October 14th, 2020The BCG vaccine might result in less severe COVID-19 and more rapid recovery, writes World Health Organisation Director General Dr Tedros Ghebreyesus. But it is 'very important' to adhere to WHO's recommendation that the BCG vaccine is used for...
October 7th, 2020Africa is known for its excellent safaris, with tourists flying from around the world, only to leave ‘with barely a hint’ of having been here, writes Professor Keymanthri Moodley of the Centre for Medical Ethics and Law at Stellenbosch...
An international analysis warns that in the race to develop medical interventions for the coronavirus, scientists have paid scant attention to gender when recruiting for clinical trials.
Reporting on the study, The Guardian, notes that...Research Issues
In response to a withering of trust in US health agencies, a group of Black physicians has created their won task force to independently vet regulators’ decisions about COVID-19 drugs and vaccines as well as government recommendations for curbing...
August 26th, 2020More than 1,500 clinical trials of new drugs and treatments for cancers, heart disease and other serious illnesses have been permanently closed down in the UK in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, a further 9,000 have been suspended and...
August 12th, 2020A widely criticised peer-reviewed study that measured the attractiveness of women with endometriosis has been retracted from the medical journal Fertility and Sterility. The Guardian reports that the study was first published in 2013 and has been...
July 29th, 2020There has for decades been a glaring lack of representation of black and brown skin in dermatology journals and textbooks, writes STAT News. The issue is now coming under closer scrutiny.
STAT News reports that when dermatologist Jenna Lester...
June 17th, 2020Some of the world’s leading medical journals are reviewing their processes after they were forced to retract major covid studies based on flawed data, reports The Guardian. None of the peer reviewers who examined a questionable study on the impact...
June 17th, 2020Most of the registered clinical trials of potential treatments for COVID-19 underway as of late March were designed in ways that will greatly limit their value in understanding potential treatments, according to a study from researchers at Johns...
June 10th, 2020A critical 500-person Cape Town trial, part of an international examination into whether the BCG vaccine protects against COVID-19, is under pressure from demands from a group of activists.
Bhekisisa reports that aCape Town scientists are...
May 13th, 2020
The nuance of a study showing a link between vegetarianism and poor mental health got lost as the study was shared widely online, reports Business Insider.
Previous research shows an association between vegetarianism and a higher risk of...
May 6th, 2020
The COVID-19 pandemic has seen "droves of research papers rushed to pre-print servers, essentially outsourcing peer review to practising physicians and journalists", write ethicists at Carnegie Mellon and McGill universities.
The global outbreak...
Results from the first studies designed to determine how widely the coronavirus has spread in communities have started to trickle in, drawing immense attention. Stat News reports that experts are already raising concerns about the validity of some...
April 22nd, 2020
Claims that the racial disparities to be seen in US pandemic data evidence of are evidence of systemic racism rests on a false presumption, writes Coleman Hughes on Quillette.
There is now a racial justice angle on the coronavirus pandemic,...
April 22nd, 2020
Most day-to-day diseases don’t seem to care what sex you are: man or woman, those coughs, colds and stomach bugs latch on regardless. But, says a report in The Daily Telegraph, there’s clear evidence that COVID-19 is different. Across the...
April 15th, 2020
The unwillingness of the authors of a recent study in Nature Medicine, to minimise moral or socio-political conclusions — in this case between Chinese wet markets and the emergence of COVID-19 — is a disheartening failing in the liberal Western...
