Category: Science and Tech
Flesh-eating worm in Mexico is upending cross-border cattle trade
Washington Post The New World screwworm in Mexico has prompted an almost year-long blockade on imported cattle and disrupted domestic feedlots and long-standing business relationships. Juan Manuel Fleischer’s ancestors ranched on the borderlands before the United States existed, and the Arizona resident’s business importing Mexican cattle across the modern-day frontier has survived decades of immigration […]
Dec 3, 2025
Empathetic, Available, Cheap: When A.I. Offers What Doctors Don’t
NYT Frustrated by the medical system, some patients are turning to chatbots for help. At what cost? Wendy Goldberg thought her question was straightforward enough. A 79-year-old retired lawyer in Los Angeles, Ms. Goldberg wanted to eat more protein, something she had read could help rebuild bone density. She hoped her primary care provider could […]
Nov 19, 2025
First scientific evidence of Black Death in Edinburgh found on skeleton
BBC The first scientific evidence of the Black Death in Edinburgh has been discovered on the remains of a teenage boy who died in the 14th Century. Plaque on the child’s teeth has been found to contain pathogens of the bacteria for the Bubonic plague. Originally excavated in 1981 from the grounds of St Giles’ […]
Nov 5, 2025
The Editor Got a Letter From ‘Dr. B.S.’ So Did a Lot of Other Editors.
NYT The rise of artificial intelligence has produced serial writers to science and medical journals, most likely using chatbots to boost the number of citations they’ve published. Letters to the editor from writers using chatbots are flooding the world’s scientific journals, according to new research and journal editors. The practice is putting at risk a […]
Nov 5, 2025
Teaching Machines to Fight Infectious Diseases
ISDE Artificial intelligence may be the hot, new, sexy term, but the subset of AI that has the most potential for improving the discovery of new antimicrobials, outbreak surveillance, diagnostic testing and other facets of managing infectious diseases is machine learning—teaching computers how to learn from and interpret large data sets. AI is “the ability of computers to perform tasks that […]
Sep 24, 2025
Understanding the Impact of Federal Cuts to mRNA Vaccine Research
American Lung Assn Last month, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) cancelled $500 million in funding for mRNA vaccine research and development. This decision will have devastating consequences for public health and goes against the science, which has demonstrated the efficacy of mRNA vaccines. Though mRNA medicine has only recently entered the public […]
Sep 17, 2025
CDC Infectious Disease Data Project Shelved
MedPageToday Website was going to make data more available, but HHS put it on hold indefinitely. HHS has put on ice a CDC project that would make information about dozens of diseases available in near real time, CDC sources told MedPage Today. Since early summer, the team has been working on a more user-friendly website that […]
Sep 10, 2025
RFK Jr. Vowed to Find Environmental Causes of Autism, but Axed That Type of Research
Med Page Today “We need to stop trusting the experts,” Kennedy recently said. Erin McCanlies, MPH, PhD, was listening to the radio one morning in April when she heard Robert F. Kennedy Jr. promising to find the cause of autism by September. The secretary of Health and Human Services said he believed an environmental toxin […]
Aug 27, 2025
Dormant cancers can be reawakened by flu, COVID: Study
Fox Infections like influenza and COVID-19 may do more than cause temporary illness. A new study suggests they can also “wake up” dormant cancer cells, potentially increasing the risk of recurrence and metastasis years after treatment. The research, led by Dr. James DeGregori at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, was published July 30 […]
Aug 20, 2025
Gene-Swaps Could Let Influenza Jump Species
Scientific American Influenza viruses like bird flu can mix and match their genomes, and this has played a role in at least three of the last four flu pandemics. Influenza viruses are shifty entities. They accumulate small genetic changes on a regular basis, necessitating yearly updates to the flu vaccines because the prior year’s strain may not […]
Jul 30, 2025