ITT: The Case Against Jenny McCarthy As A Scientist

[pH]

Joys of the modern world: Theres a special name, a pill, and an operation for everything.

Stay the fuck away from my pills.  I need those for professional reasons.

The special little blue pills?

Nope.  The yellow ones.  They make me the kind-hearted, personable old man that I am.

Ooooh, those pills. I can see how effective they are. I'm impressed by modern medicine in that sense.

Oh, yeah.  I was a real dick before.

TGRR,
Knows that most things are relative.

Come to think of it, is there anything that isnt relative?

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Joys of the modern world: Theres a special name, a pill, and an operation for everything.

Stay the fuck away from my pills.  I need those for professional reasons.

The special little blue pills?

Nope.  The yellow ones.  They make me the kind-hearted, personable old man that I am.

Ooooh, those pills. I can see how effective they are. I'm impressed by modern medicine in that sense.

Oh, yeah.  I was a real dick before.

TGRR,
Knows that most things are relative.

Come to think of it, is there anything that isnt relative?

Yes.  Holiness^TM.  You is or you isn't.

[Jenne]

We might have advancing medical technologies, but if we don't have advancing wisdom to go along with it then we'll have yet more fads where dubious diagnoses and dubious treatments will go on for years until someone pulls the plug, slaps people awake and says 'Knock it off!' Unfortunately, they usually won't do this until something dumb happens (cf: over prescription of anti-biotics and resistant infections).

I hope that someone does indeed find out more about these various disorders and discovers ways to treat them responsibly.

I think you hit at the crux of it.  It's not that the diseases, or the symptoms, or whatever CAUSED the patient to seek a diagnosis in the first place doesn't EXIST...it's more like now that what used to be arcane information is now in the hands of many, it's more likely to be overgeneralized and abused.  Like anything in the hands of the masses, as well as those of lazy or otherwise unknowing/unscrupulous physicians.

The fact that the medical community is broadening the umbrella for autism, meaning the spectrum widens, should not mean that it should be used indiscriminately.  And if you ask doctors like my husband, who makes these diagnoses every damned day, he'll tell you that there's a VERY specific set of criteria used to do this.  However, again, that doesn't mean it won't be abused.

What happened in the 19th and 20th century with lobotomies, etc. I see as misapplied emerging knowledge.  It still happens, to a large extent, as new Rx are discovered and as Rog says, you say "Doc, I can't sleep/eat/drink/fuck" and he says, "PILLS HERE!"  But that doesn't mean the science behind it is necessarily at fault, it's just that the culture is screaming for an answeranswerfixitnowanswerpleasegodmakeitSTOP! and the doctor complies (or doesn't, and the patient goes on to another who DOES).

I know they are working on it in the medical community--they have "continuing medical education" sections/workshops they are required to take, but it has to be taught to them starting in medical school first, I think.  And changing that particular rhetoric is a ponderous process.  Look how long it took the fuckers to change to electronic medical records--I think they are the last and largest American industry to do so.

[Mangrove]

Jenne,

Thank you for the post. In the back of my mind as I was typing I was thinking "Jenne's husband is a doctor and if I don't phrase this right, she will kick my ass!" 

Yes, the typical patient goes to their doctor and says 'FIX ME NOW'. And it's true, a doctor with real knowledge, ethics and the balls to use both may be faced with ticking patients off and having them leave thinking they aren't any good.

Dr: Well Mrs Jones, little Jimmy is not autistic
MJ: Yes he is! I did an online survey!
Dr: No. No he is not. He has none of the medically established symptoms.
MJ: But he won't do his homework!
Dr: HE IS NOT SICK MORON, HE'S JUST TIRED OF LISTENING TO YOU! Come to think of it...so am I!

Medicine used to be arcane and now it's in the public domain and there's advantages and disadvantages to both situations. Keeping it arcane means keeping people in the dark and running the risk of it being a control mechanism (ie: like most theology) or you have 'a little learning is a dangerous thing' syndrome in which people latch onto little scraps of information and think that makes them 'experts'.

The 'dont vaccinate your kids movement' is just horrifying. Before I moved to the US there was a documentary on tv about the MMR jab = Autism guy and even then, they said that his research was sketchy and he was getting money from Autism advocacy groups. Recently I read a new report which said something to the effect of "We knew his research was bad....what we didn't realize is that he also MADE SHIT UP!". So, it turns out that the MMR = Autism thing was based on a faulty, fraudulent study that comprised of eight people. Eight! EIGHT!

The media deserve a huge amount blame because they fuel this problem. Every few weeks or so online, on tv or in the press there will be a headline that reads 'Scientists have discovered....' The headlines will nearly always be very shocking or provocative but the stories are almost always preliminary studies. We rarely ever hear about any follow up, nor is their anything like 'peer review'. You get 'lowest denominator' type reportage which implants unverified data into the public mind and boom, that becomes 'this has been proven'.

Way too much noise, not enough signal. There's undoubtedly some really good, important research being done but if it isn't something that can be included in a supermarket checkout magazine, it's unlikely we'll get to hear about it unless we go hunting for it on purpose.

[Side rant: Dear scientists. Please STOP doing research on smoking. It's well established that it's a really bad, unhealthy habit. We know. Move on. I don't need to hear about nicotine levels in people's toe nail clippings. I also don't need to know that passive smoke is bad for pregnant women. We already covered that 'don't smoke & gestate' thing and even took the added precaution of printing it on the fucking packets so KNOCK IT THE FUCK OFF. SMOKING IS DANGEROUS. I KNOW!!!]

