by Elizabeth Grossman

The American Public Health Association’s (APHA) Occupational Health & Safety Section has announced the winners of its 2010 Occupational Health & Safety Awards. In a year that has been marked by what David Michaels, Assistant Secretary for Occupational Safety and Health, has described as “a series of workplace tragedies” - among them the deaths of 29 miners at the Upper Big Branch Mine and 11 workers on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico - noting both the honorees, and those in whose honor the awards are given, is a reminder of the enormous work, courage, and long history of efforts to ensure safety at work.

For their outstanding work to improve workers’ health and safety rights and working conditions both in the U.S. and internationally, the 2010 awards recognize five individuals:

• Dr. Sherry Baron, coordinator for Occupational Health Disparities at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health;
• Tom O’Connor, Executive Director of the National Coalition for Occupational Safety and Health (COSH) Network and principal coordinator of the Protecting Workers Alliance;
• Stephen A. Mitchell, the current Health and Safety Representative for United Automobile Workers (UAW) Local Union 974, representing 5,500 workers at Caterpillar Inc. in the Peoria, IL area;
• Wally Reardon, a communications tower climber who has dedicated himself to improving safety practices and standards in his fast-growing and dangerous industry; and
• Dr. Jeong-ok Kong, an occupational health physician who has advocated on behalf of Korean auto and rail industry workers through the Korea Institute of Labor Safety and Health, (KILSH), and most recently for semiconductor industry cancer victims through the organization known as SHARPS (Supporters of Health And Rights of People in Semiconductor Industry).

Their work carries on that begun a century ago by Alice Hamilton, considered to be the founder of occupational health in the United States; by Lorin Kerr, who served for over forty years as a physician for the United Mine Workers and was instrumental in passage of the Coal Mine Health and Safety Act of 1969; and by Tony Mazzocchi, who was one of the most influential labor leaders in the field of occupational health and safety, founder of the Labor Party, and instrumental in enactment of the Occupational Health and Safety Act of 1970. It is in their honor that the APHA awards are given. The long history represented here is a reminder of the challenges and dedication involved in this work.

I was heartened to see Dr. Jeong-ok Kong’s name among the honorees, because I’ve become familiar with her work while writing about occupational and environmental health issues in the electronics industry. I first met her at a meeting in Manila in 2008 and the impact of her work has grown steadily since then.

Read the rest of this post… | Read the comments on this post…

I love it when my fans notice me.

After all, of what use is my having taken so many hours over so many years laying down on a nearly daily basis if my words don’t have an impact? Surely I couldn’t be so egotistical that I’d do it anyway even if my readership was what it was when I first started out and had not increased to the point where I’m the (alleged) force that I’ve become in the medical and skeptical blogosphere, would I?

Wait, on second thought, don’t answer that.

In any case, back in the day I’d write my best snarky skeptical deconstruction of some bit of pseudoscience or another and the target wouldn’t notice, namely because my traffic was so low that the blogger didn’t notice the incoming traffic and Google didn’t pick me up on searches, at least not on the first couple of pages of any search results. As the blog got bigger, though, that happened less and less. In fact, I can pretty much count on most targets of a heapin’ helpin’ of my special brand of Insolence, Respectful or not-so-Respectful, to notice. Most of the time this is a good thing. After all, why wouldn’t I want purveyors of pseudoscience to have a bit of science-based criticism? More importantly, the responses are amusing. On rare occasions they even teach me something.

This is not one of those times.

Way back in March, I took note of a particularly egregious bit of quackademic medicine published in the International Journal of Oncology. True, the IJO is not a top-tier, or even a second-tier, journal, but it is peer-reviewed and in general I never thought of it as a journal that sucked; that is, at least, until March. In contrast to the mediocre journal, the research group that published this study came from one of the two most respected cancer centers in the U.S., namely the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center. Published by Frankel et al and Cytotoxic effects of ultra-diluted remedies on breast cancer cells, the study brought down the righteous wrath (or at least mockery) of Dr. Rachel Dunlop and, of course, yours truly. That’s because this was a study of homeopathy and breast cancer. That’s right, homeopathy and breast cancer. As Dr. Rachie and I pointed out, the study was riddled with methodological flaws that rendered its conclusions completely unsupported. In fact, the study didn’t show what its authors think it showed; in reality what it showed is that alcohol can be toxic to breast cancer cells in solution as certain chemotherapeutic drugs. Well, that, and random noise. Quackademic medicine doesn’t get much quackier than that, and this was right at M.D. Anderson, what should be the heart of science-based medicine in the world of oncology. Meanwhile, homeopaths trumpeted that homepathy killed breast cancer cells and was “non-toxic.”

