#(160619-)
1 Human behavior not limited to human behavior, 2 Non Communicable Disease, 3 Medical Myth, 4 Zika, 5 Health Diplomacy, 6 Autism, 7 Treatment Norms, 8 Law and Death, 9 Book Review, 10 Tuskagee, 11 Introduction
1. Predicting Disease Outbreaks Using Environmental Changes. A model that predicts outbreaks of zoonotic diseases – those originating in livestock or wildlife such as Ebola and Zika – based on changes in climate, population growth and land use has been developed. The intent of the Parademic Listicles is to focus on how humans behave in relation to biosyndemics. However human behavior itself blurs with technology, physiology, animals, environment. The ability to predict an outbreak is an example. First off prediction is not an absolute but a probability. Think of a weather report, which can be wildly wrong with a forecast of the next 24 hours, and increasingly wrong the further out it time. Consider though the influences of prediction, where people will be lulled into a false security by something that will not happen, panic by a high chance something will happen, rejection of the whole thing when predictions do not come through, trying to ease uncertainty by finding alternative or newer predictive means, exploiting the inaccuracies or accuracies. To restate a phrase (Key Idea 4), human behavior in the biosyndemic context takes place in the context of everything else, more than human behavior, more that biosyndemic, more than the synergy of the two. Animal to Human Transmission of Ebola Virus Appears Tied to Increasing Human Population Density in Forested Regions which is tied to population increase, habitat decrease, poverty, policy, global and micro economics, food and water sources, life’s basic imperative to survive, technology, perception, fuel needs, animal behavior, religion, social strife, media, transportation........ FLIRT-ing with Zika: A Web Application to Predict the Movement of Infected Travelers Validated Against the Current Zika Virus Epidemic. Dogs as Plague Sentinels and Vectors.
1.1. Trends in News Media Coverage of Mental Illness in the United States: 1995–2014 in the context of Florida Nightclub Attack Just the Latest US Mass Shooting, Gunman Omar Mateen Described as Belligerent, Racist and 'Toxic'. With common behavioral responses to the incident. Orlando Blood Donation Centers Overwhelmed, OneBlood, a blood donation center in Orlando, is so overwhelmed with donors that it has asked people to stop coming today. Donor Surge: The Challenge of Managing Blood Donations During Disaster. Gay Men Outraged over Continued Ban on Blood Donation. This along with calls to stop immigration (similar to same calls during Ebola), conspiracy theory, comboundings, anti-LGBT and Muslim rhetoric (which may cause some cognitive dissonance), social commentary humor lain (Concerned NRA Official Rushes out to Purchase Congressman Following Mass Shooting, At Times like This, We Need to Pull Ourselves Up, Hold Our Loved Ones Close, Block Any Legislation That Would Prevent Suspected Terrorists from Buying Guns, and Say a Prayer for the Victims), spontaneous memorials [Photo], continued debate about militarized police, claims of precognition, gun control, security vs human rights violations, blurring of social categories, and other behaviors that are found in parademics. After the Orlando Shooting, Pundits on Both Sides Read the Same Tired Lines from Their Scripts. Queer Muslims Exist – and We Are in Mourning Too. Who Gets to Be Angry.
1.2. The over zealous and misapplication of HIPAA is a potential area that could interfere with biodisaster operations. What Would Have Happened if Obama Waived HIPAA in Orlando – it is a common practice with online article to change the title and content after the initial publication and more information becomes available, theoriginal title was Why Obama Had to Waive HIPAA in Orlando. It is perhaps especially poignant that, in the aftermath of the deadliest shooting to date on American soil, at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, the White House applied a unique waiver to HIPAA. In declaring the situation in Orlando a national emergency, President Barack Obama and Secretary of Health and Human Services Sylvia Mathews Burwell made it easier for family and friends to gain quicker access to information -- the right move in such a circumstance. HIPAA Privacy Regulations Didn’t Need to Be Waived After Orlando. Here’s Why They Were Anyway, Nobody Waived the HIPAA Privacy Law in Orlando After All.
2. Malnutrition and Obesity Coexist in Many Countries, Too Fat, Too Thin: Report Finds Malnutrition Fuels Disease Worldwide. Have been debating for years if Lifestyle Diseases, Noncommunicable Diseases are a form of biosyndemic. Though people suffer, the problem is global, and behavior based (making it parademic). My conclusion is that these self inflicted diseases do not impact the biosphere, but do exacerbate biodisasters on humans, and the behaviors that lead to lifestyle diseases can be correlated (which does not prove cause) to behaviors that are related to biodisasters. In other words I am still not sure that one of the biggest causes of death in developed countries (which also create the most pollutants) is a biosyndemic, but does influence behavior related to biodisaster. What’s a Healthier Choice: a Big Mac or a Chipotle Burrito.
3. ∩ Origin of a Myth: The Second Trauma Cure for Amnesia. Why people still believe you need a second 'conk' to remember things. A professor explains how scientists' limited and faulty understanding of the brain hundreds of years ago gave birth to the erroneous idea that amnesia induced by a blow to the head can be cured by a second 'conk'. In parademic myth is a constant. This includes medical myths based on the state of knowledge of the time and confidence in that knowledge, and myths of the general public based on oral tradition – which in most cases are only 120 years at most – lack of confidence as the state of knowledge continues to evolve, and misinterpretation/misrepresentation of information. The myths become conflicting narratives interfering with medical policy (which is not necessarily medical) response to biosyndemic.
↕4. #Document. Zika: CDC Draft Interim Response Plan. The purpose of this document is to describe the CDC response plan for the 1st locally acquired cases of Zika virus infection in the continental US and Hawaii. As is appropriate this focuses largely on the clinical and medical response, which includes the social dimensions of education and communication, as part of the parademic issues that could interfere with the plan. It is still unclear what level of government and organizations are/is responsible for the coordination of social aspects – food distribution, medical access, security, rumor, resistence to civil authority, hoarding, stigmatization, rioting, social distancing, transportation, and other division of emergency capabilities that will be needed, to identify cases, contain and control.
4.1. Summer Camps Say They're Not Sweating over Zika Risk. Mosquitoes are part of the summer camp experience, and camp directors say they'd be hard pressed to deploy CDC guidelines for avoiding Zika virus. But it may not be an issue this summer. ¶ As of June 8, all 691 recorded cases in the country have been linked to international travel or sexual transmission. What's more, the most serious of Zika's known side effects — abnormally small heads, or microcephaly, in infants — only appears to affect babies whose mothers became infected while pregnant. Agree that this is unlikely to be a major problem in the US this year, though pregnant women will be the most vulnerable and should not plan on going to summer camp, or getting pregnant at summer camp in area identified with mosquitoes that carry Zika. Will probably have the normal incremental growth and spread of biodisasters, Mapping Zika: From a Monkey in Uganda to a Growing Global Concern. CDC: 6 Pregnancies in Zika Infected Women Resulted in Birth Defects 160522-4.2.1↓. Zika Virus Spreading Rapidly Across Puerto Rico, Number of Zika Positive Puerto Ricans Surprises Health Officials, is a reminder that once a biodisaster accelerates it can grow very fast, same as Death Toll Passes 1,550 as Ebola Outbreak Accelerates, though in this case it is not a death toll, but deformed babies who will need extra care however long their life span turns out to be.
4.2. Zika Virus – Related News Coverage and Online Behavior, United States, Guatemala, and Brazil. To assess relationships between news coverage, social media mentions, and online search behavior regarding Zika virus, we studied data available for January 1-February 29, 2016.
