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Category: Health

The course of the pandemic may depend on how many people are ultimately swayed to get vaccinated

The course of the pandemic may depend on how many people are ultimately swayed to get vaccinated

The New York Times reports: They acknowledged that they could have showed up months ago. Many were satisfied that they were finally doing the right thing. A few grumbled that they had little choice. On a single day this past week, more than half a million people across the United States trickled into high school gymnasiums, pharmacies and buses converted into mobile clinics. Then they pushed up their sleeves and got their coronavirus vaccines. These are the Americans who are…

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‘We could have prevented this’ The scientist Eric Topol on the Delta variant and its dangerous impact

‘We could have prevented this’ The scientist Eric Topol on the Delta variant and its dangerous impact

David Wallace-Wells writes: At present, there are two big anchors to conventional-wisdom thinking on the Delta variant: that those already vaccinated remain exceedingly well protected against the new, more transmissible strain; and that those who aren’t remain exceedingly vulnerable. But a third fact seems, to me, to be just as significant, in assessing the COVID risks the country faces going forward: that the age skew of the disease and the age skew of vaccine penetration, taken together, mean that the…

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GOP sees widening rift over promoting Covid shots

GOP sees widening rift over promoting Covid shots

Politico reports: The Republican Party is being torn apart by the debate over whether to more aggressively promote Covid-19 vaccines, pitting those alarmed by the virus’ resurgence against a faction that has spent weeks sowing fear about the immunization push. The deepening divide became apparent this week on Capitol Hill and across the party, with a contingent of prominent conservatives vocally advocating for the shots — even as others emphasized the need for the GOP to stick to principles of…

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The doctor who creates and profits from misleading claims about Covid-19 vaccines

The doctor who creates and profits from misleading claims about Covid-19 vaccines

The New York Times reports: The article that appeared online on Feb. 9 began with a seemingly innocuous question about the legal definition of vaccines. Then over its next 3,400 words, it declared coronavirus vaccines were “a medical fraud” and said the injections did not prevent infections, provide immunity or stop transmission of the disease. Instead, the article claimed, the shots “alter your genetic coding, turning you into a viral protein factory that has no off-switch.” Its assertions were easily…

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As pandemic worsens, ‘it’s time to start blaming the unvaccinated folks,’ Alabama’s Republican governor says

As pandemic worsens, ‘it’s time to start blaming the unvaccinated folks,’ Alabama’s Republican governor says

Politico reports: Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey issued an impassioned plea for residents of her state to get vaccinated against Covid-19, arguing it was “time to start blaming the unvaccinated folks” for the disease’s continued spread. “I want folks to get vaccinated. That’s the cure. That prevents everything,” Ivey, a Republican, told reporters in Birmingham, Ala., on Thursday. “Why would we want to mess around with just temporary stuff?” she said. “We don’t need to encourage people to just go halfway…

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Covid vaccines have higher approval in less affluent countries

Covid vaccines have higher approval in less affluent countries

Nature reports: People in low- and middle-income countries tend to be much more willing to receive a COVID-19 vaccine than are those in the United States, according to an analysis that included poll results from a dozen countries. The analysis, reported on 16 July in Nature Medicine, found that 80% of individuals surveyed in ten low- and middle- income countries (LMICs) in Asia, Africa and South America were willing to receive a COVID-19 vaccine, compared with 65% in the United…

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Suddenly, (some) Republicans are all in on the vaccine

Suddenly, (some) Republicans are all in on the vaccine

Susan Glasser writes: Since the end of the Trump Presidency, Republicans have been ratcheting up the doom-and-gloom quotient in their rhetoric. By this spring, they settled on a narrative of permanent crisis—to be blamed on President Biden, of course. There was the Biden Border Crisis. The Crime Crisis. The Inflation Crisis and its corollary, the High-Gas-Price Crisis. The Critical-Race-Theory Crisis. Even, this week, the Ben & Jerry’s-Is-Mean-to-Israel Crisis. America under Biden, to hear them tell it, has become a hellscape…

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Why vaccinated people are getting ‘breakthrough’ infections

Why vaccinated people are getting ‘breakthrough’ infections

The New York Times reports: A wedding in Oklahoma leads to 15 vaccinated guests becoming infected with the coronavirus. Raucous Fourth of July celebrations disperse the virus from Provincetown, Mass., to dozens of places across the country, sometimes carried by fully vaccinated celebrants. As the Delta variant surges across the nation, reports of infections in vaccinated people have become increasingly frequent — including, most recently, among at least six Texas Democrats, a White House aide and an aide to Speaker…

