#Medical sciences Scientific Journals

[clad992]

I think more people deserves to know this

Scientific papers are really expensive. No student can afford to have access to them. If you want to do a proper research, it is impossible to pay all the access to all the publishers that are out there. Because for one topic of your interest there are a lot of different publishers to talk about that.

Scihub is a site where you can find everything for free. It is basically piracy.

And oh i love pirates.

Scientific research should be accessible for everyone, for every type of research and for every level of education. It is not a race "i progress more than you", but should be a "we progress a humanity". Also it should be "we found this thing A is like this", "We also found A is like that and we also found B" and everyone can add a little to the research. If we don't have accesso to what other study units of other countries do, how we do progress?

It is true we need a lot of the same design of study to be certain of something, but sometimes there are too many identical studies, just because you don't know it was already there or you didn't know the same topic was being sudied by another country in the same period.

So yes Scihub is a pirate, but in this world, in this scientific world, it is the only one doing things right.

I will always use it and support it's ideal

[physicaorg]

HEY SCIENCE TUMBLR!!!

hello! we are a little science community that has been in existence for around a year but is now planning to fully bloom into something big! and we are currently looking for members!

PHYSICA is a sci-comm volunteer youth-led org that will focus on advertising the importance of scientific literacy, along with providing skills within science communication to its members - we are talking about improving our abilities to read and talk about current research, and improving access to science communication to vulnerable populations.

apart from that, we will host regular webinars with current scientific communicators - engineers, scientists, researchers, teachers, artists, bloggers, and anyone who has ever made science more understandable and accessible for the community they are in. as a member, you will not only be participating in those webinars, you will be giving active feedback as to who we invite next!

things we plan to come out with :

1. an opportunity for artists who talk, paint and write about things related to science/the environment/the universe to submit their work to be regularly featured across our social media and website

2. our very own digital magazine in which writers, artists and designers will be able to collaborate in discussing today's research that makes us believe in tomorrow 

3. building a community of people that care and believe in science 

you want to write an article about the construction of the james webb space telescope or about the new batch of dino bones that someone just found? wonderful! write with us!

you like to draw trees, fishes, birds and forests? great! we will have an article on environmental science for you to illustrate!

we need web developers (hi wix people), editors, graphic designers, social media managers and more! 

want to make a difference in the way science is learned, taught, and talked about? fill out one of the forms on this link! would you potentially be interested in helping host a webinar about effective, equitable and accessible science communication? are you a data scientist, an artist or someone who interacts with science? message us to collaborate!

sciblr, please boost this!!

[biomedres]

Mechanism of the Developed Sensorimotor Therapy Device: Synchronous Inputs of Visual Stimuli and Vibration to Improve Recovery of Distal Radius Fractures

Mechanism of the Developed Sensorimotor Therapy Device: Synchronous Inputs of Visual Stimuli and Vibration to Improve Recovery of Distal Radius Fractures in Biomedical Journal of Scientific & Technical Research

Each fracture requires immobilization following surgery. However, this immobilization impairs tactile perception and causes diminishing of cortical somatosensory maps [1]. This adverse event occurs not only among patients with undergoing immobilization for fracture, but also among their healthy counterparts [1,2]. Decreased limb use can lead to changes in the cortical representation of involved muscles [3]. These changes represent a disuse-dependent type of plasticity [4]. Because of the adverse effect arising from immobilization, we observed that some patients with distal radius fractures (DRFs) complained that prior sensation was not restored in the affected limb or that they forgot how to move the affected limb following immobilization phase, postoperatively. These patients are encouraged to further engage these limbs in active motion. Figure 1 illustrates the disuse-dependent plasticity from wrist fixation in the acute phase of patients with DRF. The process on the left illustrates insufficient coding. When joint movement of an upper limb is restricted for a certain period of time, brain activity is correspondingly reduced. As the illustration on the right shows, reduced brain activity precipitates a disuse-dependent type of plasticity that causes encoding failure, resulting in failed cerebral activation of pathways involved in the target movement or delayed recall of such movement pathways. To minimize such negative consequences of disuse-dependent plasticity during the immobilization phase, and to maintain tactile perception and somatosensory cortical maps, we developed a prototype device (development code: Ghost, Patent No. 6425355) that may be applicable to patients with DRF in the postoperative period.

For more articles in Journals on Biomedical Sciences click here bjstr

Follow on Twitter : https://twitter.com/Biomedres01 Follow on Blogger : https://biomedres01.blogspot.com/ Like Our Pins On : https://www.pinterest.com/biomedres/

[probablyasocialecologist]

The study itself is titled, “Long-Term Regret and Satisfaction With Decision Following Gender-Affirming Mastectomy,” and sought to study the rate of regret and satisfaction after 2 years or more following gender affirming top surgery. The study’s results were stunning - in 139 surgery patients, the median regret score was 0/100 and the median satisfaction score was 5/5 with similar means as well. In other words… regret was virtually nonexistent in the study among post-op transgender people. In fact, the regret was so low that many statistical techniques would not even work due to the uniformity of the numbers: In this cross-sectional survey study of participants who underwent gender-affirming mastectomy 2.0 to 23.6 years ago, respondents had a high level of satisfaction with their decision and low rates of decisional regret. The median Satisfaction With Decision score was 5 on a 5-point scale, and the median decisional regret score was 0 on a 100-point scale. This extremely low level of regret and dissatisfaction and lack of variance in scores impeded the ability to determine meaningful associations among these results, clinical outcomes, and demographic information. The numbers are in line with many other studies on satisfaction among transgender people. Detransition rates, for instance, have been pegged at somewhere between 1-3%, with transgender youth seeing very low detransition rates. Surgery regret is in line with at least 27 other studies that show a pooled regret rate of around 1% - compare this to regret rates from things like knee surgery, which can be as high as 30%. Gender affirming care appears to be extremely well tolerated with very low instances of regret when compared to other medically necessary care.

[...]

The intense conservative backlash, to the point of disputing reputable scientific journals, likely stems from the fact that reduced regret rates weaken a central narrative these figures have championed in legal and legislative spaces. Over the past three years, anti-trans entities have showcased political detransitioners, reminiscent of the ex-gay campaigns from the 1990s and 2000s, to argue that regrets over gender transition and detransition are widespread. Some have even asserted detransition rates of up to 80%, a claim that has been broadly debunked. Yet, research consistently struggles to find substantial evidence supporting this narrative. The rarity of detransition and regret is underscored by Florida's inability to enlist a single resident to bear witness against a lawsuit challenging the state's ban on gender-affirming care.

[ms-demeanor]

Hi, I share your strong pro-medicine, pro-vaccines, anti-woo beliefs. I also have chronic digestive issues and insurance that won’t cover the useful specialists. The gastroenterologists I’ve encountered are helpful for making sure my insides look okay but they don’t seem to have much training around nutrition and food science. Nutritionists are unlicensed and I find them about as trustworthy as chiropractors, and I can’t get insurance to cover a registered dietician. The internet is saturated with pseudoscience junk and “miracle cures”, and in moments of desperation I’ve fallen for some of them. Luckily I haven’t been harmed by anything so far, but I don’t think they helped much either.

I was wondering if you or your followers have any resources on IBS and/or GERD that are scientifically sound and written for a general audience? Or advice for identifying when pop-sci-style “food science” articles are a scam?

I deeply regret to inform you that I was so annoyed by this exact problem that I literally went back to school to start working on getting a degree in nutrition and got two and a half years into a second bachelor's degree before realizing I wouldn't be able to get into any programs in my area that I could afford because the local state schools aren't accepting second bachelor's applicants. (Cal State Chico, I love you and you are too far away, it's not meant to be)

Nutrition information online is completely infested with woo and I am hesitant to point people toward one of the good resources I used to reference because it is politically batshit.

If you are looking at a food science article on the internet and are trying to figure out if it's a scam the big red flags to look out for are:

anything claiming to be a silver bullet; there are no silver bullets, no magical treatments, no one weird food that will fix the problem or one weird supplement that will make everything better.