In the process of applying the clue-by-four of science to the infiltration of quackademic medicine into the hallowed halls of the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Dr. Rachie and I appear to have ticked off a writer at a homeopathy website. The writer, Patricia Maché, decided that she would defend homeopathy and try to refute both Dr. Rachie and yours truly. Her editorial, appearing in the September 2010 issue of “online journal of homeopathy” Interhomeopathy, the “international homeopathic Internet journal,” is entitled The never-ending story of Placebo. It’s virtually a textbook case in the logical fallacies, bad arguments, magical thinking, and pseudoscience that homeopaths routinely use ot justify their woo, so much so that I just couldn’t resist having a little fun providing a bit of my own editorializing. I mean, really. How on earth could I resist?

Read the rest of this post… | Read the comments on this post…

by Elizabeth Grossman

The American Public Health Association’s (APHA) Occupational Health & Safety Section has announced the winners of its 2010 Occupational Health & Safety Awards. In a year that has been marked by what David Michaels, Assistant Secretary for Occupational Safety and Health, has described as “a series of workplace tragedies” - among them the deaths of 29 miners at the Upper Big Branch Mine and 11 workers on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico - noting both the honorees, and those in whose honor the awards are given, is a reminder of the enormous work, courage, and long history of efforts to ensure safety at work.

For their outstanding work to improve workers’ health and safety rights and working conditions both in the U.S. and internationally, the 2010 awards recognize five individuals:

• Dr. Sherry Baron, coordinator for Occupational Health Disparities at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health;
• Tom O’Connor, Executive Director of the National Coalition for Occupational Safety and Health (COSH) Network and principal coordinator of the Protecting Workers Alliance;
• Stephen A. Mitchell, the current Health and Safety Representative for United Automobile Workers (UAW) Local Union 974, representing 5,500 workers at Caterpillar Inc. in the Peoria, IL area;
• Wally Reardon, a communications tower climber who has dedicated himself to improving safety practices and standards in his fast-growing and dangerous industry; and
• Dr. Jeong-ok Kong, an occupational health physician who has advocated on behalf of Korean auto and rail industry workers through the Korea Institute of Labor Safety and Health, (KILSH), and most recently for semiconductor industry cancer victims through the organization known as SHARPS (Supporters of Health And Rights of People in Semiconductor Industry).

Their work carries on that begun a century ago by Alice Hamilton, considered to be the founder of occupational health in the United States; by Lorin Kerr, who served for over forty years as a physician for the United Mine Workers and was instrumental in passage of the Coal Mine Health and Safety Act of 1969; and by Tony Mazzocchi, who was one of the most influential labor leaders in the field of occupational health and safety, founder of the Labor Party, and instrumental in enactment of the Occupational Health and Safety Act of 1970. It is in their honor that the APHA awards are given. The long history represented here is a reminder of the challenges and dedication involved in this work.

I was heartened to see Dr. Jeong-ok Kong’s name among the honorees, because I’ve become familiar with her work while writing about occupational and environmental health issues in the electronics industry. I first met her at a meeting in Manila in 2008 and the impact of her work has grown steadily since then.

Read the rest of this post… | Read the comments on this post…

I love it when my fans notice me.

After all, of what use is my having taken so many hours over so many years laying down on a nearly daily basis if my words don’t have an impact? Surely I couldn’t be so egotistical that I’d do it anyway even if my readership was what it was when I first started out and had not increased to the point where I’m the (alleged) force that I’ve become in the medical and skeptical blogosphere, would I?

Wait, on second thought, don’t answer that.

