Medical Regs & Ethics
Viewpoint: Is the FDA following ‘sound science’ in green lighting new Alzheimer’s drug Aduhelm?
The prominent economist Milton Friedman said that in order to understand the motivation of a person or organization, you must look ...
Viewpoint: AI-driven medical tools could democratize healthcare — but they could also worsen existing inequalities
If AI works as promised, it could democratize health care by boosting access for underserved communities and lowering costs — ...
GOP House house report claims possible link of COVID to China biological weapons
Republican members of the House Intelligence Committee are alleging in a newly released report that there are "indications" that COVID-19 could be ...
Podcast: Should you clone your pets? Drought-tolerant crops work; We really need more antibiotics
Do you want to clone your pet? There are companies that will do it for you—if you have a half-million ...
Part II: Jewish skeletal remains in a Norwich well — Do they undermine the controversial theory of ‘Jewish IQ’?
Gregory Cochran, Jason Hardy and Henry Harpending, co-authors of “Natural History of Ashkenazi Intelligence”, did not clearly address how disease ...
Simon & Schuster faces criticism for publishing book claiming ‘discredited’ ivermectin stops COVID
Pierre Kory, MD, one of the most vocal proponents of ivermectin for COVID-19, has the support of Simon & Schuster, ...
Part I: Intelligence, disease, prejudice — and Jewish skeletal remains in a Norwich well
Who would have thought that bones found at the bottom of a medieval well in England could stir up such ...
We haven’t approved a new type of antibiotic in nearly 40 years — and bacteria are taking advantage of this blind spot
Antimicrobials cost as much to develop as other drugs, but don’t earn the same returns. Congress could give drugmakers a ...
‘He’s more than just his DNA’: Cloning a beloved pet costs up to $500,000 — but there’s no guarantees when it comes to personality
A cloned animal could have a completely different personality from your original pet, experts say ...
Viewpoint: Gene editing is revolutionizing medicine — but it opens a Pandora’s box of ethical questions
Genetic engineering or genetic modification has long been a headline grabber, often framed in a negative light. However we need ...
American Society of Human Genetics report: Despite small gains in recent years, researchers are overwhelmingly white and homogeneous
The American Society of Human Genetics (ASHG) report examines diversity in the human genetics and genomics workforce ...
Lab leak theory backlash: Republicans back controversial COVID origins explanation, widening gap on previously bipartisan issue
In March 2021, three members of Congress sent a long letter to the director of the National Institutes of Health, the ...
Stopping bioterrorism: Here’s how new genetic sequencing can detect altered viruses and bacteria
A new, highly transmissible strain of influenza emerges. A pesticide-resistant insect decimates huge swaths of crops. A patient winds up ...
Podcast: NYT attacks another scientist; How we got ‘GMO’ insulin; Why is gene therapy so costly?
The New York Times last week alleged that a high-profile scientist is in cahoots with the meat industry. Is there ...
Debate erupts over necessity of ‘risky’ viral research
When researchers at Boston University (BU) in Massachusetts inserted a gene from the Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 into a strain ...
‘We are out on the far edge of experimentation’: Lone volunteer in Duchenne muscular dystrophy CRISPR gene editing study dies
The lone volunteer in a unique study involving a gene-editing technique has died, and those behind the trial are now ...
Viewpoint: Egg freezing is not simple, cheap or guaranteed — So why are many young women encouraged to do it?
It will give you more choices, you’re told. It will take the pressure off. It’s like an insurance policy. It ...
‘Risk score’ diagnoses: How high-tech preimplantation genetic testing is combatting disease
[A] recent breakthrough in assisted reproduction that was advanced with the help of Israeli scientists, called preimplantation genetic testing for ...
Decolonizing universities: UK schools struggle with how to address legacy of racism
In February, the nineteenth-century naturalist Thomas Henry Huxley, escaped — in the eyes of some — from ‘cancellation’ at one ...
Drawing a line: European Convention upholds ban on heritable human genome editing
The Council of Europe’s Convention on Human Rights and Biomedicine, better known as the Ovideo Convention, explicitly bans heritable human ...
Podcast: Pollution makes you fat? India approves more GMOs; Biological ‘push notifications’
Air pollution harms our health in many ways; does it also encourage obesity? Farmers in India have access to two ...
Genetics research has been weaponized by extremists. Here’s how scientists can combat this trend
Earlier this year, we were appalled to see a figure from a paper1 co-authored by one of us (S.R.) displayed ...
COVID research transparency: Lab loopholes can lead to unnecessarily risky experiments. What can be done?
Scientists at Boston University came under fire this week for an experiment in which they tinkered with the Covid virus ...
Viewpoint: The US was a leader in 20th century forced sterilizations. Roe v Wade debacle highlights America’s long history with regulating women’s bodies
More than 60,000 people were sterilized in the U.S. in the 20th century on the basis of eugenics — the ...
Manipulating nature: Should rats implanted with human brain cells be treated differently than unaltered test rodents?
A few months after they’d been implanted, the human cells made up around a sixth of the rats’ brains and ...
‘Just because we can do it, should we?’ How CRISPR co-creator Jennifer Doudna is furthering the discussion over the ethics of human genome editing
In 2012, Jennifer Doudna, then a relatively unknown biochemist at the University of California Berkeley, published a paper with Emmanuelle Charpentier ...
Human brain cells grown in rats offer ‘more ethical option’ to study neurological diseases
Letting human brain organoids grow in animal brains could be an ethical new option for experimental studies of neurological disorders ...
