A funny NYT editorial about "sound medical judgment"
Mort Zuckerman
scientifi...@ostp.gov, pkru...@princeton.edu,
Stanle...@fiu.edu, emcsw...@niaid.nih.gov, afa...@niaid.nih.gov,
Spin...@yahoogroups.com, kshe...@calea.org, fit...@gmail.com,
patrick.f...@usdoj.gov, model...@sbcglobal.net,
jdr...@nejm.org, let...@courant.com, Jgerb...@cdc.gov,
michae...@po.state.ct.us, con...@po.state.ct.us, executive-
edi...@nytimes.com, managin...@nytimes.com, news-
ti...@nytimes.com, biz...@nytimes.com, for...@nytimes.com,
nati...@nytimes.com, dv...@cdc.gov, brigidc...@optonline.net,
tr...@hotmail.com, illino...@aol.com, jle...@courant.com,
tinaj...@yahoo.com, jhorn...@fff.org, thomas...@usdoj.gov,
thoma...@po.state.ct.us, kur...@washpost.com,
georg...@washpost.com, p...@allegorypress.com,
commissi...@po.state.ct.us, brans...@comcast.net,
vts...@comcast.net, o...@po.state.ct.us, freet...@charter.net,
scott....@po.state.ct.us, govern...@po.state.ct.us,
attorney...@po.state.ct.us, randall...@usdoj.gov,
Robert....@yale.edu, edi...@greenwich-post.com,
harol...@yale.edu, sedm...@nswbc.org, rrmcg...@aol.com,
fr...@nytimes.com, dpr...@stmartin.edu
Cc: fra...@ucia.gov, dr-ahma...@president.ir,
eugener...@washpost.com, afa...@niaid.nih.gov,
bmi...@newstimes.com, tr...@hotmail.com, rast...@aol.com,
billc...@gmail.com, amcg...@rms-law.com, rjmu...@aol.com,
paulcrai...@yahoo.com, sidney_b...@yahoo.com,
criminal...@usdoj.gov, karla.d...@usdoj.gov,
christophe...@usdoj.gov, richar...@yale.edu,
harol...@yale.edu, james.p...@yale.edu, inq...@aldf.com,
ly...@idsociety.org, meganm...@theatlantic.com
Subject: A funny NYT editorial about "sound medical judgment"
Date: Dec 26, 2009 7:52 AM
EDITORIAL BELOW
==========================
Isn't it strange for the NYTimes to
be writing an editorial about the
"bitch that got over the NYT's wall,"
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060665/quotes
when it comes to sound medical
judgment, about "sound medical judgment?"
http://www.actionlyme.org/RICOCHRON.htm
http://www.actionlyme.org/BRAIN_PERMANENT.htm
All of IDSA's own data says Lyme is
a permanent infection of the brain
and Relapsing Fever, *and* IDSA said we
needed a failed HIV/tuberculosis vaccine for
this spirochetal infection that
http://www.actionlyme.org/Pam3Cys_Version15.htm
"never becomes a disease." The NYTimes
never interviewed the CT Attorney General
about this, IDSA's own data that said Lyme
was permanent, and also that IDSA never
agreed with Steere's new standard:
http://www.actionlyme.org/HOW_RICO_WILL_BE_CHARGED.htm
(search for Gary Wormser^^)
Nor did the NYTimes ever mention that
the CDC clearly *LIED* to the public about
whether or not a high-cut-off Lyme arthritis
ELISA was necessary to have a "case" of Lyme?
http://www.actionlyme.org/index.htm
http://www.actionlyme.org/STEERE_IN_EUROPE.htm
Now the NYTimes is all high-and-mighty over
medical ethics and "ideology over sound
medical judgment." This is a first for them.
I wonder what moved them to pretend to take
a position on ideology and emotions over facts.
They talk about HIV.
You know, the thing with the failed LYMErix
vaccine as a failed HIV vaccine, and over which
Anthony Fauci had to admit he was a complete idiot.
These people are too much.
They're as bad as the CDC.
Oh, what am I saying?
NYTimes Science Tuesday writer, Lawrence
Altman, is a CDC officer.
Kathleen M. Dickson
=====================
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/26/opinion/26sat3.html
Editorial
Righting a Wrong, Much Too Late
Published: December 25, 2009
Public health advocates held an understandably muted celebration when
President Obama signed a bill repealing a 21-year-old ban on federal
financing for programs that supply clean needles to drug addicts.
The bill brought an end to a long and bitter struggle between the
public health establishment — which knew from the beginning that the
ban would cost lives — and ideologues in Congress who had closed their
eyes to studies showing that making clean needles available to addicts
slowed the rate of infection from H.I.V., the virus that causes AIDS,
without increasing drug use.
But the shift in policy comes too late for the tens of thousands of
Americans — drug addicts and their spouses, lovers and unborn children
— who have died from AIDS and AIDS-related diseases. Many of these
people would not have become infected had Congress followed sound
medical advice and embraced the use of clean needles.
Congress voted to withhold federal money in 1988, at the very height
of the AIDS epidemic. Back then, life in AIDS epicenters like New York
and San Francisco had begun to resemble one long funeral, made all the
more tragic by the fact that most of the dead were young people who
should have had many more years to live.
Fortunately, not all state and local governments followed the federal
lead. In New York, for example, AIDS researchers who pioneered needle
exchange programs on the Lower East Side and elsewhere managed over
several years to cut the infection rates among addicts by about 80
percent by supplying them with clean syringes and enrolling them in
drug treatment programs. But even results like these failed to move
Congress in a direction that would have better protected public
safety.
The doctors and outreach workers who labored in the early struggle
against AIDS breathed a sigh of relief when President Obama announced
his support for ending the ban. But earlier this year, when bills were
introduced to lift it, some lawmakers tried to covertly reinstate the
ban through deviously worded riders.
It’s good to see that Congress has finally come to its senses. But
elected officials on both sides of the aisle will need to show
considerably more courage the next time shortsighted lawmakers try to
substitute political ideology for sound medical judgment.
"[Real] scientists are *fiercely* independent. That's the good
news."-- NIH's Top Fool, Anthony Fauci