Human Features
The GLP tackles innovations in human genetics and biotechnology. We highlight the work of our own writers, as well as that of contributors from around the Web. The GLP does not take a position on genetics-related issues; any opinions expressed belong to the authors.
Categories include:
- CRISPR and gene editing
- Gene therapy
- Stem cell research
- Genetic diseases
- Synthetic biology
- Epigenetics
- Biodrugs (pharmacogenetics)
- Personal genomics
- Ancestry and evolution
- Ethics and regulations
America’s trust in Trump-Kennedy’s CDC health recommendations is plunging
More than a year into President Donald Trump’s second term, poll findings released on [June 9, 2026] showed that trust in federal ...
Anguished parents, doctors in tears: Utah’s long measles outbreak takes a toll
Ben Dowse hadn’t expected to treat measles when he became a doctor, but there he was, examining a newborn exposed ...
Viewpoint: More and more younger men are falling outside our health system. What can reverse this?
Recently, on a podcast, someone asked me how public health should be communicating about vaccines to young adults, and I ...
Kennedy’s nutrition prescription for medical schools: Real problem, bad cure
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has turned a recognized challenge — medical students receive too little ...
The challenge of responding to a measles outbreak in a vaccine-skeptical community
James Mu had braced for the call that came in late January. A patient from his rural Northern California county ...
Daubert for Dummies—Scientific Reliability in U.S. Courts: Daubert, Rule 702, and Made-for-Litigation Evidence
A New York federal appeals court is poised to decide one of the more consequential courtroom battles over scientific evidence ...
Viewpoint: As the International Association for Research on Cancer loses influence, activists and trial lawyers scramble to protect a lucrative playbook
This past week, US Department of State, together (nominally) with the Department of Health and Human Services, effectively discredited any ...
Viewpoint: Embryos are becoming the newest battleground of love, loss, and legal uncertainty
Who owns a future-person? As IVF outpaces the law, embryos are becoming the newest battleground of love, loss, and legal ...
AAP v. Kennedy: While a court challenge grinds on, RFK Jr. quietly advances his anti-vaccine conspiracy agenda
The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) v Kennedy litigation is now running on two parallel tracks. Legal actions are under way both ...
Viewpoint: While unvaccinated children are dying overseas, Congress challenges Trump and Kennedy’s block on aid
A bipartisan group of US lawmakers is calling on the Trump administration to restore US funding for Gavi, the Vaccine ...
Turmeric supplements: More risks than benefits
Turmeric supplements have become a booming “natural” health product, promoted for everything from inflammation and joint pain to general disease ...
Viewpoint—‘The gleeful efficiency of an arsonist’: Administration’s health and science research cuts are ‘sabotaging’ America’s future
There is a word for what the federal government has done to American science during the past year and a ...
Is the World Cup a perfect storm for the spread of infectious diseases?
When the 2026 FIFA World Cup begins on June 11, 2026, matches will be played across 16 cities in the United States, ...
Viewpoint: “Turn on, tune in, drop out”—Kennedy embraces the Timothy Leary psychedelic revolution
U.S. Health Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr. is sticking his fingers into many pies. One of these contains psychedelics that are ...
Viewpoint: Vaccine deniers are attacking a life-saving Vitamin K shot for newborns that isn’t even a vaccine
Newborns routinely receive the Vitamin K shot immediately after birth to prevent vitamin K deficiency bleeding (VKDB), a rare but ...
Viewpoint: Scientists have scrapped the worst-case climate scenario. Is that proof that climate change is a hoax, as Trump claims?
When major new climate change scenarios are released, there’s always strong interest. These scenarios lay out what our future climate ...
Facts & Fallacies Podcast: Right-wing politics bad for your health? Separating speculation from science
Politics has infiltrated every facet of modern life, including medicine. And some Americans seem increasingly inclined to make important health ...
Viewpoint: How Earthjustice became the poster child for the abuse of special interest activist funding
A recent US Department of the Treasury announcement that organizations claiming tax exempt status (NGOs, foundations, universities and some media groups) will ...
Viewpoint: Vaccines’ non-specific effects? The ‘shoddy’ Danish couple whose ‘research’ inspires RFK, Jr.’s health delusion
In 1996, Guinea-Bissau seemed like an ideal research post for budding pediatrician Lone Graff Stensballe. Her supervisor, a fellow Dane ...
Viewpoint: Who and what’s to blame for the surge in vaccine-preventable diseases?
What causes an epidemic to spread? Don’t underestimate the power of rhetoric and oratory by politicians. About 1,500 measles cases ...
Viewpoint: Double standard—Why does the wellness industry get a free pass while Big Healthcare is treated as morally suspect?
Despite public opinion, the wellness industry is profoundly and almost absurdly commercial. It sells, among its products and services, supplements, ...
Limiting gender affirming interventions: Trump administration targets Texas even though it already bans youth access
Since early 2025, the Trump Administration has sought to limit youth access to gender-affirming care, taking a comprehensive approach to ...
Viewpoint: Greenpeace and poison: How environmental advocacy groups rely on compliant (and often ignorant) journalists to spread disinformation and spark litigation
Here we go again. Greenpeace released a report recently entitled Our Poisoned Land claiming 102 individual pesticides have been used across seven ...
Viewpoint: Can mRNA research survive the Trump administration?
In December 2020, mRNA vaccines leapt into the limelight as a response to the COVID-19 pandemic. To date, millions of ...
Sounds we can’t hear — the hidden planetary signals behind science, fear, and misinformation
Most of us think of sound as something we can hear: music, speech, barking dogs, thunder, or the roar of ...
Viewpoint: There are more than 1,000 chemicals in a cup of coffee—including many substances that can cause cancer. Why isn’t it banned?
We live in a complex chemical landscape in which risks are notoriously difficult to evaluate. It can be pretty hairy ...
Can ‘Social Stress Indicators’ help contain social media misfluencers?
Misleading information online is often treated as a technical glitch, something that better algorithms or stricter moderation can fix. But research points ...