Over-emphasis on a specific type of diet (diet as in "all the food that a person consumes" not as in "weight loss tool") for a general population. It's irresponsible to recommend a rigorous, restricted diet to a wide variety of people because people are so different that one diet that works for one person (say a vegan diet) might be unhealthy or difficult to manage for another person who would thrive on a different diet (low fat, low carb).

Anyone who tells you to cut out an entire food group or macronutrient is a liar who is trying to get your money. Unless it is your personal medical doctor who is saying "you need to stop eating grains" you do not need to stop eating grains and should not stop eating grains. You also do not need to stop eating fat, or eat only protein, or cut all fruit out of your diet. (caveat: there are some conditions that require a very low fiber diet, but even on that diet there are some fruits you can eat)

Beyond that, what you can do to make sure you're getting the best information possible is:

look up the author of any article you're looking at and see what else they've written; check what their qualifications are. See the people they interact with or have collaborated with. If they work heavily with people who are, say, antivax or proponents of raw milk, you should not trust their work.

If you see something that claims to treat your condition or help with nutrition, search "[subject] research study" or "[subject] scholarly research" and see what comes up. Read at least a few papers on the subject and see if there's a consensus or if there are broad disagreements. Get into the habit of looking up the impact scores of journals and researching the history of the journals.

Learn to recognize the woo keywords with your particular illness. For celiac that's "leaky gut," and any article I come across that discusses "leaky gut" gets extra scrutiny because sometimes there are legitimate reasons to describe a "leaky gut" but more often there are woo nonsense reasons. One really good way to figure out what the woo keywords for your illness are is to search "[your illness] + [woo huckster]", so "celiac + joseph mercola" or "celiac + the food babe." (those are good starting places to see what woo is popular around anything nutrition based, really; nothing those two say is trustworthy) you can also try "[your condition] + [specific type of medical woo]" with, like, "chiropractic" and "homeopathic" and "holistic" in the second box.

Be wary of positive assertions without evidence. If someone is making an affirmative statement and they aren't providing a citation, be suspicious.

Anyway. Good luck. It sucks out there.

[transmutationisms]

i understand no mental illnesses have been tied to any gene, but my understanding was that there is some evidence on heritability in some cases i.e. for ADHD “many genetic…risks…have a small effect” (doi:10.1016/j.neubiorev.2021.01.022); how are we to understand such findings through a antipsych lens?

okay I just want to be clear because I think a lot of you have a fundamental misunderstanding of what people mean when we self id as 'antipsych.' it's not that 'antipsych' is some sort of pie-in-the-sky theory that I pre-committed to and now have to reconcile with the medical literature—it's more like, I grew up as a very I Fucking Love Science Dot Com child, got interested in psychology among other things, started reading both popular and medical literature about it, started to notice that the things I was reading about psychology and mental diseases didn't really line up with the things I and people I knew experienced and heard when actually interacting with doctors and psychologists, and finally and only around about the age of 19 did I become aware that 'antipsych' is in fact a legitimate position that other people had come up with before me, and at that point I started to read things that you might be referring to here as being written 'through an antipsych lens.'

so, when I hear a question like this, ie one that presumes there is some contradiction between anti-psychiatric political commitments and the existing psychiatric literature, it suggests to me that you haven't really read the literature in question—where by 'read' I mean you need to actually look at the paper's methodology, and look at the process of knowledge-making that yields a sentence like "ADHD has genetic etiology." that's an empirical claim. evaluating whether it's true necessarily involves asking what evidence the person making the claim is offering. there are specific skills and strategies for doing this when you are a layperson dealing with specialised scientific literature; there is also a fundamental critical attitude you should adopt with regards to literally any claim, argument, discourse, article, etc.

it is always a good thing to recognise when you're in over your head and need help or further reading to understand a statistical method, piece of jargon, etc. but you do kind of have to, like, approach the issue with a fundamental attitude that just because someone said something in a scientific journal doesn't make it beyond reproach! read the claims, read the evidence, ask yourself if it makes sense. this isn't some rhetorical game of "I'm going to prove antipsych right"—the 'antipsych' is the loose umbrella term you are called when you actually read the psychiatric literature and critique the discipline's fundamental epistemological failures and disciplinary raison d'être. the horse draws the cart!

wrt 'genetic causes of psychiatric diseases' you also need to understand that many of you are tilting at windmills. I've never said genes don't have an effect on our affective and emotional lives. plainly, they do. this is not the same as "there is a distinct specific Pathology expressed in these genes; they are diseased and/or defective and this is why you feel miserable / cannot function / cannot go to work." like, we see these are two different statements, yes? if all we mean by ADHD is "a list of general behavioural dispositions" then yeah, of course those have genetic influences in addition to environmental ones. everything about us does. that does not mean that ADHD, the distinct and discrete clinical entity that psychiatrists presume exists (on the grounds of their patients having xyz problems), is indeed a 'genetic condition' or instantiates as a genetic mutation / malformation / differential expression / etc. this paragraph is foreshadowing.

having looked at the genetics section of this particular study for about 20 minutes (open-access here if you don't feel like searching by DOI), here are some things that immediately caught my attention:

this is just a meta-analysis of ADHD research. its claims are only as good as the underlying studies. a meta-analysis of shitty studies that had bad methodology will not 'even out' their respective badness, it will just produce a shitty meta-analysis that is intrinsically hampered by the bad underlying methodology. I've discussed this here.

the very first assertion under the genetics section cites three twin studies; I followed those links. first of all, these are written for other scientists, so they don't make a particularly clear (to lay people) distinction between the scientific notion of 'heritability' and what this term is typically interpreted to mean in popular discourses. so, to be clear, 'heritability' is an estimate of how much a given trait is caused by genetic factors at a population level. it does not tell you anything about how much an individual's expression of that trait is genetically caused, nor does heritability necessarily indicate the genetic cause is direct or dependent on one (or even a small number of) genes.

indeed, all three of these studies, and the overarching meta-analysis, assert that this genetic etiology is due to a very large number of very small genetic influences. this is not inherently scientifically unsound, but it does raise my eyebrows. how would we distinguish between a distinct pathology that is caused by a huge tangle of very low-impact genes, vs a whole bunch of behaviours that are socially stigmatised and grouped together on political grounds, and that also have some relationship to genetics, as does literally every physiological fact of human existence?

these cite twin studies, meaning basically they try to use comparisons between genetically identical twins and various other familial relationships to determine how much of a given characteristic is genetically caused. again, though, this is essentially boiling down to the observation that closely genetically related people have similar personality traits; also, twin studies in general have serious methodological problems with profound implications for the invocation of genetics in psychiatry.

in fact, the meta-analysis here also claims that ADHD can sometimes be due to "rare single gene defects" or chromosomal abnormalities. the study cited on the gene claim, for example, is also cited in the claim above, so I've already looked at it. the methodology here is to look at prevalence of ADHD among populations with certain known genetic conditions—that's it. now can we think of any other reasons why people diagnosed with one thing might also be diagnosed with another? for example, they're already in contact with the medical system. they have enough financial resources to seek diagnoses. symptoms of chronic pain & illness often manifest with attention disturbances. etc.

even if that were better founded, the claim they're making themselves here is that ADHD in fact has numerous genetic causes, all manifesting as the same behaviours and psychological disturbances. it's almost like those manifestations are not a single distinct pathology, but a group of 'signs' the clinician lumps together into a single diagnostic box regardless of whence they arise. hold that thought.

incidentally, that study also notes that initial heritability estimates for ADHD were much lower than what's cited now, and blames this on inaccurate self-assessment results, claiming the more recent studies using parent and teacher assessments of ADHD children are more accurate. of course, the actual diagnostic measure never became less 'subjective.' it's just that we trust it more if it's a parent reporting that their kids are all super ADHD than if it's the kid actually reporting their own experiences. because there certainly aren't any historical reasons why parents have felt the need to cling to the notion of a neurobiological, genetically determined distinct ADHD pathology!

