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Two quick notes, on how we participate in foiling political solutions:

Keith Humphreys on Politics and The Messenger is The Message

Keith Humphreys, who recently spent a year in the Obama Administration in the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) as the Senior Policy Advisor to the Deputy Directory, talked to Stanford's 1:2:1 program about his experience and about the California Propositions to legalize marijuana. Humphreys talked about who really uses medical marijuana, dispelled the idea that taxes would benefit state programs, and explained who would most likely control the market (tobacco). You can listen here, all very interesting.

At the end of his interview, when asked if anything surprised him about Washington DC, he said that one thing that struck him was how impossible bi-partisanship had become (transcribed by me, not exactly, from his interview):

"...At the moment at least, it's the messenger is the message entirely. What I mean by that is, for example, on the health care reform bill, we have health exchanges, where you aggregate a bunch of small buyers up and you get a big risk pool and you get a better price. That had been a Republican mainstay for decades, that suggestion could have been an applause line for you if you were giving a talk on health care at the American Enterprise Institute. But now for some reason it's become "socialism", because the president was for it. But it's the same proposal."

[Another example] "...We had a proposal in the drug strategy to give vouchers to people who were in addiction treatment, so that they buy things like a pair of workboots to go back to their job, or a babysitting so they could go to their AA meeting...That had been something the Bush administration had proposed, and we gave it the largest budget increase it had had.

When Bush administration proposed it, it was derided by people on the left as this is voucherization, it's the end of the public sector, how typical of those awful Republicans. And then when we did it was wonderful, giving poor people a choice, it's about time someone stood up for the poor. And it wasn't a similar policy, it was the same policy. It almost doesn't matter what you're for, it's who you are that controls all the perception. And that's what makes it really hard to have a bi-partisan proposal. Because almost by definition, if the other guy is for it, it can't be any good..."

Stanley Fish on our Perceptions and Crime

We deceive ourselves about culpability. Stanley Fish describes how people shift their rhetoric seamlessly as the facts of a crime emerge:

"If the bad act is committed by a member of a group you wish to demonize, attribute it to a community or a religion and not to the individual. But if the bad act is committed by someone whose profile, interests and agendas are uncomfortably close to your own, detach the malefactor from everything that is going on or is in the air (he came from nowhere) and characterize him as a one-off, non-generalizable, sui generis phenomenon."

South Africa's award winning journalist, Mzilikazi wa Afrika had been doggedly investigating government corruption, when he was arrested on August 4th by police outside the offices of his employer the Sunday Times. wa Africa¹ had recently written a story about a shady real estate deal arranged by National Police Commissioner General Bheki Cele, a deal Cele vehemently denied was shady. A few weeks later, because of its shadiness, the deal was put on hold.

The journalist had also been investigating a story about some murders of public officials that took place in the Mpumalanga province, that police were failing to investigate.

Kidnapping and Treason Accusations for South African Journalists

He was held for 48 hours, while police drove from place to place, including his house, which they ransacked, confiscating his computer (and his eight year old son's) and taking his journalist notebooks (some 10 years old). He hoped they didn't bring him to the province of Mpumalanga where all the murders had taken place, and where the murdered appear on a hit list that perhaps had his name on it. But they did. At one point the police dropped him at the Waterval Boven, Mpumalanga police station, where:

"one of the officers warned me that I was being left in this tiny town for my own safety. 'Don't eat or drink anything, we know they are going to try and poison you. These people want you dead' he said...."

Mzilikazi wa Africa tells his story of being shuttled about by police here.

"At 1:40am, I was taken back to Mapiyane's office, where the general introduced himself as the lead investigator in the case and read me my rights. He said I would be charged with fraud and defeating the ends of justice...He asked me to make a statement, 'to make things easier' for me. I told him I could not do that without my lawyer present. Mapiyane was irritated and a colleague of his told me I was giving them problems by writing stories about Mpumalanga [a province]."

"Five-and-a-half hours after I first got there, I was taken to the Nelspruit, Mpumalanga police station. It was 3:20am."

"At 8am my legal team finally had access to me...One of the questions the police asked was: "Have you either directly or indirectly been discrediting senior office bearers of the ANC in Mpumalanga?"

They asked him: "Are you destroying the image and integrity of the ANC in Mpumalanga?" The police grilled him on a story he had not published.

He was charged with fraud, forgery and uttering (passing forged documents - because he had been faxed a fake resignation of a Mpumalanga government official). People believe wa Africa's harassment is retribution for his investigative journalism, or a concerted police attempt to ferret out his sources, perhaps potential whistleblowers in the Mpumalanga province .

The police intimidation of the journalist has sent chills through South Africa and the world, especially in light of two initiatives sought by the African National Congress -- the Protection of Information Bill and the proposed Media Appeals Tribunals (MAT).

"The Sword is Mightier Than The Pen"

That's the "joke", as the South African government brims with ideas about how to curb the still vibrant press -- unruly by government standards. The detention of wa Africa, not too mention calls by a youth league of the ANC to convict the journalist of "high treason" hints at the draconian potential of these moves.

The government proposes media appeals tribunals (MAT) despite the admittedly excellent ombudsmen system already in place. As well, a bill being discussed in parliament called unconstitutional by the national lawyers bar would impose 15-25 years jail time for journalists who fail to support vague notions of "national interest".

As former journalist Sej Motau, from the opposition Democratic Alliance, wrote

"It's not about journalists; it's about every one of us in this country, and I'd like to appeal to the people of this country. If we fall asleep on this one, and we think, 'Oh no, it's only about the journalists', we're making a big, big mistake."

Indeed, if people can't ask why they don't have electricity, why the government isn't following through on promises, then all South Africans suffer. And if the ANC government can classify information willy-nilly, imprisoning journalists and newspapers who don't pen their line, businesses are in trouble too. As the Independent Online writes: "If passed, the bill would also restrict access to information from regulators and state-owned enterprises, which critics say could cut investors off from information affecting equity, treasury and foreign exchange markets."

Business Speaks Out

Foreign companies like ArcelorMittal (steel, Luxembourg), and Lonmin (mining, UK) are rightly concerned about a squashed media where cronyism thrives. Both have already been subjected to the corrupt business practices that benefited President Zuma and his associates. Domestic businesses are likewise worried, policies that favor ANC sycophants undermine their profitability too.

The business press gets it. Michael Skapinker, commenting for the Financial Times, and R.W. Johnson, writing in the Wall Street Journal, led the (rather anemic) international outcry earlier this week. Unfortunately, Johnson's column in the WSJ (it's worth noting) introduced some confusion about what South African bill was at issue.² Johnson wrote:

"the government plans a "Protection of Personal Information Bill," which would only allow reporting about people's personal lives with their consent. Heavy penalties would thus prevent any more reporting of Mr. Nizimande's wine-bibbing or of illegitimate children born to President Zuma's mistresses. This is accompanied by a new "Information Bill" proposal, which would impose penalties of up to 25 years in jail for reporting about anything the government declares to be a matter of national interest, itself defined broadly to include anything which may be for the advancement of the public good..."

WSJ has confused two bills. The "Protection of Personal Information Bill" can be found here at KPMG, Africa, and there's more information here at Deloitte. This bill deals with how organizations deal with private personal information, and the need for standards in the public and private sectors guiding how some information needs to be protected while other information needs to be accessible. KPMG writes: "Over the years, the principles contained in the Bill have become recognised as the leading practice baseline for effective data privacy around the world..."