You see, the above is exactly the kind of 25 second bullshit that gets reported on my local news. The studies that were conducted to figure out that pregnant women shouldn't be around tobacco smoke probably cost millions of dollars. How about spending that money on something we need to actually learn more about?  Start with any disease you don't have a cure for.

Incidentally, while we've certainly seen progress in many diseases, there's been a shortage of outright eradication. I was informed that there hasn't been anything like a 'cure' since they took care of Polio & Smallpox some 50 odd years ago. So, come on scientists - buckle down and cure sicknesses like you used to back in the day 

[Luna]

Incidentally, while we've certainly seen progress in many diseases, there's been a shortage of outright eradication. I was informed that there hasn't been anything like a 'cure' since they took care of Polio & Smallpox some 50 odd years ago. So, come on scientists - buckle down and cure sicknesses like you used to back in the day 

There's no profit in a cure.

See, if you can keep people sick and coming back for the pillz that keep whatever it is from killing them, you have a captive audience for life.

I hate people.

[Jenne]

The whole "its the money, stupid" is a really tough one at this point with bioengineering firms and the chemical engineering guys who work for Merck et al.  I'm sure LMNO can actually answer this particular part of it, but I do know people out here in San Diego (which actually has one of the leading biochemical engineering industries in the country, IIRC) who work in that sector of the medical field.  And they are VERY MUCH tied to working on cures--but some parts of their research gets tied up in not only private funding but also STATE and FEDERAL regulations (I'm talking stem cell research, fetal research in general, etc.).

According to the drug companies, they HAVE been working on cures for AIDS, etc., and their Rx work comes out of those endeavors.  And they also say they make the Rx profits to put BACK into cures.  *shrug*  I haven't had one of those conversations with them for years, so I'm not sure where they are on the picture anymore.  I do know their lobbyists keep their pimp hand STRONG and bitchslap Congress an awful lot...when it comes to their pocketbooks.  But I'm not sure I know enough nitty gritty to weigh in any further.

[Thurnez Isa]

Incidentally, while we've certainly seen progress in many diseases, there's been a shortage of outright eradication. I was informed that there hasn't been anything like a 'cure' since they took care of Polio & Smallpox some 50 odd years ago. So, come on scientists - buckle down and cure sicknesses like you used to back in the day 

There's no profit in a cure.

See, if you can keep people sick and coming back for the pillz that keep whatever it is from killing them, you have a captive audience for life.

I hate people.

of course there is profit. There's an invested interest in being the first on the market. Even if you don't accept private enterprise, a lot of resource is conducted overseas or out east with public money. Not to mention a lot of ambitious medical researchers who would just love to get the Nobel prize for what ever.
Also smallpox is making a comeback due to people not vaccinating their kids.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Also smallpox is making a comeback due to people not vaccinating their kids.

No, it isn't.  Smallpox is one of the two diseases that we have eradicated.

I think you mean measles, mumps, and polio.

[Mangrove]

Incidentally, while we've certainly seen progress in many diseases, there's been a shortage of outright eradication. I was informed that there hasn't been anything like a 'cure' since they took care of Polio & Smallpox some 50 odd years ago. So, come on scientists - buckle down and cure sicknesses like you used to back in the day 

There's no profit in a cure.

See, if you can keep people sick and coming back for the pillz that keep whatever it is from killing them, you have a captive audience for life.

I hate people.

This is the 'disease maintenance industry' vs 'healthcare industry' argument.

Not sure which side I fall on...think it depends on the day!

[Thurnez Isa]

Also smallpox is making a comeback due to people not vaccinating their kids.

No, it isn't.  Smallpox is one of the two diseases that we have eradicated.

I think you mean measles, mumps, and polio.

yes, sorry

[Requia ☣]

Also smallpox is making a comeback due to people not vaccinating their kids.

No, it isn't.  Smallpox is one of the two diseases that we have eradicated.

I think you mean measles, mumps, and polio.

What's the other one?

[Thurnez Isa]

Rinderpest

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Rinderpest

Which affects only cows and people from Manitoba.

[pH]

I hate the media, they manage to 'get the story', then they prance around with their little tidbit, sway the opinions of idiots, and then suddenly it causes more problems, which the media then reports on, etc.

There is a lot of research going on in the background that we don't know about for assorted reasons that may or may not be incredibly good, but fixing people isn't as profitable as maintaining them. For example, the first thing that comes to mind is HIV. We already have a general idea of how to cure HIV, and there are some experimental vaccinations for it. However, consider the industry that sprung up around HIV and AIDS: shirts, bracelets, charity events, fundraisers, websites, organizations, and then add on to that the profits from treatments to slow it down, regular guaranteed hospital visits, all of it has been turned into a profitable industry. The problem is figuring out 1. where all that money actually goes, and 2. if the researchers are seriously working at a cure and its just tricky, or if they're rolling in cash.

Autism is just one more little profitable industry, but its done in such a way that the people who actually have autism may not get help, because the people who don't may screw up research, or make effective medicine look ineffective because they have nothing to fix.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

I hate the media,

And I get mad when the sun rises!

GRRRRR!