similarly, numerous of these linked studies say that 'sub-threshold ADHD' (read: the behaviours considered to be ADHD symptoms, but at lower severity than clinicians have considered diagnosable) show the same genetic causal links—heritability. now that's also curious, no? almost like ADHD is not a discrete distinct genetically caused pathology, but a bunch of traits and behaviours that, like literally every human characteristic, have some genetic as well as environmental influence, and that are artificially grouped together under psychiatric taxa and presumed to be due to an underlying physical (genetic) defect.

indeed, what I'm laying out here is just the basic circularity that underlies all psychiatric diagnosis: we know you are X because you do Y, which you do because you are X, which we know because you showed up to the clinic and told us you do Y. I unpacked this logic in more detail here.

finally, and this bears pulling out from the list because it's important, multiple of these studies are claiming that they have identified general genetic risk factors for a broad variety of psychopathologies (example here). in other words, the claim is not even really that ADHD has specific genetic causes, but that some as-yet-unspecified genetic factor/s are generally responsible for what are diagnosed as mental diseases. how do we know that unspecified higher-order genetic factor exists? well, we don't. but we assume it's there. the same way we did for the 'general intelligence factor,' g, which by the way is entirely racist nonsense.

you may notice that basically all I've said here amounts to accusing psychiatry of failing to meet basic standards of empirical proof generally considered to be load-bearing elements of the 'scientific method.' this is not even really an 'antipsych' argument—it's, at best, a critique of psychiatry as it currently exists, using (in a locally uncritical way!) established standards of scientific discourse. I'm pointing this out both because it's an extremely valuable habit to get into yourself, and because I once again would love it if more people understood that 'antipsych' isn't really a prior theoretical commitment most of us just stumble into. it's a position we actively have to seek out, and often, what prompts us to begin doing that is precisely the experience of noticing problems like the above, and the corresponding utter failure of the psychiatric discipline to rectify such problems without nullifying its own epistemological foundations.

[is-the-post-reliable]

I wanted to practice media literacy, but something that keeps coming up is reaffirming to trust what a majority of scientists and doctors believe rather than the fringe ones who may be trying to sell you something. And I agree with that, but I keep getting this bad feeling in the back of my mind because, well, I remember learning about how a lot of different scientific fields are based in ableism, racism, misogyny, etc. Like, for example, a majority of doctors in the US are in favour of invasive and traumatizing surgeries on intersex infants to "fix" them, while intersex adults advocate against these surgeries.

Will this come up in the later courses and discussions on media literacy? Stuff like, trusting the scientific method even if the general consensus is scewed due to being a part of an oppressive system? Thank you ☆

hi! so first of all, I want to start by saying this is probably outside of the scope of this blog to definitively answer - this kind of issue could be debated forever. Also, I want to clarify that I’m not trying to give a ‘course’ here, I’m not a teacher in any way, I’m just some guy who likes fact checking

So with that in mind, I think we should definitely acknowledge that scientific communites are made up of people, who all have their own biases. Social beliefs absolutely have, and will continue, to affect our scientific understanding. That being said, I don’t think that bias is inherent to the scientific method - in actuality, it’s the opposite. When biases affect the research, that’s bad science, which is exactly what media literacy and scientific literacy helps us distinguish. Essentially, I don’t think that these biases are a reason to not practice media literacy. Media literacy is what helps us to think critically about these things.

To use your own example, surgical intervention on intersex infants was based on little data, and became the normalised ‘treatment’ before any rigorous studies were done. It’s the introduction of proper scientific method in medical care that has helped to change our understanding of surgical intervention, and is now pushing to limit surgeries on intersex infants.

From the American Journal of Bioethics: ‘However, the main empirical premises behind this approach, namely, that significant psychosocial benefits would in fact accrue to the child because of early surgery and that these benefits would, moreover, reliably outweigh the associated risks of physical and mental harm, were never subjected to rigorous testing (Creighton and Liao Citation2004; Liao et al. Citation2019). Rather, standard practice in this area became entrenched and institutionalized long before the advent of modern evidence-based medicine (Diamond and Beh Citation2008; Garland and Travis Citation2020a; Dalke, Baratz, and Greenberg Citation2020) as well as key developments in bioethics and children’s rights (Brennan Citation2003; Reis Citation2019; Alderson Citation2023; Gheaus Citation2024).‘

[ihaznoclue]

Could I request Izuku, Mirio and Tamaki with a reader who is skilled in just about every branch of science? Medicine, biology, engineering, and so on.

Pairings -> Izuku Midoriya x Reader, Mirio Togata x Reader, Tamaki Amajiki x Reader

Warnings -> None

Note -> Reader is very skill in every branch of science

Genre -> Fluff

IZUKU MIDORIYA

Izuku couldn't really help but be very intrigued everytime you explain something so scientific to him as he write down notes in his journal for future occasions purposes

Whether you are rambling about machines or discussing a revolutionary medical advancement that you have been working on for a while now

He would literally write all the stuff you ramble about just like what he does with peoples quirks

He thinks you are literally the smartest student in UA school that can not only save people but build, create medicine , learn about DNA, and create things for the future

You are always laser-focused on your stuff and he admires that

Izuku would love to ask you some questions if you are not too busy that is

But you are never busy to answer some harmless question from a special someone

MIRIO TOGATA

Mirio was never shy away from excitement like he wants to learn more stuff about you and the stuff you do for a living

And it's a daily adventure of Mirio coming in scaring you sometimes to see what you are doing in your spare time

But this time you were dragging him with you to the lab, explaining some theories that he barely understood but just nodded as he knew what you were talking about lol

He just excited to see the stuff you have made

And he will try his very best to listen to you ramble about what you have either made, built or created for the pro heros or the future heros

Mirio supports all the stuff you do, he's very positive on what your future holds for great things

TAMAKI AMAJIKI

Tamaki will often feel like a shadow beside you as you do your work, quiet, anxious and unsure what you are doing and trying to figure if its safe for you to do it in the first place

But you never treat him any lesser as you go to him first of all people to let hims see what you have done, either it be anything

He would sometimes come into the lab, maybe during lunch time and sit in the corner just in case to be safe

Maybe you will get him to test these things but if he's too nervous too you'll get Mirio to try

But in the end Tamaki is actually proud of what you become and became a very important person in the UA academy

Meaning that you are going to do great things for everyone

-A<3

[autisticadvocacy]

HHS, under the direction of RFK Jr., has hired known conspiracy theorist and quack David Geier to run a planned study which will investigate the thoroughly disproven idea of a link between childhood vaccinations and autism. David Geier and his father Mark have a scandalous past of subjecting autistic children to unproven medical treatments for their own financial gain. They have published multiple fake studies claiming a link between vaccines and autism. Hiring David Geier is a clear indication that the Trump administration plans to rig the upcoming study and claim that it proves vaccines cause autism. This will set public health back decades at a time when vaccine hesitancy and infectious disease are both spreading at alarming rates. This plan will harm autistic people and the health of all Americans. We urge members of Congress to demand accountability from HHS for this dangerous and destructive decision.

Fake studies

In papers that one public health researcher described as “riddled with basic flaws,” David Geier and his father Mark Geier have repeatedly claimed that there is a link between vaccines and autism. The Geiers, who have profited from promoting junk science about vaccines and autism to both courts and patients, did not declare all of their financial conflicts of interest in their papers. For one of their “studies,” rather than seeking approval from an institutional review board (IRB) the Geiers simply created their own “sham” IRB made up of their family members and business associates. This and other issues led to the paper being withdrawn by the journal.

There is every reason to believe that in his role at HHS, David Geier will continue to do what he has always done: use flawed and unethical methodology to ensure the result that will benefit him the most.

Fake cures

The Geiers argued that autism was caused by mercury poisoning from vaccines, a lie that has been disproven again and again. They said that the “mercury” raised testosterone levels in autistic children. They claimed that the solution was lowering testosterone in autistic children with high doses of the prostate cancer drug Lupron, with Mark Geier claiming that “Lupron is the miracle drug” for autism. Lupron did nothing to help the many autistic children whose families were duped by the Geiers. It can, however, cause serious side effects including pain and osteoporosis. The Geiers charged families $5,000 to $6,000 a month (in 2009) for Lupron “treatments”. 

Because of this fake “cure”, Mark Geier’s medical license was revoked in 9 states. David Geier, who has no medical degree, was fined for practicing medicine without a license. Anyone who would fleece families with fake cures should not be trusted to interpret a scientific study, let alone conduct one.

Real consequences

Vaccines save lives. Vaccine hesitancy leads to deaths from vaccine-preventable diseases. By even announcing that they will study a disproven link between vaccines and autism, the Trump administration will further erode public confidence that vaccines are safe and effective. If David Geier is allowed to cherry-pick the study’s “results,” even fewer families will choose to vaccinate their children. 

The news of Geier’s new role comes at a time when measles is spreading across the country, uptake of COVID vaccines is low, and avian flu threatens to become a pandemic. If vaccine levels continue to drop, we could see the resurgence of yet more infectious diseases. This could cause hundreds of thousands of preventable deaths and serious injuries, and force disabled and immunocompromised people out of public life.

The Trump administration is cutting research funding across the board, including for studies on autism. Millions of dollars to help autistic students find careers in STEM were cut, as was research on making autism diagnosis practices better (ASAN was a partner on that study). This administration is not interested in expanding autism research to address the most critical quality-of-life issues facing autistic people. Instead, they choose to spend taxpayer money paying a con artist to rig a vaccine “study.”

In hiring David Geier, the Trump administration has abandoned its responsibility to safeguard public health and promote science. This move towards conspiracy theories and junk science puts all our lives at risk. We deserve better from our government. ASAN will do all we can to oppose this planned “study,” and will let you know if there are opportunities for action.

[astrologydray]

♍️Virgo Mc in the each of the degrees♍️

If you have a Virgo Midheaven (MC), your career and public image are shaped by Virgo’s themes of precision, analysis, service, and mastery. You likely thrive in careers requiring problem-solving, organization, and attention to detail, such as healthcare, science, writing, education, research, or business administration.

• 0° Virgo (Aries Point) – A powerful initiator in service-based or intellectual fields. May gain recognition in medicine, science, or social reform.

• 1° Virgo – A perfectionist with strong critical thinking skills. Could succeed in editing, analytics, or quality control.

• 2° Virgo – A talented communicator; could thrive in writing, journalism, or teaching.

• 3° Virgo – An analytical mind, ideal for investigative work, research, or forensics.

• 4° Virgo – A love for learning and refinement; may excel in academia, law, or technical writing.

• 5° Virgo – A meticulous worker; likely to succeed in finance, administration, or data analysis.

• 6° Virgo – Naturally inclined toward healthcare, therapy, or alternative medicine.

• 7° Virgo – A precise, creative thinker; may find success in graphic design, architecture, or craftsmanship.

• 8° Virgo – Drawn to healing professions, including nutrition, physical therapy, or holistic medicine.

• 9° Virgo – A problem-solver with innovative ideas. Could thrive in technology, engineering, or logistics.

• 10° Virgo – A strong educator; may work in teaching, coaching, or mentoring.

• 11° Virgo – A tech-savvy, analytical mind; may excel in IT, cybersecurity, or programming.

• 12° Virgo – A perfectionist in fashion, music, or fine arts. Success through precise craftsmanship.

• 13° Virgo – A highly responsible worker; may thrive in law enforcement, military, or humanitarian work.

• 14° Virgo – Health-conscious with a sharp mind. Could be drawn to dietetics, fitness, or medical research.

• 15° Virgo – A master of writing, editing, or academic research.

• 16° Virgo – Business-minded; excels in consulting, financial planning, or business strategy.

• 17° Virgo – A detail-oriented expert; could work in surgery, pharmaceuticals, or scientific research.

• 18° Virgo – A deep humanitarian drive; drawn to nonprofits, environmental work, or psychology.

• 19° Virgo – A critical thinker who excels in law, politics, or policy-making.

• 20° Virgo – A master of their craft; recognized for expertise in specialized fields.

• 21° Virgo – Exceptionally intellectual; may thrive in philosophy, academia, or technical writing.

• 22° Virgo – An innovative thinker; could work in product design, systems development, or efficiency consulting.

• 23° Virgo – A strong researcher; may specialize in history, archeology, or science.

• 24° Virgo – An excellent communicator; may succeed in broadcasting, publishing, or public relations.

• 25° Virgo – A sharp and strategic mind; could work in legal fields, investigative journalism, or intelligence.

• 26° Virgo – A healer at heart; may be drawn to nursing, surgery, or psychological counseling.

• 27° Virgo – A gifted analyst; could thrive in economics, data science, or cybersecurity.

• 28° Virgo – A precise and disciplined artist; success in sculpture, architecture, or technical art.

• 29° Virgo (Anaretic Degree) – A master strategist, perfectionist, or critic. Success comes through expertise, refinement, and precision. However, may struggle with overanalyzing or career indecision.

[darkmaga-returns]

by Aussie17, aussie17

Dr. Mikolaj Raszek from Merogenomics just unpacked the world’s first peer-reviewed paper(SOURCE) exposing DNA contamination in Pfizer’s mRNA vaccine���oh, and it comes with a delightful bonus of the shady SV40 enhancer. Yep, that pristine shot millions rolled up their sleeves for? Not so pristine after all. This isn’t some wild conspiracy scribbled on a napkin—it’s actual published science. For now, at least. Dr. Raszek’s already placing bets on its lifespan, saying, “We'll see how long this might last before perhaps such information that just simply does not look good for the company, how long that might last before it gets retracted.” Apparently, the scientific community knows the drill: if it makes Big Pharma squirm, it’s only a matter of time before the peer-review gods swoop in with their trusty retraction stamp. Shocking, right?

And it’s not just a hunch—pharma corruption runs deep and everyone knows it. The retraction game is just one piece of the puzzle. During his campaign last year, Robert Kennedy Jr. laid out a plan to tackle it head-on, promising to bring in the Justice Department on medical journals and boards cozying up to Big Pharma. He said, “The Justice Department will also call in the medical journals that are corrupted by the pharmaceutical industry and explain to them that they’re all going to be subject to criminal and civil RICO actions if they don’t show us a way that they’re going to stop revoking studies and refusing to publish studies that challenge the mercantile interests of pharmaceutical companies.”

[covid-safer-hotties]

Also preserved in our archive

A very long but worthwhile read chronicling the liberal descent into antimask/vax madness and the doctors who led the charge.

The full article includes a wealth of helpful links I can't reasonably transfer. Follow the link to find them! I'll try to transfer as many images and videos as I can.

Emily Oster, Leana Wen, Ashish Jha, and Zeynep Tufekci Betray America

Public Health in America is having its Budd Dwyer moment.

We were told time and time again how crucial it was that Kamala Harris defeated Donald Trump this past November. Well, it was recently revealed that Harris' internal polling never showed her defeating Trump. Instead of retooling her campaign and doing what's necessary to defeat Donald Trump, even if it meant giving Wall Street the middle finger, Harris and the Democrat Party burned over a billion and a half dollars praising Dick Cheney and putting Donald Trump back in the White House - as well as leaving 65% of races uncontested nationwide, simply handed to the Republicans on a silver platter. Giving Oprah a million dollars, spending six figures to re-create a podcast set that resembled a dentist's waiting room, and countless other thoughtless grifts, made it clear that Kamala Harris and the Democrat Party were never serious about defeating Trump - a blatant insult to every liberal and Democrat voter that put their faith in the opposition party which insisted "democracy was on the ballot" as their Vice Presidential nominee livestreamed Sega Dreamcast games.

Now we all get to live with the consequences of such a horrific act of political irresponsibility and cowardice. David Gorski of Science Based Medicine, Walker Bragman of Important Context, and the Death Panel podcast have all done extensive breakdowns of how Trump's handpicked crusaders against vaccines and public health have a long history of getting countless children sick, hospitalized, disabled, and dead. This isn't an article about retreading the same territory as the above-mentioned outlets, which have covered these nominees and their long history of failures and moral depravity in excruciating detail.

What's most important about these appointees is what they all share - a dangerous combination of two traits: utterly incompetent and arrogantly dishonest. We are talking about scientifically illiterate narcissists who, when soundly rejected by the overwhelming consensus of their colleagues in medicine and science, as well as...reality, instead embraced sadistic billionaires such as Peter Thiel and the Koch oil dynasty, taking to social media to spread their message amongst right-wing cranks and contrarian media in the hopes of fooling Americans into embracing their unethical delusions. The fantasy of these inept contrarians being brave medical geniuses, censored by The Man, became a popular fiction amongst conservatives and conspiracy theorists across social media; adolescent fantasies of the brave Rebel Anti-Vax Alliance hero Luke Skywalker brandishing his fully erect lightsaber against the evil giga-vaxxed Lord Vader of the Galactic Public Health Empire.

Sadly, we are now watching liberals in journalism and academia begin to embrace and even endorse this depraved crankery in a total betrayal of the public that puts their trust in them, legitimizing the same old tired anti-vaccine crankery that has haunted us for centuries - at one point, smallpox was even advertised as harmless and beneficial. We are witnessing the beginning of a total rewriting of the history of the past five years, even when the facts are readily available, in order to push false equivalences or outright lies to grant legitimacy to the utterly illegitimate, just weeks before a second Trump Administration is set to be sworn into office. There is no excuse for such a gross violation of every professional and ethical standard in the world of medicine, science, and public health - yet liberals in academia and journalism are happy to openly engage in such obscene banjaxing.

Lobbyist Leana Wen and Economist Emily Oster Endorse RFK Jr. on Raw Milk, Fluoride, and Vaccine “Choice”

Take it from a cattle farmer with over a decade of hands-on experience shoveling manure: Unpasteurized or “raw” milk can make you very sick and possibly even kill you. (FDA) This is a well-documented, basic scientific fact that has been well-established for a very long time. (Wikipedia) Pasteurization is, essentially, the process of boiling milk in order to kill bacteria and other threats to human health, because humans are not cows - or bats. There are no meaningful health benefits to drinking "raw" milk, a frankly bullshit term that is an insult to any serious farmer. We are also now at a point where H5N1 is being detected in "raw" milk products, risking the start of another pandemic within our own borders. Dr. Noha Aboelata of Roots Community Health breaks this down in detail in a 30-minute briefing:

Potential head of the HHS under Donald Trump, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. - who has already gotten countless children killed from his anti-vaccine advocacy (Mother Jones) - pushes the imaginary health benefits of this garbage to his easily deluded audience. Unsurprisingly, liberal pundits like Leana Wen and Emily Oster are rushing to defend these sorts of "choices" using fraudulent data, just as much as they worked overtime to confuse parents about COVID-19, which has already killed and disabled many children; a fact that both paid opinion havers are still in serious denial of.

We previously profiled Leana Wen in January 2023, a Brookings Institute lobbyist and M.D. who has experienced the COVID-19 pandemic from the safety of her couch. We've also talked extensively about Emily Oster over the past two years: an economist with zero medical or scientific credentials and a long history of morally depraved garbage to her name - from claiming “it isn’t economical” to give Africa drugs to treat AIDS, (Forbes, Archived) to declaring that the right of pregnant women to drink alcohol (Twitter) is a feminist issue, to taking money from bloodsucking fascist Peter Thiel (Twitter) to publish fraudulent data in order to get countless children killed and disabled by COVID-19. These are not legitimate medical or scientific experts.

Both Emily Oster and Leana Wen took out opinion editorials (Oster in the New York Times, Wen in the Washington Post) recently citing the same JAMA Pediatrics study claiming that fluoride in drinking water is potentially a biohazard - using the racist, long-debunked concept of "Intelligence Quotient points," in order to legitimize Robert F. Kennedy's depraved conspiracy theories and baselessly attack one of the most effective public health initiatives in our lifetime. If you actually read this study for yourself, you will find the results to be…utterly inconclusive. Epidemiologist Abby Cartus breaks this down in extensive detail on her newsletter Closed Form. Wen and Oster think you are too inept to read for yourself and form your own conclusion from the reality that this single study is... worthless!

Why any self-respecting woman would carry water for a depraved, exploitative wretch who drove his wife to suicide by keeping a black book of all his affairs, rating each woman he had sex with based on how extreme a sex act he was able to perform with them, is utterly beyond belief - achieving absolutely nothing but completely destroying their own professional reputations in the process. If you truly hate yourself on this level, you're supposed to either seek professional help or drown out your sorrows with a bottle of whiskey in the privacy of your own home, instead of publicly humiliating yourself in service of an abusive, misogynistic creep that considers you subhuman for the unforgivable atrocity of having a uterus.

Unsurprisingly, Biden's final COVID-19 Czar Ashish Jha went to bat to endorse his fellow Brown University laptop class academic Emily Oster, writing on Twitter that this was merely a crisis of "public health messaging:"

"Great [Emily Oster] piece about how to do public health messaging better. Some public health experts believe the public can't handle nuance. That's nonsense. Talking to folks about the complexity of the evidence, tradeoffs, and strength of recommendations is good. Want to rebuild trust in public health? Treat the public as adults."

There is no "nuanced" argument legitimizing the selling of "raw milk" and other scam health products with serious public health risks, especially with a potential H5N1 pandemic on the horizon. It’s not “complex” to state that children should be vaccinated against COVID-19, and the overwhelming majority of pediatric COVID-19 deaths are in unvaccinated children. There are no meaningful “tradeoffs” for putting safe amounts of fluoride in water fountains. These are all basic scientific facts, and a large part of maturing into an adult is having to accept the reality of being told "no," and realizing when you're simply dead wrong. As Final COVID Czar under Joe Biden, Ashish Jha's primary goal was not to "treat the public as adults," but as bleeding piggy banks to be exploited for profit from unmitigated COVID-19 infections.

As a handpicked crusader for "privatizing the pandemic response," Ashish Jha oversaw millions of Americans winding up disabled by COVID-19, often losing their careers in the process - falling into poverty, homelessness, and deaths of despair. Women are disproportionately affected by Long COVID disability, and the messaging of the failed Harris campaign was that these women were to be abandoned (Twitter) and brutalized by the same police that the Biden-Harris administration diverted pandemic relief into buying more weapons and military toys for.

Ashish Jha smugly shrugged his shoulders and took out an opinion editorial telling everyone to "ignore COVID" whilst accepting prestigious awards. If we lived in a just society, he would be living out of a cardboard box under a freeway overpass, begging for pocket change. Unfortunately, we live in the world where the Brown University Dean of Public Health is comfortable making public endorsements of sadistic anti-vax cranks, such as Marty Makary and Jay Bhattacharya, to senior government positions.

Biden's COVID Czar Ashish Jha Endorses Mehmet Oz, Jay Bhattacharya & Marty Makary for CMS, NIH & FDA Directors You've likely heard a version of the phrase "if one Nazi is sitting at a table of a dozen people, you have a table of a dozen Nazis." The same is true of anti-vaxxers and their depraved ideals, which are often rooted in a naked embrace of fascist eugenics. You simply cannot find a "reasonable middle ground" or stake out some sort of enlightened "centrist" view that legitimizes the opinions of the arrogantly incompetent & dishonest, who champion pestilence whilst fearmongering about safe & effective vaccines for their own personal gain. By lending credence to these frauds, you establish your priorities: saving lives is less important than not hurting the feelings of sadistic cranks, or one's own personal comfort.

With a second Trump administration about to be sworn in, Democrats should be in open revolt that the Biden Administration left the COVID response in charge of anti-vax cheerleader Ashish Jha, who in a November 24th, 2024 post on Twitter wrote:

"I think [Marty Makary] at FDA, [Mehmet Oz] at CMS, and [Jay Bhattacharya] at NIH are all pretty reasonable...They are smart and experienced."

This is, undeniably and objectively, an absolute lie from the former Biden Administration official, similar to how Biden parroted the lies that Iraq had "weapons of mass destruction" as head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 2003. It shouldn't be surprising that rewarding failure only breeds more failures, even when a nation is gripped by a once-in-a-century pandemic disaster.

For starters, Mehmet Oz is a morally depraved quack celebrity doctor who once boldly proclaimed that the public has "no right to health," and has frequently abused his daytime television platform to peddle quack cures to exploit his elderly audience. If put in charge of the CMS, Oz's priority is privatizing Medicare and Medicaid so that he may profit from companies that he is personally invested in, leaving the elderly and disabled with substandard, privatized "Advantage" plans that do not cover essential medical needs - driving more American families to medical bankruptcy and begging strangers on GoFundMe to survive, or more likely: homelessness & deaths of despair.

This is what the Brown University Dean of Public Health, Ashish Jha, considers "pretty reasonable."

Marty Makary's claim to fame was as a cheerleader for nakedly embracing COVID-19, falsely proclaiming the end of the pandemic via "herd immunity" multiple times, starting in early 2021. In September 2021, he claimed that getting COVID-19 protects you from COVID-19 - try telling that to the countless American children who have had it half a dozen times already, and are losing their health, dreams, and futures as a consequence. When it became clear that this approach of nakedly embracing COVID-19 had obviously failed, disabling millions of Americans in the process, Makary took out an opinion editorial in the Wall Street Journal in December 2022, attacking Long COVID - claiming it was "long anxiety" on Fox News. The evidence is overwhelming at this point, and it all says that this supposed practitioner of "evidence-based medicine" was dead wrong and is too craven and pathetic to admit that he was dead wrong about the disease he simped for to millions of FOX News views.

Makary would also fearmonger about the COVID-19 vaccine, claiming that the disease - which has killed tens of millions worldwide, according to the Economist - is essentially harmless, while the vaccine is supposedly causing massive epidemics of myocarditis. Marty would falsely label COVID-19 as "omi-cold" and "nature's vaccine," both objectively false lies that got countless thousands of Americans killed and disabled in the winter of 2021-22. Makary openly celebrated parents not vaccinating their children against COVID-19; of the thousands of pediatric COVID-19 deaths in America, they were overwhelmingly unvaccinated. Their parents would likely prefer a child with a sore arm instead of a child who is now six feet under, in a coffin. Marty has never apologized to these parents or lifted a finger to help pay for the funerals of these children who have been forever silenced.

This is who Biden's COVID Czar, Ashish Jha, considers "smart."

Last but not least, we have Jha's endorsement of Jay Bhattacharya, a Stanford "health economist" who made bold proclamations about the alleged harmlessness of the SARS-CoV-2 virus from the comfort of his couch, taking money from the Koch oil dynasty - which has already funded an incredible amount of unscientific climate collapse denial propaganda as well as the "Tea Party" which would evolve into Trump's "MAGA" hordes - to champion a mass infection strategy for COVID-19 as it was overwhelming hospitals, driving some doctors and nurses to suicide. Bhattacharya was happy to openly demand millions of American teachers risk death and disability from COVID-19 in early 2020, long before a vaccine was available, in order to preserve “normalcy.” It’s worth noting that teaching is a predominantly female-dominated profession.

These sorts of Little Eichmanns (Wikipedia) have always existed in society in one form or another; morally depraved sadists desperate to play God with the lives of their supposed inferiors. They must always be condemned, combatted, and outright rejected by polite society. Instead, liberals like Ashish Jha are openly lying in public displays of support for these lecherous, vapid narcissists who can only derive self-worth via forcing suffering upon others.

Much like how the Third Reich was helmed by incompetent scam artists cooked to the gills with methamphetamines, Stanford's Jay Bhattacharya looked at the COVID-19 pandemic and his inability to do anything to treat COVID-19 patients & save lives - as he never bothered to put in the work to attain a medical license - and decided to make the largest mass death event in the history of the United States all about how he could promote the most important "health economist" in America: himself. Starting off 2020 by conducting a fraudulent seroprevalence study (Twitter) and publishing false conclusions, Smilin' Jay never bothered to stay grounded in reality whilst his fellow Americans were dying and being disabled by COVID-19. Jay's priorities were rooted in growing the public profile of Jay Bhattacharya, no matter how wrong he was or how many Americans he would get killed in his sycophancy for a deadly and disabling virus he refused to learn a single thing about.

Employed by Republican Governor Ron DeSantis, Jay Bhattacharya would get countless Floridians killed in 2021 by failing to vaccinate the population before the Delta variant struck, after boldly proclaiming that he "protected the vulnerable." Smilin' Jay never apologized for this failure, or his many others - and why would he? He's been generously rewarded for his loyalty to the SARS-CoV-2 virus, with liberals like Ashish Jha cheering him on. As part of his narcissistic fetish for spouting unscientific nonsense in front of any camera he could find, Jay Bhattacharya would also fearmonger about the COVID-19 vaccine, fearmongered about PPE, falsely portrayed himself as a victim of "censorship," falsely proclaimed getting COVID-19 protects you from COVID-19, openly embraced anti-vax conspiracy theorists, and even endorsed Canadian white nationalists whilst tweeting "Honk Honk" - a dogwhistle for Heil Hitler.

This is what Ashish Jha considers "experienced." This is who Biden and the Democrats put in charge of the final months of the COVID-19 response: a vocal supporter of abusive, scientifically illiterate anti-vax cranks that nakedly endorsed conspiracy theories whilst advertising pediatric illness as beneficial for your child’s health. If you voted for Biden in 2020 in the hopes that he would treat the very real domestic threat of COVID-19 more seriously than the blatantly false threat of a "smoking gun" from Saddam Hussein, you should be outraged: you have been made a fool of, and the anti-vaccine movement is now primed to unleash a torrent of pestilence upon you and your children via the federal government.

Liberal pundits, such as sociologist Zeynep Tufekci of the New York Times, are now working overtime to try and rewrite history - even if it means legitimizing anti-vax cranks like Jay Bhattacharya in a craven attempt to save face.

Desperate to establish herself as some sort of Enlightened COVID Centrist in "the paper of record," Zeynep was a vocal loyalist to the Biden Administration's vaccine-only strategy of mass infection from 2021 onwards. As the consequences of such a failed strategy came to light, such as COVID-19's negative impacts on the immune system - a well documented fact now in 2024 (PAI) - Zeynep would frequently cherry pick experts that validated her pro-viral opinions, and abuse her own platform to attack developing science in a failed crusade to falsely equate COVID-19 reinfections as "mild," on par with the common cold and influenza. This required endorsing obscene, unscientific views like "immunity debt," (PAI) a myth easily debunked by opening any Immunology 101 textbook.

The Pandemic Accountability Index will provide a full profile of the years of disinformation that Zeynep Tufekci peddled to the public in due time, but for now, it's worth noting that on November 27th, 2024, Sociologist Zeynep Tufekci would write an opinion editorial in the New York Times titled "Trump's Pick to Lead the N.I.H. Gets Some Things Right." Zeynep would open this drivel by making an objectively false statement that disqualifies anything which might come after:

"It's a welcome sign that, unlike many of Donald Trump's picks to lead parts of the nation's health system, his pick for director of the National Institutes of Health, Jay Bhattacharya, is actually qualified."

Fact Check! There is zero tradition of the National Institute of Health employing "health economists" such as Jay Bhattacharya, especially in a leadership position, and especially when they have a morally depraved history of making obscene claims like "health insurance encourages obesity." Jay is, by any serious definition of the term "qualified," utterly unqualified for the responsibilities of heading the NIH. We know this, because thanks to his previous experience under Ron DeSantis, he got countless Americans killed by COVID-19.

To pretend otherwise, one has to completely erase the history of Jay Bhattacharya's activities over the past five years. Zeynep Tufekci of the New York Times is either too dangerously incompetent to handle the responsibilities of medical journalism, or so utterly dishonest that one has to wonder if she's been contracted by the SARS-CoV-2 virus itself to function as a Public Relations spokesperson. This sure as hell has nothing to do with sociology, but this hasn't stopped Zeynep from asserting her supposed expertise on topics she clearly knows very little about.

Zeynep would also claim on Twitter that Bhattacharya "has made valid points about the pandemic;" mainly her insistence that SARS-CoV-2 must have come out of a laboratory, and that repeated COVID-19 infections are protective against... COVID-19. Zeynep is too scientifically illiterate and devoid of ethics to answer the very serious question raised by such "valid points:" if you seriously believed SARS-CoV-2 was designed in a lab, why would you take money from the Koch oil dynasty to argue that we should rapidly infect hundreds of millions of unvaccinated Americans, including children, with said lab-designed virus less than a year after it touched our shores, well before we had any comprehensive understanding of the harms it posed to the human body? Are working Americans and their children little more than lab rats?

Tufekci would also make more absurd, blatantly false claims in defense of Jay Bhattacharya via Twitter:

"[Jay's] dismissal as 'fringe' by public health authorities, and even censorship on social media, was unjustified and wrong. Not every point was completely wrong, and besides, they deserved addressing, not silencing. The public has a stake in such major decisions."

In reality, Jay Bhattacharya and his deranged ideals of letting COVID-19 ravage hundreds of millions of Americans well before a vaccine was widely available *was* addressed by an overwhelming consensus of scientists, doctors, and public health experts...in the fall of 2020. David Gorski for Science Based Medicine, Epidemiologists Abby Cartus & Justin Feldman with the Death Panel podcast, and countless other voices from experts around the world, including the Royal Bank of Canada Global Asset Management, published extensive rebuttals about such a horrific idea from the same mind that brought you "the thin are subsidizing the gluttony of the obese via health insurance premiums." Liberal pundit Zeynep Tufekci is outright lying and rewriting history, silencing critical voices in order to construct a false legitimacy to anti-vax social media grifter Jay Bhattacharya’s appointment to lead the NIH.

To claim that Jay Bhattacharya is an "unjustified" victim of "censorship" is a morally depraved and outright fictional statement. A laptop-class loudmouth being told "you're dead wrong" by doctors and scientists with real-world responsibilities isn't censorship. Privately owned social media networks, such as Twitter and YouTube, are entitled to moderate their platforms as they see fit and does not qualify as "censorship." Jay Bhattacharya isn't some oppressed dissident voice that the public needs to hear; to embrace his sage wisdom about how COVID-19 infections protect against COVID - Jay is backed by wealthy billionaires that have, for decades now, peddled the same unscientific propaganda that alleged liberal journalists like Zeynep Tufekci are supposed to vigilantly oppose - not launder - in the newspaper.

Every single "point" that Jay Bhattacharya has spouted about COVID-19 has been completely wrong, time and time again. This is a well-documented phenomenon, all across the Internet, because Smilin' Jay simply cannot shut his own goddamn mouth for five minutes. Yet again, Zeynep Tufekci of the New York Times thinks the general public is too incompetent to verify her outlandish claims in defense of a cruel, manipulative fraud that has incited violence against doctors and scientists that are tasked with actually saving lives.

In Closing People are rightfully afraid to fear of what might come to pass if America's federal public health apparatus is put in the hands of a gaggle of unscientific anti-vax cranks who already have the blood of countless Americans on their hands. It will be crucial for real experts to raise hell and get their teeth bloody in angrily rejecting whatever bullshit comes out of the mouths of these frauds - and guerilla, grassroots public health, in whatever form that may take, will become crucial to safeguarding the health and wellbeing of Americans over the next four years - especially that of our children. What we simply cannot do is embrace outright fiction in order to legitimize and empower bad actors that have long proven themselves utterly incapable of handling the real-world responsibilities of managing public health in America.

Every single liberal academic & pundit you see going to bat to endorse Trump's hand-picked social media sycophants - bloodthirsty zealots waging a crusade against public health and regulatory authority on behalf of their billionaire backers - is committing a grave act of treason against their fellow American, on behalf of a nefarious villain that dates back to the origins of human civilization. Countless thousands of years ago, ancient mythology was a tool to pass down essential knowledge from one generation to the next via oral tradition, and the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse were no different. These are forces that have shattered human societies throughout our long and bloody history - War, Death, Famine, and yes, Pestilence - infectious diseases. This war that medicine has waged against disease has a long tradition; you can read up on the mother of modern medicine, Florence Nightengale, (PBS) on the importance of clean air in preventing the spread of disease, or Death in Hamburg (Internet Archive) on the class politics of pandemics - or read up on saboteurs in 1830 claiming that smallpox is a "New Year's Gift to the world." (Twitter)

As long as we have civilized society, we will always have this fight against infectious diseases, and those who insist we nakedly embrace them will never have your best interests in mind. This is a basic fact that any credentialed sociologist getting paid to write about public health should know quite well by now.

There is no good reason for any liberal to waste a drop of ink legitimizing these grandstanding carny hacks. Going forward, one has to wonder how liberal journalists & academics will help forward Trump’s crusade against public health.

We have a long four years ahead of us, and mainstream institutions like the New York Times will try again and again to rewrite history. The Pandemic Accountability Index refuses to let this pass, and only with your support is our archival work and reporting possible. If you haven’t already, please consider taking out a paid subscription or making a one-time donation.

[saywhat-politics]

The Trump administration reportedly wants to erase terms including gender, transgender, pregnant person, LGBT, transsexual and nonbinary.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ordered government scientists to withdraw or pause the publication of all papers set to appear in medical or scientific journals so the Trump administration can review the material for “forbidden terms” such as “gender,” “LGBT��� or “pregnant person,” according to a shocking new report.

Inside Medicine, a Substack published by Dr. Jeremy Faust, obtained an email the CDC’s chief science officer sent to researchers instructing them to stop the advancement of manuscripts that are currently being revised or those that have already been accepted for publication. Researchers were told to remove any mention or reference to a list of terms.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Nick Visser at HuffPost:

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ordered government scientists to withdraw or pause the publication of all papers set to appear in medical or scientific journals so the Trump administration can review the material for “forbidden terms” such as “gender,” “LGBT” or “pregnant person,” according to a shocking new report. Inside Medicine, a Substack published by Dr. Jeremy Faust, obtained an email the CDC’s chief science officer sent to researchers instructing them to stop the advancement of manuscripts that are currently being revised or those that have already been accepted for publication. Researchers were told to remove any mention or reference to a list of terms. That list includes “gender, transgender, pregnant person, pregnant people, LGBT, transsexual, non-binary, nonbinary, assigned male at birth, assigned female at birth, biologically male, biologically female,” Inside Medicine, citing the email, reported. The order applies to any paper authored or co-authored by a CDC scientist. Reuters added that if any scientists are co-authors on a paper with outside researchers, they must remove their names from the manuscripts.

The censorship at the CDC under 47 has begun.

See Also:

CDCGuidelines.com/Abortion, Every Day (Jessica Valenti): Download CDC Guidelines Removed By The Trump Admin

[transmutationisms]

hi Caden, I was wondering if you had any recommendations on the topic of the insanity defense during trial, tests of "psychological fitness" in the framework of the criminal law, the idea of "responsibility for the insane", or the division between prisons and asylums for those accused of crimes?

yeas there's literally so much on this i forced myself not to list multiple books that cover the same geographic demarcation. like this is a huge topic lol. i don't have a singular global overview text in mind but if you have an area/time period you're interested in it's very likely there is at least some body of literature on criminal/forensic psychiatry in that context.

David W Jones (2017) Moral insanity and psychological disorder: the hybrid roots of psychiatry. History of Psychiatry (pp. 263-279).

Manuella Meyer (2022) Crimes of Passion and Psychiatry in Early Twentieth-Century Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences (pp. 131-157).

Willemijn Ruberg (2023) Hysteria as a Shape-Shifting Forensic Psychiatric Diagnosis in the Netherlands c. 1885–1960. Gender and History (pp. 565-581).

Stefan Wulf (2020) „Schlagt das Hitlerei zu Brei.“. Medizinhistorisches Journal (pp. 47-74).

Christina Ramos (2022) Bedlam in the New World: A Mexican Madhouse in the Age of Enlightenment. The University of North Carolina Press

Perrault, Isabelle (2015) “Sans honte et sans regret”: Les chemins de traverse entre le pénal et le psychiatrique dans les cas d'aliénation criminelle à Montréal, 1920--1950. Canadian Bulletin of Medical History/Bulletin Canadienne d'Histoire de la Medecine (pp. 51-75).

Jonathan Metzl (2009) The Protest Psychosis: How Schizophrenia Became a Black Disease. Beacon Press

Jinee Lokaneeta (2020) The Truth Machines: Policing, Violence, and Scientific Interrogations in India. University of Michigan Press

Santiago Stucchi-Portocarrero (2018) Eugenics, medicine and psychiatry in Peru. History of Psychiatry (pp. 96-109).

Verplaetse, Jan (2002) Prosper Despine's Psychologie naturelle and the Discovery of the Remorseless Criminal in Nineteenth-Century France. History of Psychiatry (p. 153).

Dan Healey (2022) Bolshevik Sexual Forensics: Diagnosing Disorder in the Clinic and Courtroom, 1917-1939. Cornell University Press

Barras, Vincent (1991) Péripéties genevoises de la psychiatrie légale fin-de-siècle. Gesnerus (pp. 485-501).

Catherine L. Evans (2021) Unsound Empire: Civilization and Madness in Late-Victorian Law. Yale University Press

Júlia Gyimesi (2022) Epilepsy, violence, and crime. A historical analysis. Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences (pp. 42-58).

[madamemachikonew]

Because I am a fucking NERD, I read a medical journal article about testing the pharmacological properties of the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) herb Atractylodes Macrocephala, aka Bai Zhu 白术 (after which our beautiful wife is named).

Here are some of the clinical findings! Sources linked at the end!

TLDR: Many of the traditional properties of Bai Zhu are rooted in good science! It is a versatile herb that can be used widely to treat many distinct ailments. The most amazing one for me is that Bai Zhu has anti-depressant properties! HE CAN LITERALLY ALLEVIATE OUR DEPRESSION.

Disclaimer: I have as many medical degrees as this guy, which is zero, firstly because he's an engineer not a medical doctor and secondly because he didn't even graduate.

I'll look at the TCM first and then highlight the salient points of the science article. Always consult a professional if trying TCM!

Bai Zhu flowers resemble those of a thistle, but it is in fact the sliced dried rhizome root that is used in TCM. It's categorised as one of the 'Tonic herbs for Qi Deficiency', ie strengthens the Qi. Bai Zhu is one of the components in the 'Four Gentlemen' Qi invigoration formula.

Bai Zhu is used quite widely in TCM as a core 'king' ingredient of many standardised formulas, some recipes going back to the 3rd century. It is also used to augment other herbs as an deputy or assistant ingredient.

Under TCM Five Phases Theory, the flavour profile of Bai Zhu is both bitter and sweet. Each flavour is said to target different organs and meridians in the body. Bitter ingredients alleviate 'dampness' in the body and encourages cleansing/elimination via urine/poop.

Sweet ingredients are said to detoxify the body, replenish Qi and blood, and slow down acute reactions. This is an interesting parallel with his story quest, where he formulates an antidote to what is essentially a poison.

Bai zhu is associated with relieving afflictions relating to the spleen and stomach. In TCM, the spleen has a huge role and impacts not just digestive health, but muscles, blood, saliva and raising of Qi. It houses the intellect, so is impacted by anxiety, affecting mental health

In TCM foods have different heat properties. Baizhu is a Warm ingredient, meaning it can alleviate Cold or Dampness in the body. Being vulnerable to Dampness, the spleen relies on it a lot. It's also used for immune/neurological issues said to arise from spleen dysfunction.

Bai Zhu is also believed to have anti-inflammatory properties. In addition, it is prescribed to assist with 'fetal safety' and reduce likelihood of premature birth.

Bai Zhu also has a 'drying' effect, helping the body to eliminate excess moisture and restore balance. This is an interesting quality when compared with his speciality dish 'Heat-Quelling Soup', which balances the natural 'Warm' and 'Drying' properties of the Bai Zhu herb.

In TCM, to assist the spleen, it is recommended to eat soft or easy to digest foods, preferably cooked. This is consistent with Baizhu's lines in 2.1 Moonchase.

NOW THE SCIENCE!

Gastrointestinal disorders

Bai Zhu decoction might greatly speed up the passage of the digestive tract and gastrointestinal contents. Also, improve the small intestinal smooth muscle's capacity to contract, amplify, and frequency, as well as its ability to prevent hypoxia.

Anti-osteoporotic activity

Further data is necessary, but there is evidence to suggest that Bai Zhu may be helpful in the treatment and prevention of osteoporosis.

Anti-inflammatory and immunomodulatory effects

Certain components of Bai Zhu were found scientifically to indeed have strong anti-inflammatory effects, reducing production of nitric oxide and TNF-α, as well as stopping TNF-α mRNA and inducible nitric oxide synthase from working.

Metabolic disorders

Some data suggests that it does indeed aid digestive metabolism, and can help the body better absorb nutrients from food and maintain proper metabolic functions. Furthermore, some studies suggest that it may have a role in regulating blood sugar levels.

Antibacterial activity

It has been shown that giving ethanol extracts to bacteria such as Shigella felxneri, Bacillus subtilis, Escherichia coli, and Staphylococcus aureus for a whole day significantly inhibits their development.

Neuroprotective properties

A component of Bai Zhu reduced the extent of brain infarcts, restored cerebral blood flow, and improved brain edema and neurological deficits.

It also ALLEVIATED DEPRESSION.

BAIZHU ALLEVIATES DEPRESSION!! SCIENTIFICALLY PROVEN!! (But we knew that)

Antioxidant activity

Some components of Bai Zhu may possess antioxidant and phytochemical properties and stimulate endogenous antioxidant enzymes. This can help reduce oxidative damage to cells and tissues, linked to neurodegenerative conditions like Alzheimer's and Parkinson's Disease.

Memory enhancement

It was found that Bai Zhu might help improve learning and memory problems in older people and could potentially be used as a therapeutic approach for improving cognitive function in aging individuals. This is adorable given the lore with Qiqi.

Preservation of smooth muscle functions in the uterus

Bai Zhu was found to be beneficial in reducing the frequency of uterine contractions in the latter stages of pregnancy, which decreased the chance of an early delivery. [Honestly, this one kind of blew my mind a little]

More studies are required but Bai Zhu is believed to have potential in many other areas as well, such as controlling blood cholesterol and glucose levels, anti-platelet aggregation agent, improve spleen and immune function, anti-tumour agent, easing side effects of chemotherapy.

So yeah, Bai Zhu can do a lot and while not a universal healer (because there's no such thing as a true panacea), it's extremely versatile and diverse in its application. Moreover, it still has a lot of untapped potential.

Here are the two main science articles I used, though their references contain many more, some of which I had fun reading:

https://sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667142524000381#bib0008…

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9452894/…

Here's an easy TCM overview of Bai Zhu with formula recipes: https://meandqi.com/herb-database/atractylodes-rhizome…