The WSJ is the only place I've read Johnson's unique interpretation of the Protection of Personal Information. The bill has been heralded by some human rights advocates because it will protect victims. Could be abused by government? I'm sure anything could happen, but it would also be highly unusual for WSJ (and the FT) to oppose KPMG and Deloitte. Security of personal information is important to democracy, and security is also a growing business sector. Condyn, an IT security contractor, recently issued a press release seeking to clear up just this type of confusion between the two similarly named bills.

No, the bill that worries everyone is the "Protection of Information Bill", the ANC controlled government's wild grab to redefine how government officials classify and release information. It basically gives government officials free reign to classify any secrets as they wish into "classified", "secret", and "top-secret". The media appeals tribunal would impose the government's view.

Don't Go Hysterical About Tribunals Zuma Says -- Russia is Sharing Their Media Strategy With Us?

Of course President Zuma and members of government insist that the African National Congress,(ANC), is not trying to muzzle journalists, and will not impose "draconian apartheid laws to gag the freedom of the press".

Zuma says that, while complaining that media is a consolidated institution destroying the good of the nation on the other. He explains that: "South Africans rebelled against the media in June-July this year, united in their diversity" during FIFA. They defied the "media fraternity" and its "chorus of division and negativity", he said, peddling the notion that South Africa would be a Disneyland of green grass, ball playing, vuvuzelas, and international jubilance if not for the negative media.

The discussion document accompanying the paper gets to the meat of the ANC media crackdown and exudes an anti-liberal (in the economics sense), pro-socialist view:

"Our objectives therefore are to vigorously communicate the ANC's outlook and values (developmental state, collective rights, values of caring and sharing community, solidarity, ubuntu, non sexism, working together) versus the current mainstream media's ideological outlook (neo-liberalism, a weak and passive state, and overemphasis on individual rights, market fundamentalism, etc)."

For journalists who resist being state messengers? Apparently it'll be loud droning vuvuzelas, kicks to the ribs, and shots to the heads. Zuma explains the tribunals:

"The media has put itself on the pedestal of being the guardian. We therefore have the right to ask, who is guarding the guardian?....During our State visit to Russia a week ago, Russian television was running a promotional jingle saying: 'How dependent is the independent media? Who pays for the news'?

Newspapers are profit motivated says Zuma, the the news isn't "independent". Therefore, why shouldn't the news be the megaphone of the ANC party? And what better example to reassure your countrymen of your intentions for the press -- than Russia? Reporters Without Borders ranked Russia 153rd of 175 countries in the Press Freedom Index last year. As the International Press Institute reports, Russia remains one of the most dangerous places for reporters, a place where journalists are murdered with impunity. What a puzzling PR move. Is this a twisted way to get western investment? Or are public announcements about lessons from Russia on dealing with the media, just...governance as usual?

"Freedom" of the Press

With recent actions, the Zuma government has been compared to the oppressive states of Gambia and Zimbabwe. 37 of the country's editors signed a petition protesting the government's intentions to curtail freedom of the press. The international response, including that from top US media, is an unanimous call to drop the contentious bill and media appeals tribunals.

But the crackdown has been brewing for a while, and is not the first step the ANC has taken to sweep in some censorship. And the government has long derided newspapers and journalists who unveil information that doesn't paint the government in a favorable light. In 2007 we wrote about Africa's AIDS and public health crisis in hospitals, which the media persistently exposed. In response to the press attention, Mbeki pounded back in his own newspaper columns, including one Acronym Required dubbed "the mini-skirt memo". But Mbeki never did address the issues.

Mbeki's ANC consistently labeled anyone who criticized him as being unfaithful to the revolution, and Zuma hints at as much. This would be a blow for democracy, human rights, and business. But unfortunately, some countries have proven, like China and Russia and many others, that with the help of greed enabled complacency from US and Europe, freedom of information and freedom of press aren't necessarily requirements for state enrichment.

President Zuma urges people to "move away from hysteria dwelling on individual experiences". And he concludes: "We will use our right to express what we think. And we should not be silenced by claims of 'threats to press freedom'".

Acronym Required writes frequently about South Africa, especially issues involved the state's public health policies, HIV/AIDS progress, public media.

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¹a name he adopted meaning "of Africa"

² No one would accuse these authors of being dedicated to politically liberal causes. Concurrent with China, Skapinker this spring urged a ban on comment anonymity 'to promote civility', a trending meme that would slap a lid on many important forms of speech. While some people took exception to Skapinker's tedious idea, in one published letter to the FT editor, the writer agreed with Skapinker, and added that we should also identify motorists' identities via their license plates to promote highway civility, because as he noted, fooled by randomness, people who drove cars with vanity plates were more polite.

RW Johnson recently outraged writers, academics, and civilians with a racist piece he wrote for the London Book Review. 73 signatories complained in a letter to LBR that his work was "often stacked with the superficial and the racist".

Update 08/13: AB 70 was defeated. However, the Bring Your Genes to Cal program was altered because they planned to do the analysis in Berkeley labs, which are not certified medical labs. In accordance with state demands the students will not receive their own results.

Legislation usually moves along at a crawl, slowly, glacially -- except if you're the California State legislature trying to corral the University of California, Berkeley's personal genomics walkabout offered to incoming freshmen. The state bill AB 70 was introduced in December, 2008 to encourage transparency on how school districts classify "English learners" to "proficient".* Now, the text of AB 70 the "English learners" bill has been parasitically devoured and replaced with text to impede the University of California, Berkeley's program for incoming students, known as: "On the Same Page: Bring Your Genes to Cal".

How the State Tries to Come Between Cal...and Your Genes

Like many universities, freshmen are welcomed to UC Berkeley with some thematic program. Historically that's meant they all read a book, for instance last year they read Omnivore's Dilemma, by Michael Pollan. This year they decided on a more interactive learning experience, asking incoming Freshman to spit in a cup and submit that for analysis of lactose, alcohol metabolism, and folate gene variants. The idea seemed fresh and relevant, and Berkeley went forward with it apparently without much internal debate. Certainly getting students involved in their own health can't be bad can it?

Some people actually thought it was bad, however, and eventually the state legislature got involved -- very late to the game, of course. But as the university mailed out saliva spit kits to students, AB 70 suddenly gained what seemed like unprecedented speed and "urgency". If passed, it will be "enacted immediately."

The original AB 70 proposed adding a section to the education code requiring that school districts report their criteria for assessing English proficiency. The bill languished until being amended June 24, 2010. The amended title reflected not-too subtle changes. The old sponsor and bill purposes were simply crossed out, and the new sponsor and purpose inserted so it read:

"Duvall Norby English learners. Public postsecondary education: genetic testing."

That's how an English learners bill morphed into a bill to stop UC Berkeley from teaching about genetic testing.

Legislation 101

English learners text was crossed out:

....This bill would require the department, as part of its duties in administering the English language development test, to gather from each school district that has one or more English learners the criteria that the district uses for the reclassification of a pupil from English learner to proficient in English and to summarize and report the criteria it receives...