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Coexisting with the coronavirus

Coexisting with the coronavirus

Katherine S. Xue writes: In the spring of 1846, a Dutch physician named Peter Ludwig Panum arrived on the Faroe Islands, a volcanic chain about two hundred miles northwest of Scotland. He found the Faroes to be a harsh and unforgiving place. The islands’ eight thousand inhabitants, who were Danish subjects at that time, spent their days outdoors, buffeted by sea winds, fishing and tending sheep. The conditions, Panum wrote, were unlikely “to prolong the lives of the inhabitants.” And…

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New York air quality among worst in world as haze from Western wildfires shrouds city

New York air quality among worst in world as haze from Western wildfires shrouds city

The Guardian reports: New York City air quality was among the worst in the world as cities across the eastern US were shrouded in smoke from wildfires raging several thousand miles away on the country’s west coast. State officials in New York advised vulnerable people, such as those with asthma and heart disease, to avoid strenuous outdoor activity as air pollution soared to eclipse Lima in Peru and Kolkata in India to be ranked as the worst in the world…

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India’s true pandemic death toll likely to be well over 3 million, new study finds

India’s true pandemic death toll likely to be well over 3 million, new study finds

The New York Times reports: The number of people who have died in the coronavirus pandemic in India so far is likely to exceed three million — nearly 10 times the official Covid-19 death toll — making it one of the worst human tragedies in the nation’s history, according to a new study. In a comprehensive examination of the true toll of the pandemic in the sprawling nation of 1.4 billion, the Center for Global Development, a Washington research institute,…

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Ivermectin Covid-19 scandal shows how vulnerable science is to fraud

Ivermectin Covid-19 scandal shows how vulnerable science is to fraud

James Heathers and Gideon Meyerowitz-Katz write: Most scientists assume they will never come across a single case of fraud in their careers, and so even the thought of checking calculations in reviewable papers, re-running analyses, or checking if experimental protocols were properly deployed is deemed unnecessary. Worse, the accompanying raw data and analytical code often needed to forensically analyze a paper are not routinely published, and performing this kind of stringent review is often considered to be a hostile act,…

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Is it time to assume that health research is fraudulent until proven otherwise?

Is it time to assume that health research is fraudulent until proven otherwise?

Richard Smith, former editor of the British Medical Journal, writes: Health research is based on trust. Health professionals and journal editors reading the results of a clinical trial assume that the trial happened and that the results were honestly reported. But about 20% of the time, said Ben Mol, professor of obstetrics and gynaecology at Monash Health, they would be wrong. As I’ve been concerned about research fraud for 40 years, I wasn’t that surprised as many would be by…

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Humans started growing cannabis 12,000 years ago

Humans started growing cannabis 12,000 years ago

ZME Science reports: A new study traced back the origin of cannabis agriculture to nearly 12,000 years ago in East Asia. During this time cannabis was likely a multipurpose crop — it was only 4,000 years ago that farmers started growing different strains for either fiber or drug production. Although it’s largely understudied due to legal reasons, cannabis is one of the first plants to be domesticated by humans. Archaeological studies have found traces of cannabis in various different cultures…

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How Covid-19 has upended life in undervaccinated Arkansas

How Covid-19 has upended life in undervaccinated Arkansas

The New York Times reports: When the boat factory in this leafy Ozark Mountains city offered free coronavirus vaccinations this spring, Susan Johnson, 62, a receptionist there, declined the offer, figuring she was protected as long as she never left her house without a mask. Linda Marion, 68, a widow with chronic pulmonary disease, worried that a vaccination might actually trigger Covid-19 and kill her. Barbara Billigmeier, 74, an avid golfer who retired here from California, believed she did not…

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Africa’s Covid crisis deepens, but vaccines are still far off

Africa’s Covid crisis deepens, but vaccines are still far off

The New York Times reports: Africa is now in the deadliest stage of its pandemic, and there is little prospect of relief in sight. The Delta variant is sweeping across the continent. Namibia and Tunisia are reporting more deaths per capita than any other country. Hospitals across the continent are filling up, oxygen supplies and medical workers are stretched thin and recorded deaths jumped 40 percent last week alone. But only about 1 percent of Africans have been fully vaccinated….

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