In any case, back in the day I’d write my best snarky skeptical deconstruction of some bit of pseudoscience or another and the target wouldn’t notice, namely because my traffic was so low that the blogger didn’t notice the incoming traffic and Google didn’t pick me up on searches, at least not on the first couple of pages of any search results. As the blog got bigger, though, that happened less and less. In fact, I can pretty much count on most targets of a heapin’ helpin’ of my special brand of Insolence, Respectful or not-so-Respectful, to notice. Most of the time this is a good thing. After all, why wouldn’t I want purveyors of pseudoscience to have a bit of science-based criticism? More importantly, the responses are amusing. On rare occasions they even teach me something.

This is not one of those times.

Way back in March, I took note of a particularly egregious bit of quackademic medicine published in the International Journal of Oncology. True, the IJO is not a top-tier, or even a second-tier, journal, but it is peer-reviewed and in general I never thought of it as a journal that sucked; that is, at least, until March. In contrast to the mediocre journal, the research group that published this study came from one of the two most respected cancer centers in the U.S., namely the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center. Published by Frankel et al and Cytotoxic effects of ultra-diluted remedies on breast cancer cells, the study brought down the righteous wrath (or at least mockery) of Dr. Rachel Dunlop and, of course, yours truly. That’s because this was a study of homeopathy and breast cancer. That’s right, homeopathy and breast cancer. As Dr. Rachie and I pointed out, the study was riddled with methodological flaws that rendered its conclusions completely unsupported. In fact, the study didn’t show what its authors think it showed; in reality what it showed is that alcohol can be toxic to breast cancer cells in solution as certain chemotherapeutic drugs. Well, that, and random noise. Quackademic medicine doesn’t get much quackier than that, and this was right at M.D. Anderson, what should be the heart of science-based medicine in the world of oncology. Meanwhile, homeopaths trumpeted that homepathy killed breast cancer cells and was “non-toxic.”

In the process of applying the clue-by-four of science to the infiltration of quackademic medicine into the hallowed halls of the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Dr. Rachie and I appear to have ticked off a writer at a homeopathy website. The writer, Patricia Maché, decided that she would defend homeopathy and try to refute both Dr. Rachie and yours truly. Her editorial, appearing in the September 2010 issue of “online journal of homeopathy” Interhomeopathy, the “international homeopathic Internet journal,” is entitled The never-ending story of Placebo. It’s virtually a textbook case in the logical fallacies, bad arguments, magical thinking, and pseudoscience that homeopaths routinely use ot justify their woo, so much so that I just couldn’t resist having a little fun providing a bit of my own editorializing. I mean, really. How on earth could I resist?

Read the rest of this post… | Read the comments on this post…

This post is part of a Nature Blog Focus on hallucinogenic drugs in medicine and mental health, inspired by a recent Nature Reviews Neuroscience paper, The neurobiology of psychedelic drugs: implications for the treatment of mood disorders, by Franz Vollenweider & Michael Kometer. This article will be available, open-access, until September 23. For more information on this Blog Focus, see the Table of Contents.

___________________________

ON August 15th, 1951, an outbreak of hallucinations, panic attacks and psychotic episodes swept through the town of Saint-Pont-Esprit in southern France, hospitalizing dozens of its inhabitants and leaving five people dead. Doctors concluded that the incident occurred because bread in one of the town’s bakeries had been contaminated with ergot, a toxic fungus that grows on rye. But according to investigative journalist Hank Albarelli, the CIA had actually dosed the bread with d-lysergic acid diethylamide-25 (LSD), an extremely potent hallucinogenic drug derived from ergot, as part of a mind control research project.

Although we may never learn the truth behind the events at Saint-Pont-Esprit, it is now well known that the United States Army experimented with LSD on willing and unwilling military personnel and civilians. Less well known is the work of a group of psychiatrists working in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan, who pioneered the use of LSD as a treatment for alcoholism, and claimed that it produced unprecedented rates of recovery. Their findings were soon brushed under the carpet, however, and research into the potential therapeutic effects of psychedelics was abruptly halted in the late 1960s, leaving a promising avenue of research unexplored for some 40 years.