And in its place, text warning about allowing "On The Same Page: Bring Your Genes to Cal":

• Collecting, testing and storing genetic material presents "unique challenges to protecting individual privacy".
• Medical testing "subjects" should receive "substantial" written and verbal explanation before supplying consent
• Students "may feel coerced to participate in official activities involving widespread genetic testing"
• A 2006 GAO report showed that tests are "unproven, misleading, meaningless.."
• Students could "suffer consequences later in life" because of privacy breaches.

The June 24th version demanded that the school report quarterly, all the costs of the "solicitation" so that the state of California could recoup those expenses. The trouble with that legislation was that the solicitation already happened and was funded with a gift (probably, the funding is unclear). (The state only provides Berkeley with a small percentage of its funding.) So the August 02 amended version of AB 70 struck out "prohibits" and entered "requests" instead. The August version also struck out the demand for accounting of "unsolicited requests", and replaced that for a demand to account for "legal judgements or settlements resulting from violations of the informed consent requirements".

On Different Pages

The August amendments show the state adjusting to meet the realities of the program moving forward. It's a learning experience for all. Clearly the legislature is trying to wrap its head around the project, and adjusting as needed. As is Berkeley. As are organizations who oppose the program.

The text of the bill reflects very closely the rhetoric of the Massachusetts based Council on Responsible Genetics (CRG). Their primary concern seems to be privacy, and their multiple letters to California legislators practically dictate the content of AB 70. But as they gather more information about the project, they too change their rhetoric. In their most recent letter to California legislators, the Council For Responsible Genetics joined with the ACLU, Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, The Electronic Freedom Foundation and others, urging the legislators to "request a full accounting" of the "On the Same Page: Bring Your Genes to Call" program, specifically issues of conflict of interest, funding, privacy, and data confidentiality.

The Berkeley program certainly brings relevant topics to the fore, and who can challenge the importance of this? But Berkeley scientists and the Council on Responsible Genetics have stuck doggedly to their talking points. Scientists advocating the program stress the need for education about genomics, and accuse critics of being anachronistic and paternalistic. They stress individuals personal right learn genetic information. Therefore, they would argue, this is a relevant topic worthy of the attention of the program.

Certainly healthcare in America is at such a nadir that anyone with half a brain in their head who has visited a doctor lately would agree that giving individuals more information to take more ownership of their own healthcare would be great. Personal genomics could give such insight, democratize information, and benefit health consumers. But this is one (there are others) big hitch. Direct to consumer genetics testing (this is related) walks a fine line between being innocuous information and a "medical test". Bring Your Genes to Cal proponents simultaneously push the importance of the students learning about genomics - and by pushing this they get necessary support, while at the same time belittling the relevance of the tests and their results - so as not to attract unwanted attention.

Meanwhile, critics are focusing on the very issues that the University is trying to downplay. CRG insists on repeatedly labeling the Bring Your Genes to Cal tests "medical tests" in order to prompt alarm and greater scrutiny. The critics dwell on privacy, data confidentiality, and interpretation of data. To me, if genomics data is important enough that it's worth building this program around (as innocuous seeming as these variants may be), than it's important enough for the critics' issues to matter -- even if the involved scientists twist themselves into knots to avoid those discussions.

The state, for its part, is trying to respond, quickly at that, without having a clear handle on the issues. Perhaps they yearn for 2008, when AB 70 was stymied in controversy over adding a webpage to assure transparency in schools' English Learner programs.

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*AB 70 was also once a bill about state dams.

The skirmish over at ScienceBlogs between PepsiCo and the science bloggers actually made me feel sorry for Pepsi.

Pass The Bong and the Aspartame

You have to admit, PepsiCo had a tough month...week. First, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom banned Pepsi from vending machines, a move that elicited potshots from conservative DC paper The Washington Times, as in: "Pass The Pot Brownies, But Drop That Soda". Expounding on that clever cliche, they wrote: "In the City by the Bay, it may soon be easier to get a pot-laced brownie than a can of Pepsi".

Oh yeah, nailed it! Hippies in the "City By The Bay" ("Frisco" to some) -- don dirty tie-dyed t-shirts daily, in order to stand on corners and flash "peace" fingers to badly parented long-haired youth driving orange Volkswagon buses, wearing flowers in their hair, swaying to the music, THC soothing their psychedelics' addled nerves. Wow, The Washington Times sure knows "The City By The Bay".¹

It used to be that Coke would lose its big university or city contract to Pepsi, then Pepsi to Coke, back and forth. But not this time, soda was ousted. No sooner than being ejected from San Francisco city vending machines, PepsiCo was yelled off ScienceBlogs. Curiously, ScienceBlogs also hails from the Bay Area.

SciBling Hospitality?

It must have been a confusing time for PepsiCo. First, warmly courted by ScienceBlog editors, PepsiCo invitingly titled their blog "Food Frontiers". But they couldn't even pen a "Hello, World! Corn syrup is so good for you", before "SciBlings" (ScienceBlog bloggers) rose up en masse from their virginal science blog space and confronted the evil sugar-water mixer about stealth advertising. (If you can do stealth with prominent branding, that is.)

I wasn't there. But it's mid-July, pretty slow in science news, so I thought I'd Twitter all the anger, consternation, then mass exodus of 20 SciBlingers, thus entertaining all the fluffy dogs, porn stars (and some cool peeps) who follow AcronymRequired. Unfortunately, before anyone could figure out whether to call it PepsiCoGate, Pepsigate, or Pepsicopalyse, Pepsi Food Frontiers skedaddled as if confronted by a battalion of helmeted storm troopers spraying plastic bullets and tear gas at their sit-in.

Safely back at PepsiCo.com, Food Frontiers publicly reminisced about the "very candid feedback" and their "intent to embrace that conversation". The regrouping Pepsi bloggers talked microbial stability, acidity, phosphorous content, obesity, and salt, vis-a-vis PepsiCo. And as promised, they engaged "that conversation", by answering the demands of SciBlingers who chased them back.

PepsiCo "embraced" the bracing blog comments from SciBlingons ("Does the material leave your own computer when you write a post, ever? I.e, pass in front of other people's eyes? Is there a standard workflow for producing a blog post that involves any kind of oversight or inspection?...The truth is that if you'all blogging researchers can only write approved copy, then the whole blog thing really is probably a bad idea"), and responded promptly and sweetly: "Thanks Greg Laden" in "The Posting Process on Food Frontiers".

But will such sugary pabulum engage ScienceBloggers? No. Only two comments to that PepsiCo post, neither of them reciprocally "embracing". It would have been more SciBlingy for Food Frontiers to be a little in their face: "WTF is YOUR process -- why do so many ideas conflicting with your world view meet with such profane outbursts and bunkerbuster-style attacks? What are you, the Department of OK Blogs?" -- Now that, would be "engaging the conversation", sciblingy-like. Instead, light, huggy, bubbly, marketing stuff.

Maybe Food Frontiers bloggers were jittery, wan and weak from a diet of caffeine, phosphorous, sugar, water, and natural flavors. Or, possibly they were devouring cans of spinach voraciously and weight-training vigorously, but saving their vim and vigor for this week's attack on a more familiar foe -- CocaCola.

In a newish YouTube spot, the two opposing soft drink truck drivers meet in a diner and swap colas, "Why Can't We Be Friends?" by the band War, a 1970's song. As one driver drinks a soda, the other betrays him (can't tell you why). Then they get mad and crash through a window together. The Associated Press wrote:

"Analysts say people love the funny, spirited rivalry of the decades-old cola wars and the move will benefit both soda makers. That's good news for the $100 billion industry, which is seeing weak soft drink sales as shoppers switch to healthier juices and teas."

