Dengue

Random Thoughts (28/3/18) by Muhammad Amir Ayub

1) Thinking of deleting Facebook? Here's some accounts of people managing a life less dominated by it. And if you really want to see how creepy Facebook is (I'm sure Google is just the same), go ahead and download how much it knows about you.

You’ll see a detailed history of chats, phone numbers (wonder how it managed to get those because we don’t remember sharing ours) and much more – it’s like having your very own FB page, but offline.

2) Medical schools should definitely prioritize nutrition and lifestyle education. Preventive medicine is a key tenet in achieving health. The only problem is that nutrition and exercise science does not have a robust research culture as clinical medicine. Low fat or no to low fat (I believe personally that intentional low fat causes more harm)? How much should we reduce salt (everyone agrees that we take too much sodium in general)? Are we facilitating a more active lifestyle? Cardio vs strength (both are good)? The dietary cholesterol debate (no correlation)? Pharma companies won't sponsor such studies, but they must be done nonetheless as they are intuitively effective and cost-saving. We have so many questions that need to be answered. And just in time, my friend shared this, which really encapsulates the problem with evidence-based health promotion.

This movie displays all the great characteristics of really bad thinking. Confusing causation with correlation in clinical trials? Check. Cherry picking data to support your view while ignoring data to the contrary (i.e., “confirmation bias)? Check. Relying on “experts” who are selling books and seminars but have nothing to do with real science, as evidenced by their fundamental misunderstand of basic physiology (carbs can’t make you fat? diabetes is caused by chicken consumption?) –> Chickity check.

3) People in Vietnam are publishing critical research on severe dengue, characterizing features (including serial echocardiography) that predict the risk of shock and pulmonary edema among such patients. How about us?

4) After so long not playing on the competitive Street Fighter 5 scene, Infiltration has been totally dominating out of nowhere.

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