Read the rest of this post… | Read the comments on this post…

One of the mysteries of genome-wide association studies (”GWAS”) is the problem of ‘missing heritability’: quantitative genetics indicates that a trait (e.g., height, heart disease) has a significant genetic component, but the genetic variation we can link to that trait only explains a small amount of the suggested heritability. Christophe Lambert describes why he thinks GWAS hasn’t had that much success so far:

One major limitation is that the microarrays used in most major GWAS efforts to date employ common genetic variants originally identified in a rather small number of presumably healthy people (HapMap Phase I). Many high-profile and heavily researched diseases, such as Type 1 diabetes, are really not so common, appearing in 1 person out of, perhaps, 500-800. Why, then, should we expect that common genetic polymorphisms found in a handful of HapMap individuals would be linked to the causes of disease in the relatively small proportion of people who have Type 1 diabetes?

To the extent we do find linkage with disease, these are weak correlations:

Read the rest of this post… | Read the comments on this post…

This post is part of a Nature Blog Focus on hallucinogenic drugs in medicine and mental health, inspired by a recent Nature Reviews Neuroscience paper, The neurobiology of psychedelic drugs: implications for the treatment of mood disorders, by Franz Vollenweider & Michael Kometer. This article will be available, open-access, until September 23. For more information on this Blog Focus, see the Table of Contents.

___________________________

ON August 15th, 1951, an outbreak of hallucinations, panic attacks and psychotic episodes swept through the town of Saint-Pont-Esprit in southern France, hospitalizing dozens of its inhabitants and leaving five people dead. Doctors concluded that the incident occurred because bread in one of the town’s bakeries had been contaminated with ergot, a toxic fungus that grows on rye. But according to investigative journalist Hank Albarelli, the CIA had actually dosed the bread with d-lysergic acid diethylamide-25 (LSD), an extremely potent hallucinogenic drug derived from ergot, as part of a mind control research project.

Although we may never learn the truth behind the events at Saint-Pont-Esprit, it is now well known that the United States Army experimented with LSD on willing and unwilling military personnel and civilians. Less well known is the work of a group of psychiatrists working in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan, who pioneered the use of LSD as a treatment for alcoholism, and claimed that it produced unprecedented rates of recovery. Their findings were soon brushed under the carpet, however, and research into the potential therapeutic effects of psychedelics was abruptly halted in the late 1960s, leaving a promising avenue of research unexplored for some 40 years.

Read the rest of this post… | Read the comments on this post…

One of the mysteries of genome-wide association studies (”GWAS”) is the problem of ‘missing heritability’: quantitative genetics indicates that a trait (e.g., height, heart disease) has a significant genetic component, but the genetic variation we can link to that trait only explains a small amount of the suggested heritability. Christophe Lambert describes why he thinks GWAS hasn’t had that much success so far:

One major limitation is that the microarrays used in most major GWAS efforts to date employ common genetic variants originally identified in a rather small number of presumably healthy people (HapMap Phase I). Many high-profile and heavily researched diseases, such as Type 1 diabetes, are really not so common, appearing in 1 person out of, perhaps, 500-800. Why, then, should we expect that common genetic polymorphisms found in a handful of HapMap individuals would be linked to the causes of disease in the relatively small proportion of people who have Type 1 diabetes?

To the extent we do find linkage with disease, these are weak correlations:

Read the rest of this post… | Read the comments on this post…

A friend of mine sent me a link to one of my hometown news stations because he saw something that irritated him. On the front page, there is a poll of such epic burning stupid that it requires an immediate crash. I may not be P.Z., but I have in some instances overcome my previous dislike of poll crashing, especially when it’s a poll this stupid:

Do you think immunizations are safe?

Yes
No

As if an Internet poll has any bearing whatsoever on whether vaccines are safe or even on whether people believe vaccines are safe.

The poll is located on the webpage of the Detroit FOX affiliate in the rightmost sidebar about halfway down. Right now, the poll is running 43% yes, 56% no. Go, my mini-horde! You’ll have my eternal (or at least for a few hours) thanks.

Read the comments on this post…

Last winter Chip Yates wowed the electric motorcycle scene with his plan for a powerful electric superbike, which would he would race in this years TTXGP season, declaring that “2010 is really the pioneering year for electric superbike racing.” While the 2010 TTXGP and e-Power season has been amazing, Chip Yates team was not there citing the need for more R&D to achieve their vision. According to a press release sent on Friday their bike is to be officially unveiled in early October at the Battery Show conference in San Jose. They have been releasing teasers and tidbits on his…