Business as usual, just pining for the 1970s? See how it works Sciblingers? Friendly public rivalry.

Butlered off the Isle?

Of course, I don't really feel sorry for Pepsi. They have a nice new sepia toned 1970's ad and a brilliant business, patenting and selling corrosive sugar and water drinks. But as we've written before, soda's not so healthy for humans or the environment ("Childhood Obesity, The American Way", or "Pop's Out Drug's are In", or "Coke: Teaching the World to Sing", or "Why So Fat? It's System Wide", or "Common Sense Foods in Schools""). And PepsiCo doesn't need us, they can always fall into the arms of Coke, or the loving the Cato Institute. or FOX, and many others.

Apparently there was more going on at ScienceBlogs than PepsiCo, there always is. I've read and mostly enjoyed ScienceBlogs since the inception. There weren't too many bloggers way back then and I've watched SB evolve with particular interest. So I get it. But Sciblingons! Sheesh! "Spirited rivalry" and gentle brawls people! Do you really need to beat them up, throw them off the island, bash their heads in, then drown them? What good are they too you then?

Just my opinion. I believe that ScienceBlogs has done wonders for getting others online writing about science. A ton of SB bloggers blog seriously about science, every day, good stuff. But some bloggers get increasingly spiteful as they vie for the attention that blogging compels, then use that attention to generate a certain brand of PR for SB. The level of conversation often spirals downward (there must be some entropy model that describes it). And that downward spiral seems infectious -- I've noticed Nature has been forging new ground lately in diluting their brand with some profane blogs also.

Pepsi's not the first one to feel SciBlingon wrath, though sleepy-hot July always gives these incidents an extra charge. Remember the Nature/Butler/PLoS fracas of July, 2008? It was similarly acrimonious with a familiar corporate/underdog theme.

These bloggers know their power, they say. But this is how SB looks from the outside, to me, an independent sometimes-blogger. Everyday science bloggy, bloggy, bloggedy, great - oh, too boring? Yawn? Then Boom, Smash, Bang, big tizzy over at ScienceBlogs over something, lots of media coverage. Repeat. For someone not in the thick of it, the episodic commotions tempt a plea for perspective.

I hope ScienceBlogs settles -- certainly finding eager writers shouldn't be a hurdle, and there are 60 left. I look forward to future writing from the diaspora. But I would also venture that it's complicated, messy business, this advertising stuff, this ethical boundaries stuff. It's pretty easy to inadvertently be seen as hypocritical trying to carve arbitrary ethical boundaries that suit your own very personal interests. As a minor, minor example, isn't most blogging just personal branding/advertising? But your brand is pure as the driven snow, whereas Pepsi's is marred by soda pop? Anyway, I'm not sure getting Pepsi off of ScienceBlogs, although certainly a "cause", was one worthy of the show or the arena.

(To Be Continued)

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¹ Actually, in another "City By The Bay", they plan to grow pot by the acre, an unfortunately timed news story which you'd think would crush my defense. But then the city will tax it, hopefully so they can pay for a much needed police force. Complicated. Another story.

The University of California, Berkeley always amazes. It has an ultra-liberal reputation, yet it defies its label by harboring some of the most controversial figures, and protects them under the auspices of academic freedom -- an excellent institution -- strreetttched at Berkeley to fit many circumstances. The law school dean used it to protect John Yoo, the law professor who crafted the Bush administration's torture policy, for instance. Now the school has invoked the useful catch-all to clear scientist Peter Duesberg of wrong-doing over a paper he wrote denying the HIV viral link to AIDS. The University said there was "insufficient evidence" to do anything else.

Berkeley Did Not Judge the "Accuracy or Validity of the Article"

Although UC Berkeley didn't judge the "accuracy or validity of the article", those issues lie at the heart the ongoing Duesberg controversy. This was only Dueberg's latest foray, that he initiated last year by publishing a paper in a non-peer review journal called "Medical Hypotheses". He claimed in his paper that the HIV virus didn't cause AIDS, something he's been promoting for years. The paper did not undergo peer-review. Scientists refuted his false theories in a collective uproar, the journal retracted the paper, the journal editor was fired, and Elsevier, the publisher, promised to rethink the journal format.

Then the University received two letters, one from Treatment Action Coalition (TAC) in South Africa, criticizing Duesberg's paper for conflict of interest and for "making false claims". The letters asked the University to investigate. The school did so, however yesterday's action clearing Duesberg of wrongdoing indicates that the UC Berkeley mission, policy and conduct documents don't contain anything that's applicable to Duesberg's situation.

Duesberg's Legacy In South Africa

The main problem is not necessarily the statements Duesberg published last year, but the fact that for years he's been publishing them and they've significantly influenced policy and beliefs about AIDS and science in general. It's his actions outside the University, like Yoo's, that cause the most distress. Duesberg sat on former South African President Mbeki's advisory panel on AIDS back in 1999-2000, and the South African government frequently cited his AIDS ideas to support their policies. Mbeki didn't treat AIDS in his country, letting hundreds of thousands of people die.

Whether Duesberg was a handy foil for Mbeki's pre-determined policy -- whether Mbeki's countrymen died because the president was more driven to toe conservative economic and social policy the procure available AIDS drugs -- is unclear. What is clear is that the country had the highest death rate from AIDS in history, while wielding the most mendacious policies, which Mbeki backed-up with "science" created by Duesberg.

Yet there's nothing in Berkeley policy that specifically calls this a crime.

Peer-Review? Whatever. Duesberg = UC Berkeley= AIDS Denial = Mbeki's AIDS Policy = Death

A Berkeley spokesman told Nature: "The university relies on the scholarly peer-review process, rather than disciplinary procedures, for evaluating the value of scientific work." There. Very official. However AIDS denialists don't rely on peer-review. They revel in non-peer-review.

And unlike the University and scientists who care about peer-review, for Duesberg's purposes, getting a paper retracted by some flaky non-peer-reviewed tabloid called "Medical Hypotheses" doesn't matter. He has his audience. For years he's had a self-promoting website up, and his ideas have gained an audience. Next they'll go after "my parking permits" he says. His audience laps this stuff up -- the underdog, taking on the big evil science establishment.

UC Berkeley has their policies and official responses. Academic freedom, the concept, is inarguably beneficial, the heart of academia. But the fact remains, one of the most renowned research universities in the world supports a scientist largely responsible for some of the most deadly anti-science claims in history. If you search "Duesberg" in Google, his site is featured at the top. Here's how the Google results page text reads today:

"Peter Duesberg on AIDS - Duesberg.com - HIV / AIDS research ... Infectious AIDS - Have We Been Misled? This is the official HIV/AIDS research from the University of California Berkeley, Department of Molecular and Cell ... www.duesberg.com/ - Cached - Similar"

"Official" HIV/AIDS "research" from the University of California, Berkeley. The Wikipedia entry for Duesberg appears third today on the same Google search page. Here's how it reads:

"Duesberg hypothesis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia The Duesberg hypothesis is the claim, associated with University of California, Berkeley professor Peter Duesberg, that various non-infectious factors such ... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duesberg_hypothesis - Cached - Similar"

UC Berkeley policy has nothing to say. Peer-review? Here's what the world sees: Duesberg = UC Berkeley= AIDS Denial = Mbeki's AIDS Policy = Death. Somewhere deep in the heart of hearts of university bureaucracy, under all the official, vague missions, purposes, and policies, doesn't this cause angst?

