- Most new drugs do not cover the cost of their development. So, the pharmaceutical industry needs a few blockbusters (with annual revenues of $1 billion or more) in order to survive. HT: Tyler
- Railroad deregulation occurred under Carter, not under Trump and accidents and derailments plunged thereafter.
- Humans share 98.8 percent of their DNA with bonobos and chimpanzees.
- Is Biden about to surrender authority over US pandemic policy to the WHO?
- Prof. Marty Makary: Ten myths about Covid that were propagated by the “experts.”
- How different federal agencies view the origin of Covid.
- Yglesias on the lab leak theory.
Category: COVID-19 and Public Health
Tuesday Links
- Lancet study: Covid natural immunity is at least as protective as two doses of mRNA vaccines.
- Nearly all contemporary countries were colonized at some point in their history by a foreign power; yet most citizens have a favorable attitudes toward their country’s former colonizer. HT: Tyler
- Losing fitness: Scientists have found that it is around the three-week mark [of no exercise] that people experience the biggest changes in their ability to get through a workout. (NYT)
- North Carolina’s medical system would have had an additional 55 hospitals, including 24 in vulnerable rural areas, were it not for the state’s certificate-of-need regulations. (WSJ)
- Cocaine Bear scene: what are the effects of swallowing a tablespoon of cocaine?
Monday Links
- After the government took steps to raise the price and restrict the supply, opioid consumption and overdoses went up. Casey Mulligan explains why.
- Sally Satel on “Social Justice Therapy.”
- Health care worker shortages: Half of the states, including all in New England and most in the Midwest, have health care employment lower than three years ago.
- Who does AARP really represent? It backed the IRA bill – taking $280 billion away from Medicare and spending the money on heath insurance subsidies for the well-to-do and special interest green energy projects.
- U.S. Energy Dept: the coronavirus most likely came from a lab leak.
Why Are Hospitals Hurting Financially?
You would think with Covid driving so many people to the emergency rooms, hospitals would be in great financial shape. Yet in 2022 hospitals experienced the worst financial performance in memory. Jeff Goldsmith writes: