In today’s Dose: Health care reform (Congressionional Budget Office numbers; Why Maggie Mahar isn’t worried; Kevin MD, Daniel Callahan) Foodborne illness (Cookie dough) Industrialized agriculture (Food Inc.) The risk society (Jodi Picoult novels) Health care reform A recent Ezra Klein Klein column in the Washington Post discussed the bad news this week from the Congressional… Read more
Category Archives: Arts & Media
Health Culture Daily Dose #4
In today’s Dose: Health care reform (Public option; Gawande’s article) Health news (Parkinson’s and pesticide) Sleep (Sleep and mental illness) Social networking technology (The digital brain and higher education) Health care reform The Washington Post reports that there is no ‘public option’ in the Senate’s health care draft. The absence of a “public option” marks… Read more
Health Culture Daily Dose #3
In today’s Dose: Health care reform (Gawande radio interview; Public option) Health news (Bayer and prostate cancer) Obesity politics (Michelle Obama) Social networking technology (Doctors on Twitter and email) Health care reform National Public Radio has an interview with Atul Gawande about his recent New Yorker article. It’s 30 minutes and covers much the same… Read more
Health Culture Daily Dose #1advertising, alcohol, doctors, FDA, health care, health news, Obama, pharmaceuticals, tobacco
In today’s Dose: Health care reform (Obama’s AMA speech; Underlying issues; David Brooks on Obama; Robert Samuelson’s take; WSJ fiction) Health news (Benefits of alcohol?; Ritalin and unexplained deaths) Tobacco (Litigating over free speech; Is the FDA demoralized) Health care reform The American Medical Association (AMA) came out last week against any government sponsored insurance… Read more
What’s wrong with our food?
A new movie, Food, Inc., will be in theaters starting June 12. The film documents how industrialized agriculture has changed the food we eat and explores the impact of this change on health, food safety, and the environment. In the movie’s trailer (see below), a woman eyeing vegetables in a grocery store says “Sometimes you… Read more
Grapefruit and the Pill
How the press scared readers with headlines like “Hunt for DVT Cause Reveals Link to Grapefruit.” Wouldn’t you read a story that claims grapefruit causes deadly blood clots? The case was much more complicated than the grapefruit diet. It included birth control pills, a long car trip, and a pre-existing condition. “As several of the better stories pointed out, it’s unwise to do anything in extreme. When part of a balanced diet, grapefruit should not be dangerous. Given increasing evidence of the potency of the grapefruit flavonoid naringin, medical science may want to consider whether women on birth control pills should avoid eating grapefruit every day.” Read more
"Killer" grapefruit?
Grapefruit is a particularly bitter taste – something supertasters are unlikely to indulge in. This post and the next concern the story of a woman who had been on a grapefruit diet – and taken a long car ride – just before experiencing deep vein thrombosis (DVT). … “How did the media handle this story? It was all about the grapefruit, something anyone might innocently eat — and then promptly die. Or at least lose a leg to gangrene. I suppose, to give the media the benefit of the doubt, they probably saw this as a ‘teachable moment.’ Unfortunately, outright fear of ‘killer grapefruit’ was the wrong lesson.” Read more
Coughing Up Blood Money: The hit parade of cigarette ads
We’ve come a long way in the history of cigarette advertising. Here’s a 1949 commercial for Camels. The “More doctors smoke Camels” campaign was a response to concerns, starting in the 1940s, that smoking caused lung cancer and heart disease. There had been a series of articles on this in the widely read Reader’s Digest.… Read more
Coughing Up Blood Money: FDA regulation of tobacco
Smoking causes lung cancer. We’ve known that for 60+ years. But the regulation of tobacco has happened in slow motion, thanks largely to political lobbying by the tobacco industry. In 2000, the Supreme Court ruled that the FDA could not take it upon itself to regulate cigarettes. It would first need legislative approval from Congress.… Read more
Coughing Up Blood Money: Taxing tobacco, taxing credibility
Roll Call, the daily paper aimed at Washington politicos, gets endorsements such as the following from members of Congress: Former House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt (D-Mo.): “Roll Call is a critical and indispensable tool for deciphering the day-to-day maneuverings of Capitol Hill. Roll Call has its finger on the pulse of Congress.” Former Sen. John… Read more
Gupta vs. Sicko: Are there socially acceptable mistakes?
Among those opposing Obama’s choice of Sanjay Gupta as the next Surgeon General is Adrian Campbell, a Michigan woman who appeared in Michael Moore’s film Sicko. Gupta told his television audience: In Canada, you can be waiting for a long time. A survey of six industrialized nations found that only Canada was worse than the… Read more
Sanjay Gupta a victim of obesity myths?
One group that opposes the nomination of Sanjay Gupta as the next surgeon general is the Center for Consumer Freedom (CCF), an organization that promotes the interests of the restaurant and food industries. Anyone who suggests eating less can expect criticism from an industry that wants us to eat more. Gupta took on the topic… Read more
Sanjay Gupta, George Lundberg, and Obama’s Enneagram type
Back in November, following a two-hour meeting in Chicago, president-elect Obama offered Sanjay Gupta the position of Surgeon General. (This from a presumably reliable source: Gupta’s mother, Damayanti.) Gupta has been prudently tight-lipped about the appointment ever since the Washington Post broke the story in early January. Gupta, the chief medical correspondent for CNN, discussed… Read more
Science, engineering, and the recession
It was the UK’s Bryan Appleyard who started me thinking about health and the recession. In an article on what to expect in 2009, he interviewed Chris Ruhm, who stands by his 1996 findings that recessions are good for your health. “People get physically healthier and mortality rates fall during bad economic times,” he tells… Read more
"Screw You Yahoo"
Losing your job is a powerful stressor that can have a long-term impact on health. A 2006 study by Sullivan and Wachter found that, in the 20 years following the loss of a job, your chances of dying increase by 15 to 20 percent. This makes a lot more sense to me than Chris Ruhm’s… Read more
How to read health news
Here’s a good companion thought to HRT and the incredible shrinking brain. It’s from Dr. Alicia White, an employee of Bazian, the evidence-based medicine firm in Great Britain. Bazian does research for the health news on Behind the headlines, the National Health Service site I recommend as a source of health news. If you’ve just… Read more
HRT shrinks women's brains? What's wrong with this picture?
There was a widely reported story today about hormone replacement therapy (HRT) and a decrease in the size of women’s brains. The headlines were predictably but needlessly sensational. In fact, the study did not measure a decrease in the brain size of any individual woman. Source: Richard Amsel, The Movie Posters First, the headlines. There… Read more
Happy New Year
I love music and hope to write more about the relation between music and health in 2009. In the meantime, here’s the video Playing for Change. The Playing for Change Foundation provides resources to musicians and their communities around the world and is dedicated to achieving peace through music. May 2009 bring you health, contentment,… Read more
Paging Dr. Frankenstein
Yes, there’s mercury in your salmon and melamine in little Jenny’s formula, but not enough to do any real damage. Read more
Happy Holidays!
A few holiday gifts to share. Here’s one of my favorite YouTube videos, Free Hugs. It’s 3:39 minutes, the length of the Sick Puppies song, All the Same. This one, Free Parking, has a theme similar to Free Hugs, but it’s by filmmaker Kurt Kuenne and is quite a bit longer, 16:23. Watch the beginning… Read more
Direct-to-consumer: The ads we love to hate
Last week the CEO of Roche Pharmaceuticals had some candid comments on direct-to-consumer advertising: Direct-to-consumer promotion [of drugs] was the single worst decision for the industry. … When industry says we’re spending all the money on R&D but actually it’s spending it on TV advertising to preserve margins, it doesn’t get much credibility. William Burns… Read more
Ich Habe Genug on Thanksgiving
It’s Thanksgiving and I’m feeling ‘Ich habe genug’ (I have enough). I’d like to share some poetry, music, and a film while continuing the ‘death’ theme of my last blog post. First the film, Wit, starring Emma Thompson and directed by Mike Nichols. It’s the story of Vivian, a woman with ovarian cancer who spends… Read more
Will Obama’s health policy survive a Big Pharma challenge?
“Here’s some friendly advice to the pharmaceutical industry: don’t make the mistake of attacking the policies of our new President. Such a move is likely to backfire.” Read more
The election, the common good, Starbucks, and driving safely
There’s been plenty of coverage of the Obama and McCain health plans during the presidential election campaign. I debated whether to contribute my opinion and decided against it. I think everyone is exhausted with media coverage. There’s a nice Time Magazine article this week on “The 24-Minute News Cycle.” It was reassuring to read that… Read more
Does chocolate prevent heart disease?
Stories about the health benefits of chocolate are a good way to get the attention of viewers and readers. Wouldn’t it be great if the headlines were true? Read more
EBM provider Bazian uses Scrubs to make a point
A few more things about Bazian, the company that provides the evidence-based medicine (EBM) analysis used by Behind the Headlines. (Bazian, BTW, is named after the 18th century mathematician Thomas Bayes, as in Bayesian probability.) Those who work at Bazian call themselves evidologists. “Evidology aggregates, filters and synthesizes the entire universe of research about a… Read more
Get your health news here
A health news site on the Internet that provides objective information, with no incentive to stretch the boundaries of truth. Read more
Health news and competitive journalism
If we really understood the motivation behind news stories on health and medicine, we might reasonably decide to stop reading. Read more
How the pharmas make us sick
Just in case you thought your symptoms were benign, drug companies and advertisers will be happy to set you straight. Read more
Are Americans naive about medicine?
Despite a growing dissatisfaction with the doctor/patient relationship, does our traditional respect for the medical profession leave us susceptible to disease mongering? Read more