j7uy5 | January 26, 2009On 14
January, 2008, the US FDA
href="http://www.frx.com/news/PressRelease.aspx?ID=1244788">approved
milnacipran for use in treatment of
href="http://www.med.umich.edu/painresearch/pro/fibromyalgia.htm">fibromyalgia.
It is ( or soon will be) available in tablets of 12.5, 25, 50, and
100mg. It has been marketed as an antidepressant in Europe for
years, but has not been available in the USA until now.
Milnacipran is a drug that inhibits reuptake of serotonin and
norepinephrine. The effect on norepinephrine is stronger than the
effect on serotonin. It can be thought of as an SNRI,…
j7uy5 | January 24, 2009This photo is from Wikimedia; it shows a Japanese macaque (Macaca fuscata) in the Jigokudani Monkey Park in Nagano Prefecture,Japan. The photo is in the public domain.
The Park features natural hot springs.
There are more photos here and here. There is a live webcam here.
j7uy5 | January 23, 2009This is precious. It is a screen shot from The Economist, from an article (The frat boy ships out) on the departure of George W. Bush.
I recall that The Economist ended up endorsing Kerry, saying something
like it was a tough call between two deeply flawed candidates.
Now, not so tough.
It turned out to be the third-most "commented" article, gathering 338 comments, and being recommended by 282 readers.
j7uy5 | January 22, 2009Today I received an email from the hivemind, saying, in part:
In
his first speech as President-elect last November, Barack Obama
reminded us of the promise of "a world connected by our own science and
imagination." He recently stated, "promoting science isn't just
about providing resources--it's about protecting free and open
inquiry... It's about listening to what our scientists have to say,
even when it's inconvenient--especially when it's inconvenient. Because
the highest purpose of science is the search for knowledge, truth and a
greater understanding of the world around us. That will be…
j7uy5 | January 19, 2009If the only thing Obama does, is to not do the bad things that Bush did,
then he will be a success. A disappointment, yes, but also a
success.
Above is a clip of Olbermann, summarizing in about 9 minutes the worst
of the past eight years. Below the fold is one of the consequences. It is achart depicting the KBW Bank Index
performance over the past four years. The Index is a weighted
index comprised of the 24 largest national and regional banks. It
is now at a 13-year low -- and that is AFTER a gazillion dollars (actually $2.8 trillion) in bailouts.
The prospects are not good. …
j7uy5 | January 15, 2009There is a thought-provoking editorial in the openly-accessible Journal of Psychiatry of Neuroscience (JPN): Has the time come for clinical trials on the antidepressant effect of vitamin D?
(45 KB PDF). In it, the editor of the the Journal, Simon N.
Young, PhD, argues that there is enough evidence to justify increased
research efforts.
He points to a recent article in the Archives of General Psychiatry to support this view:
Depression Is Associated With Decreased 25-Hydroxyvitamin D and Increased Parathyroid Hormone Levels in Older AdultsWitte J. G. Hoogendijk, MD, PhD; Paul Lips, MD, PhD;…
j7uy5 | January 12, 2009Two things happened to the New York Times recently. For one, they announced that they will place advertisements on their front page. Two, they are publishing Opinion columns written by Bono.
I suspect the two are not unrelated. Which is another way of saying that I suspect the two are related, in this case, by economic necessity.
This brings to mind a minor memory, the telling of which may illustrate a point. I distinctly recall standing in line at a supermarket, while a random glance fell upon a copy of a new magazine: People. Within an instant, I had the thought, "how dumb, no one is…
j7uy5 | January 11, 2009
Xinhua has helpfully posted the top 10 astronomy photos of the year (2008), according to National Geographic.
j7uy5 | January 6, 2009When I was in training, the chairperson (John Greden)
of the department never spoke about schizophrenia. Instead, he
always used the phrase, "the schizophrenias." He believed that
there were different disease states that all produced similar clinical
presentations. But because of the rudimentary state of our
knowledge, we were unable to make clear, meaningful distictions between
these different illnesses. As a result, we were improperly
lumping them together. He thought that soon, we would be able to
make meaningful distinctions between these different illnesses.
Perhaps the advances…
j7uy5 | January 5, 2009Man decides to enter Amtrak "
href="http://www.amtrak.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=Amtrak/am2Copy/Hot_Deals_Page&c=am2Copy&cid=1093554057903&ssid=224">Picture
Our Trains Contest." Man goes to boarding area and
takes
href="http://photos.duanek.name/popular/1/443114799_ewRgR#443114799_ewRgR">picture
of train. Man is told it is illegal to photograph trains.
