Local Policy Solutions: Report and Recommendations to the Office of the Mayor of New York City},
journal={The Hastings Center and the New York Immigration Coalition,},
year={2015},
month = {April},
comment = {About 1/4 of immigrants in NYC will remain uninsured after DACA and DAPA are in effect (200,000 people). The health care options for them are limited, mostly Medicaid (if they are lucky), Emergency Medicaid, and public hospitals.},
category = {health, immigration, CUP}
}
@techreport{NBERw21290,
title = “Hospitals as Insurers of Last Resort”,
author = “Craig Garthwaite and Tal Gross and Matthew J. Notowidigdo”,
institution = “National Bureau of Economic Research”,
type = “Working Paper”,
series = “Working Paper Series”,
number = “21290”,
year = “2015”,
month = “June”,
doi = {10.3386/w21290},
url = {http://www.columbia.edu/~tg2370/garthwaite-gross-notowidigdo-hospitals.pdf},
URL = “http://www.nber.org/papers/w21290”,
abstract = {American hospitals are required to provide emergency medical care to the uninsured. We use previously confidential hospital financial data to study the resulting uncompensated care, medical care for which no payment is received. We use both panel-data methods and case studies from state-wide Medicaid disenrollments and find that the uncompensated care costs of hospitals increase in response to the size of the uninsured population. The results suggest that each additional uninsured person costs local hospitals 900 each year in uncompensated care. Similarly, the closure of a nearby hospital increases the uncompensated care costs of remaining hospitals. Increases in the uninsured population also lower hospital profit margins, which suggests that hospitals cannot simply pass along all increased costs onto privately insured patients. For-profit hospitals are less affected by these factors, suggesting that non-profit hospitals serve a unique role as part of the social insurance system.},
comment = {See digest summary here: \url{https://www.nber.org/digest/oct15/w21290.html}},
category = {health, insurance, NYIC, CUP, medicaid}
}
@article{martinobamacare,
Author={Martin, Nina},
url={http://www.propublica.org/article/behind-supreme-courts-obamacare-case-a-secretive-societys-hidden-hand},
Title={Behind Supreme Court’s Obamacare Case, A Secretive Society’s Hidden Hand},
journal={ProPublica},
date={2015-03-03},
comment = {ProPublica interviews Amanda Hollis-Brusky about the conservative Federalist Society’s influence on the Supreme Court and Obamacare. The Federalist Society has championed a change to “statutory interpretation” of law - what it means in plain language. This is against a long history of considering the meaning of law in light of legislative intent.},
category = {health, supreme court, obamacare, affordable care act}
}
@techreport{kuziemko2013elastic,
title={How elastic are preferences for redistribution? Evidence from randomized survey experiments},
author={Kuziemko, Ilyana and Norton, Michael I and Saez, Emmanuel and Stantcheva, Stefanie},
year={2013},
institution={National Bureau of Economic Research},
comment = {We find that information about inequality also makes respondents trust government less---the treatment decreases by nearly twenty percent the share of respondents who trust government’’ most of the time. Hence, emphasizing the severity of a social or economic problem appears to undercut respondents’ willingness to trust the government to fix it—the existence of the problem could act as evidence of the government’s limited capacity to improve outcomes more generally.’’ This paper is cited by Edsall in his argument that the Obamacare is hurting the liberal agenda of sharing wealth. \url{http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/15/opinion/has-obamacare-turned-voters-against-sharing-the-wealth.html}},
category = {government, health, inequality, affordable care act, obamacare}
}
@article{fraktcostsharinghealth,
Author={Frakt, Austin},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/05/upshot/with-sickest-patients-cost-sharing-comes-at-a-price.html},
Title={With Sickest Patients, Cost Sharing Comes at a Price},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-05-04},
comment = {Reducing cost sharing charges on the sickest patients (i.e. spending more on them) for preventative care actually saves money. This is not true for patients who are healthy though.},
category = {health, statistics}
}
@article{Sangerkatzinsurancemedicalbills,
Author={Sanger-Katz, Margot},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/20/upshot/why-insurance-doesnt-always-prevent-giant-medical-bills.html},
Title={Why Insurance Doesn’t Always Prevent Giant Medical Bills},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-05-20},
comment = {High dedectible plans mean that many low-income people are still struggling to cover medical expenses. The rate is virtually unchanged since before Obamacare, but those effects may still come in the future.},
category = {health insurance, ACA, CUP, affordable care act}
}
@article{khullarobamacaremedicaid2016,
Author={Khullar, Dhruv},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/24/upshot/how-to-stop-the-bouncing-between-insurance-plans-under-obamacare.html},
Title={How to Stop the Bouncing Between Insurance Plans Under Obamacare},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-03-23},
comment = {Many people with a family income around the edge of the cutoff for Medicaid find themselves bouncing between Medicaid and private insurance (called ``churning’’). This is costly and inefficient and almost certainly bad for health outcomes. Some solutions include guaranteeing 12 months of Medicaid if you qualify. New York State is currently the only state that does this for adults.},
category = {obamacare, affordable care act, CUP, Health}
}
@article{carroll2016uncoveredinsurance,
Author={Carroll, Aaron E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/28/upshot/when-having-insurance-still-leaves-you-dangerously-uncovered.html},
Title={When Having Insurance Still Leaves You Dangerously Uncovered},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2016-11-28},
comment={Contains a nice plain-language review of terms like premium, deductible, actuarial value, co-insurance, co-pays, and out-of-pocket. Then it talks about how out-of-pocket costs are still very high, even with caps on how high they can be.},
category={obamacare, affordable care act, Health, CUP}
}
% I sort of wonder if he was looking at the CUP project when he did the definitions part of this article.
@article{carrollsickdoctor,
Author={Carroll, Aaron, E.},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/22/upshot/trapped-in-the-system-a-sick-doctors-story.html},
Title={Trapped in the System: A Sick Doctor’s Story},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-09-21},
comment = {``The Affordable Care Act, which seems so complicated to so many, was almost entirely about getting more people in the United States health insurance. That was just a first step, arguably an easy one, and we’re still fighting about it. Reforming the ways in which we actually deliver care and try to improve outcomes? That’s so much more important, and we barely talk about that at all. But that’s what matters to the people who use the system, and it’s why so many of them are frustrated.’’},
category = {health insurace, ACA}
}
@article{zimmerinuitdiet,
Author={Zimmer, Carl},
url={http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/22/science/inuit-study-adds-twist-to-omega-3-fatty-acids-health-story.html},
Title={Inuit Study Adds Twist to Omega-3 Fatty Acids’ Health Story},
journal={The New York Times},
date={2015-09-17},
comment = {Inuit evolved to eat meat diets high in fats. Other humans don’t have the gene for digesting those fats. The hope that eating fish oil would help with people’s heart health came from studying Inuit and was applied to humans in general.},
category = {evolution, humans, Inuit, fish oil, Health, Humanity}
}
% What other things have some humans evolved but others haven’t?