Exonerated?

Interestingly, it's Duesberg himself whose been spear-heading the reporting on the investigation. Apparently Duesberg has enough confidence in the support of anti-science, AIDS denialist community, to know the outcome would work for his purposes. And since now Duesberg is claiming that he was "exonerated", it's like free marketing for his theories. How tragic.

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¹PLoS One, the audience reviewed journal, is also tangentially affiliated with UC Berkeley via PLoS co-founder and esteemed scientist Michael Eisen.

Acronym Required has written frequently on South Africa and AIDS, occasionally about HIV/AIDS deniers, and once in a while about UC Berkeley.

People commenting publicly about the BP spill need to choose their words carefully, as certain comments play badly on short-attention span TV. Parker Griffith (R-Alabama) recently refuted the oft-stated comment that the BP spill is one of the most impactful environmental disasters ever.

From Oncologist to Apologist

Griffith made a point to tell the congressional committee:

"...I'd like to remind the committee [that] the greatest environmental disaster in America has been cigarettes...let's be sure we don't leave that out...[T]he environment is an important concept. We regret the loss of life. But there's much that we can do, and we'll put this in perspective. This is not going to be the worst thing that's ever happened to America."

Master of relativist thinking, Griffith lets BP off because of tobacco and some ominous future disaster? And his idea of 'environment as concept' -- I like that. Maybe he was seeking to qualitatively bolster his disapproval of the moratorium on off-shore drilling that he called "a public relations stunt" earlier in the week.

We're used to oil spill gaffes, we chortle and put our hands to mouths in gestures of mock horror when hearing: "We care about the small people" (BP chairman Carl-Henric Svanberg), or "I'd like my life back"(from banished BP CEO Tony Hayward). But Griffith's comment wasn't a gaffe. He was serious.

From Republican To Democrat

Griffith is a lame duck representative who lost his primary after changing parties. He has campaigned to ban cigarettes in Alabama. He's a retired radiation oncologist, who says "I never fail to bring that up." He changed parties because he disapproved of the health care bill (interesting, since the bill purports to help lower income people, who are more likely to smoke).

So maybe after he exits Congress he can continue with his anti-smoking campaign, such as it is, since he's seems less effective, in terms of public interest, campaigning for sustainable energy and the environment.

Maybe there's a place for him (at BP), or getting more people to quit smoking. Now for the segue. Despite various government actions and the lack of recent press about cigarettes, tobacco remains profitable. Efforts continue to curb smoking through taxes and smoking bans, but cigarette consumption has leveled out after falling for decades, writes the Financial Times. Accordingly, future taxes will not impact tobacco profit, and tobacco is a good investment.

Investors' Perennial "Love"

Investors will "come to love the sector", says FT, explaining how the price elasticity of demand for cigarettes has remained stable with price and volume for decades:

"...Last year's 25 per cent price increase per pack caused consumption to fall 8 per cent, an elasticity of -0.34, calculates UBS. By comparison, since 1969 prices have risen 87 per cent (adjusted for inflation), while consumption fell a third, giving a similar elasticity of -0.37. Based on this fairly steady relationship, UBS argues that tobacco manufacturers can sustain price increases of 4 to 5 per cent annually (8 to 9 per cent for retail prices) for the next decade, while absorbing consumption declines of 3 to 4 per cent..."

Very interesting, if discouraging because all told, FT concludes: "Not one for socially responsible investors but, for the rest, it may be time to light up".

From Politician to Lobbyist?

Which means that the recently proposed NY State cigarette tax increase may help state coffers, but it won't put cigarette makers out of business. At $5.85 $9 or $11 (in NYC) a pack, the American Cancer Society cheered the tax, because higher prices reduce the number of smokers. Of course the Seneca Nation doesn't like it, noting that they will fight for their ancestors treaties.

Lobbyists for cigarette retailers, also opposed, warn that black markets for tobacco will become more lucrative. Which is why multi-pronged regulation is best. The US Postal ban on mailing cigarettes goes into effect at the end of this month. But, cheers UBS, there will be enough smokers to keep the profit flowing.

Liberated from law-making, Griffith could put his crafty rhetoric skills to use for his favorite cause. And apparently he won't hurt the sector. And he could probably safely lobby for alternative energy too. What's the price elasticity of oil? Or will it just run out?

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced today that it was adding bisphenol A (BPA) to its list of "chemicals of concern", and will require testing to assess BPA's effects on the environment. A recent review paper by Tufts University researchers, published in Environmental Health Perspectives reinforces the need for concern about BPA exposure, which is widespread in the population. According to the article, public agencies in the US and Europe perennially underestimate the risks of bisphenol A.

While the FDA regulates the food packaging by which most individuals would be exposed to BPA, the EPA regulates the chemical's effect on the environment. The chemical's effect on the environment is neither trivial nor inconsequential, as we've previously noted. But the doubt about whether BPA should be regulated continues.

In "The Politics of Everyday Bisphenol A", Acronym Required looked at the different approach Canada took to banning BPA recently, compared to the United States' more reluctant stance on regulation. The most obvious difference underlying the policies of the two countries seems to be the more minor economic interest Canada has in BPA, compared to the US.

However, in banning BPA last year, Canada also considered the input of its environmental agency, Environment Canada, in addition to Health Canada. Canada's Minister Baird noted at the time: "When it comes to Canada's environment, you can't put a price on safety". Of course, the rhetoric of the Canadian Prime Minister belies an inconsistent environmental stance, illustrated in the country's other environmental activities, like the destructive but lucrative Alberta oil sands industries.

But notably, in contrast to Canada, the US BPA policy has depended more on human health data. These results are more difficult to obtain because you can't test a potentially toxic chemical like BPA on human subjects. This ethical consideration leads confusion about the strength of the data, as the chemical lobby goes on and on that rat and mice data don't predict health effects in humans. There's some truth in the logic of their statements, but their forceful arguments obscure data on deleterious results of BPA exposure that are disturbing and do have implications for public health.

Importantly, their arguments make politicians go all limp. Thus weakened, politicians generally cave when faced lawsuits against their proposed regulations by the same lobbies and plastics manufacturers, which in turn secures the permanence of BPA in our bloodstreams.

Environmental effects are easier to test -- dead tadpoles in brackish water and such are easier to quantify. Not to say that this is the EPA's goal, not at all.

In addition to listing BPA as a "chemical of concern", the EPA will:

• Require information on concentrations of BPA in surface water, ground water, and drinking water to determine if BPA may be present at levels of potential concern.
• Require manufacturers to provide test data to assist the agency in evaluating its possible impacts, including long-term effects on growth, reproduction, and development in aquatic organisms and wildlife.
• Use EPA's Design for the Environment (DfE) program to look for ways to reduce unnecessary exposures, including assessing substitutes, while additional studies continue.
• ..Continue to evaluate the potential disproportionate impact on children and other sub-populations through exposure from non-food packaging uses.