Man
href="http://carlosmiller.com/2008/12/27/amtrak-police-arrest-photographer-participating-in-amtrak-photo-contest/">is
arrested after refusing to delete photo of train. In Ann Arbor, heading for…
j7uy5 | January 2, 2009Some things never change. These are words from the remarkable Bertrand Russell, from 1932:
One of the commonest things to do with savings is to lend
them to some Government. In view of the fact that the bulk of the
public expenditure of most civilized Governments consists in payment
for past wars or preparation for future wars, the man who lends his
money to a Government is in the same position as the bad men in
Shakespeare who hire murderers. The net result of the man's economical
habits is to increase the armed forces of the State to which he lends
his savings. Obviously it would be better…
j7uy5 | December 31, 2008Ethanol is a poison. But the difference between poison and
medicine sometimes is only a matter of dosage.
For decades, there have been studies that purport to show a small
benefit from regular consumption of small amounts of ethanol, with
obvious problems caused by excessive alcohol consumption.
Physicians, however, are divided about what to do with this
information. Do we recommend that people have one alcohol
beverage per day, or do we remain silent on the subject?
One reason to be reluctant to recommend moderate drinking, as opposed
to abstinence, is that it is very difficult to prove…
j7uy5 | December 29, 2008This photo is one of Yahoo's most emailed.
(AP Photo/Detroit Zoo,Mark M. Gaskill)
j7uy5 | December 28, 2008The impetus for this post came from a confluence of stimuli, as is usually the case. Recently I received a book, a biography
of J. Robert Oppenheimer (American Prometheus, by Kai Bird and Martin
J. Sherwin). The book describes the persecution of Oppenheimer
during the Red Scare in postwar USA. The current global and
perpetual war on terrorism shows us that such persecution still simmers.
I also read a post about matronizing, on the blog Mad Melancholic Feminista. The post reminded me that the war between the sexes also simmers.
At this point in time, were are a few years into an economic…
j7uy5 | December 25, 2008Let us all
savor the season and be appreciative of our good fortune. I
really mean that, although what I am about to say will lead some to
think otherwise.Earlier this year, it was
href="http://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSTRE4B28CB20081203">reported
that thirty million Americans were receiving food stamps.
That is one out of every ten persons. Last
month, the USDA said 36.2 million Americans or 11 percent of households
struggle to get enough food to eat, and one-third of them had to
sometimes skip or cut back on meals.
Alsothis:The
last government statistics said 11.9…
j7uy5 | December 23, 2008GlaxoSmithKline, also known -- to old-timers -- as
GlaxoWellcomeSmithKlineBeecham, has elected to halt all political
contributions. Almost. The corporation itself will not make
any contributions, after having made a total of $585,425 to candidates
in the USA in 2008. It will facilitate PAC activity by its employees.
GlaxoSmithKline to halt political contributions
LONDON (AP) -- The London-based international drug firm GlaxoSmithKline
announced Monday a global ban on corporate political contributions.
The primary impact will be in the United States and Canada, where the
company has been…
j7uy5 | December 21, 2008On 24 November 2008, the United Nations reported the outcome of the Human Rights Council's Working Group On Right To Development. They held a vote on the question of whether people have a right to food. The United States of America voted against this:
By a vote of 180 in favour to 1 against (United States) and no abstentions, the Committee also approved a resolution on the right to food, by which the Assembly would "consider it intolerable" that more than 6 million children still died every year from hunger-related illness before their fifth birthday, and that the number of undernourished…
j7uy5 | December 18, 2008Saudi
offers $10m for shoes thrown by journo
Iraq: Wednesday, December 17 - 2008 at 09:22
A Saudi man has offered $10m to buy the shoes that Iraqi journalist
Muntadar Al Zaidi hurled at US President George W. Bush, according to a
report carried by Al Arabiya net. Sixty-year-old Hassan Mohammad
Makhafa, from Aseer, south west of Saudi Arabia, said he is ready to
sell all his properties to buy Al Zaidi's shoes, which he described as
a 'medal of freedom' to put them on offer at a public auction.
HT:
href="http://www.juancole.com/2008/12/al-zaidi-injured-pleads-guilty-mosul.html">Juan
Cole…
j7uy5 | December 17, 2008Ovation Pharmaceuticals obtained the rights to a drug developed by
Merck, Indocin IV. It is used as a medical treatment for
href="http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/dci/Diseases/pda/pda_what.html">patent
ductus arteriosus. PDA is a type of birth defect in
the heart. It is serious.
It is helpful to have a medication that is an alternative to surgery.
The following year, they obtained the rights to Neoprofen, a similar
drug used for the same purpose.
Then, they raised the price. Instead of $108 for a course of
treatment, it now costs $1,500. I suppose that you could say
that it still…
j7uy5 | December 12, 2008Land's End sells white coats. The kind that doctors wear.
I got an email hawking Land's End stuff. Promising big
savings. So I notice this:
Anyway, I looked at the image of the coat. I imagined myself
putting it on. Got chills. Yuck.
I'm glad I went to medical school. There was more good than
bad. But yuck.