GLP Podcast: Abortion muddies COVID vaccine debate; Coffee is heart healthy again; Genetics of homosexuality

If women have a right to abortion, does everyone else have a right to refuse a COVID shot? The “my body, my choice” rhetoric has raised some awkward questions in the wake of the federal government’s proposed vaccine mandate. A large study suggests that drinking coffee reduces your risk of heart disease. After hundreds of similar papers, how seriously should we take these results? Evolution favors traits that encourage reproduction, so why does homosexuality persist? A new study may have an answer.

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Join geneticist Kevin Folta and GLP contributor Cameron English on this episode of Science Facts and Fallacies as they break down these latest news stories:

• Wide disagreement among religious groups about vaccine mandates

Abortion is now a dividing line in the debate over the ethics of vaccine mandates. If you’re pro-life, say abortion advocates, you have an obligation to get a COVID-19 shot, because immunization protects your community from severe infection and death. Nonsense, retorts the other side. Why does bodily autonomy only apply when a woman wants to terminate her pregnancy, they ask? The dispute raises awkward questions about individual liberty and public health and, perhaps, distracts us from the key issue—ending the pandemic as soon as possible.

• Coffee and heart disease: Yet another study funds multiple cups a day reduces death risks

Coffee is good for you. No, coffee is bad for you. Actually, coffee is good for you. The research on the health effects of America’s favorite morning beverage continues to yield confusing and contradictory results. Can we make sense of all these data? Should we even bother?

• If evolution encourages reproduction, why do people have same-sex preferences?

Evidence uncovered in recent years has clearly shown that genetics exerts significant influence on our sexual preferences. But since evolution encourages reproduction, why does homosexuality, which offers no reproductive benefit, persist today? A new study of genetic data from more than 350,000 people in the UK has put forth an intriguing hypothesis that may help explain this “Darwinian paradox.”

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Kevin M. Folta is a professor, keynote speaker and podcast host. Follow Professor Folta on Twitter @kevinfolta

Cameron J. English is the director of bio-sciences at the American Council on Science and Health. Visit his website and follow ACSH on Twitter @ACSHorg