The EPA has decided to call this exercise "scrutiny" to assuage the environmental doubters in the crowd, as in "EPA to Scrutinize Environmental Impact of Bisphenol A". On cue, American Chemistry Council (ACC) president Cal Dooley reminded everyone he speaks for that the EPA isn't proposing regulation. And right he is. The EPA is talking about looking at more data. Dooley said in a statement that he looked forward to a "productive exchange" with the agency, code perhaps for a collective chemical industry mutiny against regulation? Stay tuned.

Bisphenol A, Trees on Mars, and Riveting Headlines

Headlines can be deceiving, as well all know. But we often fall for them anyway. "Are Those Trees on Mars?" asked FoxNews and 150 other news outlets last week. So I squinted at the photo, trying to imagine how those could possibly be trees...maybe if a small city like Le Mars, Iowa shipped all the old Christmas trees collected on January 8th to Le Other Mars, instead of chipping them?

A fool I was, but you can't imagine my disappointment when the article attached to the NASA photo explained that there were No Trees On Mars, only dark sand illuminated differently than the surrounding carbon dioxide ice(1) -- (Tricky editors! - 'HA, made you look'). I guess readers' attention was elsewhere last week because closer to home, more subtly, but equally misleading, news headlines announced: The FDA "reverses" its position on bisphenol A (BPA), the FDA "backtracks" on BPA, the FDA advises consumers to "limit exposure" to BPA.

These headlines seemed like real news, since the FDA has for years faiiled to come out with either actions or public statements reflecting the growing research evidence for BPA toxicity. During the Bush administration the glaring gap between the FDA's position and BPA research propelled scientists to publicly criticized the relationship between the FDA and the industries it was supposed to be regulating. Acronym Required wrote about the fraught regulatory environment in the FDA vis-à-vis BPA, in "Scientists Criticize FDA Methods on BPA", in "Conflict of Interest in the FDA?", in "FDA Panel Offers Corrections to BPA Draft", in "Bisphenol A, The FDA, Industry -- Whassup?", and others.

Given the FDA's lackluster BPA regulation history, plus the fact that BPA is almost a household word, the newest headlines on BPA and the FDA attracted everyone's attention. The New York Times listed its story "F.D.A. Concerned About Substance in Food Packaging", as one of the "most e-mailed" articles one day. But underneath the headlines, what did the stories really report?

FDA -- Aging Cheerleader?

Despite the headlines, the FDA announced no "guidelines", and no new news. The LA Times quoted a statement from FDA Deputy Commissioner Joshua Sharfstein under the title "FDA issues BPA guidelines". "For the present", Sharfstein said", the FDA does support the use of baby bottles with BPA.'" (emphasis ours)

So in essence, the FDA has offered the same counsel for years, ever since it started studying BPA. In 1995 for instance, FDA scientists found that BPA migrated from heated plastic containers. The agency remained unalarmed. In 1997 the FDA began pondering how to change regulation to reflect evidence that endocrine disruptors altered physiology at low doses -- but barely flinched.

In 1999 several consumer groups, environmental safety groups, and scientists, petitioned the FDA to ban BPA in plastic baby bottles, because research then showed without a doubt that the chemical could leach out of polycarbonate, and indicated that BPA caused sex organ problems for male babies of exposed pregnant mice. At the time, the FDA deployed Dr. George Pauli to quell rising consumer concerns and Pauli assured families that polycarbonate bottles didn't leach under 'everyday' conditions, only at high temperatures; infant formulas required only mild heating, he said. (Although, alarmingly, parents typically microwaved the bottles.)

Now, over a decade later, despite dozens more studies, the FDA is still equivocating on baby bottles, although bottles present one of the riskiest sources of BPA because of babies' vulnerability to endocrine disruptors during development.

The FDA's statement becomes all the more difficult to swallow when you know that all on their own, without any encouragement from the agency, manufacturers voluntarily pulled polycarbonate bottles for babies and adults off the shelves.

The FDA did manage to bring its assessment -- that there is "some concern" about BPA health risks -- in line with the National Toxicology Program's (NTP) assessment. Although this is no small feat given the FDA's history, the agency didn't do much else, despite delaying this announcement three times.

From the FDA website, here's what the FDA committed to:

• "supporting industry actions" to stop making BPA containing baby bottles
• "faciliting the development" of BPA alternatives for formula cans
• "supporting efforts" to replace BPA in food can linings

Such mealy-mouthed statements give the impression that the FDA has little more persuasive authority than Acronym Required. The agency also said it would work with other agencies like the National Toxicology Program (NTP) in the NIEHS/NIH, and with foreign governments (legislators have aggressively questioned the FDA why it hasn't taken action when the Canada has banned BPA).

What Should Consumers Think?

The FDA is also seeking "external input" on the "science surrounding BPA", and will solicit "further public comment". Acronym Required commented on public comment periods used by agencies before. We wouldn't want to appear cynical in saying you can never have too much "public comment" or assume that the FDA is using the comment period to stall regulatory action. But since the FDA is now working with the National Toxicology Program in the NIH (NTP), it could review the numerous public comments solicited by the NTP during its assessments of the chemical in February, 2006; April, 2007; November, 2007; and April, 2008. (2)

The FDA is also "supporting a shift to a more robust regulatory framework for oversight of BPA". The FDA explains that a 40 year rule limits the FDA's ability to regulate BPA (as a food additive). The FDA can regulate new substances under a 2000 rule, but that doesn't help with BPA. So the agency will "encourage manufacturers to voluntarily submit a food contact notification for their currently marketed uses of BPA-containing materials." This is interesting because for years the FDA has been researching BPA and has declined to regulate the chemical because the agency found the science unconvincing; for some reason it hasn't brought a lot attention to its legal inabilities to regulate.

Does the FDA's latest announcement clarify its previous confusing position? What should consumers do? As my favorite headline, by "Beforeitsnews.com" byline has it: "It's in Your Urine But Is It Safe?".

More to the point, what should citizens do that they haven't done already? They've stopped buying polycarbonate, so much so that manufacturers have pulled bottles off the shelves, they've sued, they've urged local and state ordinances. By all measures, consumers have made the most credible effort to regulate BPA.

The FDA -- Nudging Itself Out of a Job? Drowning Itself In the Bathtub?

Other non-governmental organizations have responded with none of the ambiguity of the FDA. For instance spokespeople from the Breast Cancer Fund, Natural Resources Defense Council, Consumers Union, Clean New York, Center for Health Environment & Justice, and others, all urge the FDA to ban the chemical.

Even the National Council of Churches offers a suggestion for the FDA, saying, "As we celebrate the Christmas season, we are reminded of Jesus' commitment to those in poverty. We hope that the FDA will take measures to ensure that canned food is BPA-free through the use of safe alternatives in the future."

The FDA has been researching the chemical for over a decade. Their most recent statement followed delays -- not just three delays, but years of delays. Naturally the FDA, along with the CDC and NIH will support further research, in addition to supporting a new regulatory framework. The research will add to the already substantial body of research showing BPA dangers. And I guess that's how it is. The FDA is obviously hesitant to impact a multi-billion dollar industry, so the research needs to be far more conclusive than, say, if you were putting a potentially profitable pharmaceutical drug on the market.

In the meantime, as the FDA maintains relevancy by "supporting", "facilitating", and "encouraging" -- cities, towns and states across the US will continue to be at the forefront of 'patchwork' BPA regulation, pushing manufacturers to use alternatives.

