Words about science and hiking
No one questions that antibiotic resistance has risen in the last 20 years and has contributed to a substantial number of deaths. But this is a high-level question, and it deserves a high-level answer. Antibiotics prevent death and suffering from bacterial infections. That’s the criterion by which the effectiveness of antibiotic therapy should be judged. Read More …
I tend to be skeptical of claims that AI is going to lead to big breakthroughs in medicine. Drug discovery is the usual arena for such claims, the notion being that algorithms will pick over drug datasets to open a pipeline of new therapeutics. I’m pretty confident that AI plays will not revolutionize drug discovery. Read More …
Our healthcare system is oriented toward cures, not prevention. Outlays for public health measures have never been more than 2-3% of total healthcare spending, and this small amount is falling – even though we know that every dollar spent returns several dollars in benefits. We could blame greedy doctors or pharmas or hospitals, or more Read More …
Sepsis is the LaBrea Tar Pit of medicine. Many investigators go in; few come out, and those few are covered in ooze. As one review [1] notes: “More than 100 randomized clinical trials have tested the hypothesis that modulating the septic response to infection can improve survival. With one short-lived exception, none of these has resulted Read More …