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¹ From NASA: "At that time, dark sand on the interior of Martian sand dunes became more and more visible as the spring Sun melted the lighter carbon dioxide ice. When occurring near the top of a dune, dark sand may cascade down the dune leaving dark surface streaks -- streaks that might appear at first to be trees standing in front of the lighter regions, but cast no shadows."

² As a side note, the progression of public comments is interesting because it also shows growing awareness of BPA. In 2006 the only public comment was from the American Plastics Council. By 2008 almost 50 individuals and agencies commented.

Checklists?

Atul Gawande's latest book, The Checklist Manifesto, advocates checklists to systemize the complexity of healthcare delivery and reduce medical mistakes. Making the media rounds, Gawande spoke for an hour recently on Democracy Now. He also testified before the President's Council on Science and Technology (PCAST).

Checklists, you ask? Certainly they're not new. Indeed, a few years ago, another physician, Dr. Peter Pronovost presented research showing the utility of checklists to tackle infectious disease in hospitals, and of course they've been used by airlines, oil change places, pizza delivery people, families going shopping, etc. Gawande's rendition appeared in this piece for The New Yorker in 2007. But his book is especially timely, given the current focus on healthcare reform.

The amount of information in medicine is vast -- 68,000 different patient diagnoses, 4,000 different surgeries, thousands of medicines. But despite our knowledge and exorbitant spending, healthcare outcomes in the US are lower than other industrialized countries -- 37th lowest, in fact, and sinking.

The fee for service incentives derail efficient healthcare, for instance by encouraging surgery. There are 230 million surgeries a year, 50 million in the US. Problematically, more surgeries means more surgical complications. The number of surgeries outstrips childbirths in the US, according to Gawande, but with 10-100 times the death rate. As he puts it, "150,000 people who die of complications of surgery, die within thirty days following surgery. And we know at least half are avoidable."

Gawande et al conclude that checklists help reduce mortality and morbidity from surgery and infections. Gawande also says they increase teamwork during procedures, for instance, by empowering nurses to point out missed checklist items. Better teamwork in turn increases success rates.

Checklists are not the complete solution to avoiding deaths, but when Gawande conducted research using checklists in eight hospital centers and 7,688 patients across the globe, the researchers found that deaths decreased by 46%, which, as a percentage looks quite dramatic, but according to their research surgical teams reduced deaths from surgery from 1.5% before the checklist to .8% afterwards. Serious complications fell from 11% to 7% according to the study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) last year.

Checklists as Partial Solution

But if the improvements observed by the research teams aren't artifacts, checklist implementation is still not without other issues. Harold Varmus pointed out in the PCAST panel that checklists could impede creative solutions, and noted that investigations into best practices inevitably unveil multiple equally effective ways of solving medical challenges.

As well, according to Gawande, sometimes checklists impede profit. There are strong financial incentives encouraging doctors to do procedures like surgeries. Gawande wrote last summer about the high cost of healthcare in McAllen Texas, where Medicare spends $15,000 per enrollee because entrepreneurial doctors have found ways to profit mightily within the fee for service system. In Boston, although the checklists reduced emergency asthma admissions at Boston Children's Hospital by 80%, asthma admissions were the number one revenue source for the hospital admissions. The surgeon stressed that payment systems need to be adjusted when necessary, checklists won't work on their own. The problem of keeping costs down he told Democracy Now, has not been accomplished by insurance companies.

Checklists: Simple and Cheap, Dumped into a Technology Centric World?

One of Gawande's chief points is that checklists are simple and cheap to implement compared to proposed solutions for healthcare which involve ever more complicated technology that doesn't necessarily scale. As Gawande says: "There are technologies that we've tried to introduce. We've pursued very expensive solutions. But what we've not recognized is that we can pursue an idea like checklists...".

When Gawande presented these views to the President's panel, he ran into some interesting opinions from some in the IT sector who sit on the panel. His low tech solution elicited questions like: "Will physicians accept technology?"

Gawande observed that there "can be a sense of seeing the technology almost as a panacea". Problematically he says, although technology can be beneficial, "we have not really gathered evidence on what the components are that make it a successful implementation versus unsuccessful". Two systems in two different organizations can save lives and money in one institution and be a total failure in another, as was the case with a physicians' order entry system that Brigham Women's successfully implemented, which then failed to deliver cost savings and life saving benefits when implemented at Cedar's Sinai.

No sooner had he said this, when Eric Schmidt, Google's CEO who sits on PCAST, asked him why doctors didn't use technology more. Schmidt tried to get some insight for "the model of healthcare that we'll have five or ten years from now."

"It's pretty clear that we'll have personal health records and you'll have the equivalent of a USB stick or cloud based medical history. You'll show up at the doctor with some set of symptoms. And in my ideal world what would happen is that the doctoor would type the set of symptoms that they see as a doctor and they would be matched against this data that is a repository. And then a knowledge engine would use best practices and all the knowledge of the world to then give the physician some standardized guidance. This is a generalized form of your checklist mechanism. As a computer scientist, this is a platform database problem...And it's also knowledge engineering problem.

We do these very, very well, as a general rule in computer science. And it befuddles me why medicine has not organized itself around this platform opportunity. Do you have an opinion as to why not? Do you have an opinion as to how such a system would evolve so that the doctors would use it, it would standardize practices in the way you described and ultimately lead to presumably debates over healthcare and what the right outcomes are and all the kinds of incentives. If you don't have such a platform you'll never measure it to scale...

There are a lot of assumptions implicit in Schmidt's statements, we won't go through them all here, although some physician/commentators on the internet have already had a field day. Gawande started out responding that the people who make those systems "don't know how the clinical encounter works" -- six problems in 15 minutes per patient, for starters. He ended up more conciliatory towards the idea of computerized checklists. But he emphasized that his checklists involve understanding systems engineering issues involved with ensuring well-functioning teams. That checklists were not simply a challenge of listing as Schmidt put it "all the knowledge in the world".

Gawande also proposed to the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology a new "science of health delivery" to study systems innovations, team organization and motivations, and coordinated deployment of healthcare. He even suggested a "National Institutes for Health Systems Innovation" to stand apart from the NIH (although such new agencies are fun to dream up but practically improbable).

Moving Forward on Platforms

For all the issues brought to the fore in "Checklist Manifesto", and for the all the issues at stake in healthcare, and to Gawande's warning about technology panacea's, it was interesting that the panel ended up quickly focusing on healthcare records. It's easy to imagine the temptation to look to health care records as that very panacea. A lot of the failures in medicine are also failures of communication, between the patient and doctor (15 minutes is often generous), between doctors, between facilities. Certainly technology already helps a lot of this, but for all the improvements in medical information technology to date, medical care is still fragmented, expensive, fraught with inconsistency and at times dangerous to the patient. Still, technology is necessarily part of the solution, and building the platform is critical.

So how would a new healthcare IT platform change the current medical system? There's a lot at stake for doctors and for patients. Any major change to the system could rearrange profits. Much of the routine patient care could be accomplished via a computer and a nurse or administrator. Why does a doctor need to charge $200 to tell you to take aspirin and drink fluids? Both Google and Microsoft are positioning themselves well -- it's hard to imagine either not grabbing the opportunity to root itself themselves into healthcare, they have a lot of mouths to feed back on their campuses.

It's troubling that the primary recipient, the patient, isn't very well represented in any of these discussions except by proxy of Google and various university doctors. 'We know what's good for you and we'll tell you what that is.' Everyone is advocating for "the patient", but Google is advocating for itself as well, as is Microsoft. And do university doctors in the upper echelons really experience the same problems with healthcare that your average patient does? That's what you get with 3rd party healthcare payers? The primary customer perhaps is not patients but insurance companies, who will no doubt benefit from the knowledge in more comprehensive databases of patient information.

The challenge perhaps is to improve healthcare (behind the patient's back), to not make it worse (no small feat), and to avoid simply adding another layer of expense and bureaucracy, to the gigantic Dagwood sandwich that is modern healthcare. It would be too easy to add more layers, to the layers and layers that comprise healthcare services, insurance, and companies that administer benefits, each one yielding profits from their slice, who in the end complicate healthcare and add costs for ambiguous ends.

• Copenhagen: Despite walking past sculptures of skeletons and eerie melting ice polar bears and mermaids daily, the climate change delegates collectively refused to come up with anything substantial in Copenhagen. President Obama curtailed his much awaited visit, altogether minimizing his association with what was by most accounts a failure, but also known as an accord, in order to fly home early and beat a snowstorm. If we are one world we are also many countries with our own economic interests in mind.

  Is there a better way? The Economist suggested in an article last week that the talks may have gone better if different regions and pollutants were considered separately. While the idea is interesting, this sort of regime is also how fishing interests repeatedly fail to establish effective ecological safeguards and effective quotas.

  Although the talks weren't considered fruitful, an interesting sidenote is the inability of very tenacious climate change deniers to convince delegates or the thousands of protestors in Copenhagen that climate change is a hoax, that nothing's at stake.

• The Ice Floe Debate: Last month, in our Notes on Science Dust-Ups and Dirty Laundry, under "Curly-haired Science Populizers Spar" we wrote about what we'll call the IQ nurture:nature debate between two science popularizer giants, Steven Pinker and Malcolm Gladwell. Pinker had criticized Gladwell for what he cuttingly labeled the "Igon Value Problem", defined as, "when a writer's education on a topic consists in interviewing an expert, he is apt to offer generalizations that are banal, obtuse or flat wrong."

  In return, Gladwell wrote that Pinker might be "unhappy" with him for not joining him on the "lonely ice floe of IQ fundamentalism", and criticized him for quoting bloggers. (Although if not for bloggers there might not be people in science of lower regard in the research hierarchy than some of Gladwell's mashable social scientists -- just saying.)

  After we left off, Pinker responded to Gladwell that IQ was related to "many important educational, economic and social outcomes" according to "52 signatories" and "a unanimous blue-ribbon panel". Gladwell then raked over Pinkers' sources, detailing how 15 of those 52 signatories belonged to a group founded by a eugenicist -- whose members are racists, eugenicists and sexists. After substantiating his response at length, he concludes:

  "The fact that ideas are sometimes supported by people with unsavory connections does not make them invalid. An ice floe is not necessarily a bad place to be. It's just that if you are plainly floating on one, it doesn't make much sense to insist that you are standing on solid ground."

  Although both science popularizers are getting more popular via the dispute, there are important issues at stake here. (Acronym Required previously wrote "Watson Uncut: Surprising? Boring? Racist?)

• Racism Persists: Psychology researchers at Yale University found that racism persists, despite US society's more tolerant overt attitudes. The psychologists studied nonverbal interactions between white and black characters on television shows, then surveyed study participants for their responses to the actors attitudes (complicated methodology). They concluded that nonverbal behavior towards minorities on television influence the attitudes of millions of viewers.(Dovidio et al Science(326) 1641 - 1642 DOI: 10.1126/science.1184231)

• Larry Summers Summons the Economy to Man-Up: Larry Summers is overly optimistic on jobs says a guest blogger on Naked Capitalism in the article titled: "Larry Summers Is Like a Guy Who Yells That the Sun Really DOES Revolve Around the Earth and that the Current Orbit is Just a Temporary Aberration . . . and That If We Just Wait a Little While, Everything Will Return to Normal". We last reviewed Summers's history of unfailing optimism in Mission Accomplished: Summers Ends Economy's Free Fall.

• Coaxing The GOP To Eat Arugula: Michael J. Petrilli questions the GOP vote getting strategy in Wall Street Journal. The Hoover Institute Fellow observes that "with the white working class shrinking and the educated 'creative class' growing", Republicans such as Sarah Palin, "whose entire brand is anti-intellectual", and GOPers who brand themselves for "working-class families", "Sam's Club Republicans", and "your co-worker not your boss", might be miscalculating. Petrilli's assessment of those who criticize "Eastern Elites"? "Playing the populism card looks like a strategy of subtraction rather than addition". Instead he suggests: "What is needed is a full-fledged effort to cultivate "Whole Foods Republicans" - independent minded voters who embrace a progressive lifestyle but not progressive politics."

• South Africa's Ex-Health Minister Dies: South Africa's Dr. Manto Tshabalala-Msimang died of complications from a liver transplant she had two years ago. As Health Minister during the Thabo Mbeki administration, she was known as "Dr. Beetroot" for her suggestions that lemon, beetroot and garlic would protect AIDS patients against the deadly effects of the disease in lieu of antiretrovirals. Mbeki's administration oversaw the fraught handling of the AIDS crisis in South Africa, and the former president went to great lengths to protect his comrade Tshabalala-Msimang, who attracted international attention for her positions.

  Even the Minister's liver transplant was controversial. The Times wrote in Manto: A Drunk and a Thief, of a Health Minister who was an alcoholic with liver cirrohsis -- a kleptomaniac on bad behavior while in hospital. One hospital employee told the paper that Tshabalala-Msimang's "antics were common knowledge among staff.'Everyone here thinks its hilarious that she is today a health minister in South Africa'". The story questioned whether favoritism and power enabled her to receive a liver transplant ahead of others.

• Sickle Cell Anemia Not the Only Genetic Mutation to Protect Against Malaria: We learned in our biology courses that the genetic mutation that causes sickle cell anemia is an adaptation to the malaria causing parasite Plasmodium falciparum. Recently, scientists at the Pasteur Institute in Paris have shown that a less common malaria causing strain, Plasmodium vivax, has also caused adaptive pressure on the genome. The scientists found a gene variant associated with an enzyme deficiency which seems to protect against infection by P. vivax in Southeast Asian populations. The variant causes a deficiency of the enzyme glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G6PD), associated with neonatal jaundice and hemolytic anemia after exposure to certain infections, foods, or medications. (Sakuntabhai et al Science 326, 1546-1549 (2009)DOI: 10.1126/science.1178849)

• Cookstove Technology: Indoor pollution causes 1.6 million deaths per year. Cookstoves contribute significantly to indoor pollution, especially in developing countries where morbidity and mortality from cookstoves disproportionately affects women and children. The New Yorker recently published an article about an Oregon company (one of many) working on cookstove technology for developing countries. An efficient cookstove will vent smoke out of the dwelling and will also burn fuel effectively, saving both lives and forests. But as the article shows, it's about more than technology -- there's many ways a cookstove can not work in developing countries.