4.3. Is the Risk of Catching Zika Greater in Poor Neighborhoods. A statement of advice for visitors to the Olympics, from WHO, initially said to avoid impoverished areas to reduce the risk of Zika. Does research back it up. ¶ Humans are the main long distance transmitters of dengue or Zika or chikungunya, in comparison to mosquitoes. That's because mosquitoes catch Zika from biting an already infected human. So an infected person could travel to any part of the city, then infect a mosquito in a different part of town, rich or poor. And even though researchers and health officials often draw a link between poverty and the spread of mosquito borne viruses, there aren't many studies to back up the claim. It likely depends on the specific city and the specific disease. There are many assumptions that are credible, but not actually tested. Assumptions are not the problem, not knowing they are an assumption is.
4.4. Zika Risk in U.S. States: Widespread or Limited. The White House Hijacks a Key CDC Message to Attack Republicans; Public Health Officials and Reporters Mostly Go Along. The International Business Times emailed conducted a telephone interview withus about “how public health officials juggle the need to educate the public and convey a sense of urgency about the Zika virus without sending people into unnecessary panic”. ¶ Instead of focusing on education/urgency versus panic, we focused on our judgment that public health messaging about Zika risk in the continental U.S. had become much more alarmist starting around the beginning of April. Instead of preparing Americans to take limited domestic Zika outbreaks in stride, the message started preparing Americans to expect epidemic level domestic Zika outbreaks; to see even small limited domestic Zika outbreaks as widespread and catastrophic; and to blame them on Republicans for failing to pass Zika funding. ¶ Zika Virus in the US: How the Outbreak Became a Public Relations Mess made little use of the interview, ignoring the main point about the hijacked message. The article’s main point was how hard it is for public health officials to communicate nuance to a frightened population. It wrongly attributed to us the view that there was a “media frenzy” to cover Zika that made “crucial nuances disappear”. This excerpt is highly edited from the original. Well worth the time to review the whole post. What I find interesting is that this is one of the rare times where a source has had opportunity to rebut a reporter outside of letters to the editor, and even rarer and hard to find retractions. Usually it is the reporter “protecting their sources”, which is admirable, but unfortunately means that the source cannot be verified to exist and to have said what was reported. We see the same when officials claim FOUO or Classified, giving the impression that they are hiding something, or plagiarized, which fuels conspiracy theories. In the reporter’s defense her topic of interest was clearly stated and not what was provided, though that indicates that the reporter has an a priori narrative already developed and the source was used to sharpen what agreed with the narrative, level what did not support the narrative, and the narrative of the topic being the template that was assimilated too (SLA, the process of creating a narrative).
A. Zika has proven to be an excellent vehicle to demonstrate the blog’s own SLA that biosyndemics are literally a synthesis of multiple biodisasters, and that parademic is more about social perception than an actual disaster. Readers have probably noticed the bouncing around to multiple topics related to Zika. Though this is the complexity of complication whenever one delves into social aspects, this is also given as a reason to dismiss parademic as being unfocused, though my preference is a wide angle shot to give larger context. So far with Zika (and this is not a complete list) we have had articles related to corruption, elites exploiting the impoverished, deforestation, pesticides, GMO mosquitoes, conspiracy, abortion, the Catholic church, the Olympics (protesting it being it being held in Rio, which I believe happens with every Olympic venue*), poverty, health issues related to water, public health, the risks of mass gathering, artificial enhancements of athletes, pregnancy risks, deformed children and their long term health care, plight of single mothers saddled with multiple and handicapped children, risk communications, immigration, terrorism, elections. As one can imagine this plays hell with trying to list keywords. Collectively the pattern have been to use Zika as a focus for various agendas and causes, in other words a parademic, which like biosyndemic is not a single biodisaster, but that fact that all social dimensions are an aspect of the whole of society. Some may recognize the Whole of Society as a buzz term associated with global health, A “Whole of Society” Approach Can Overcome Global Health Challenges, Beyond Pandemics: A Whole of Society Approach to Disaster Preparedness. Studies Find 'Super Bacteria' in Rio's Olympic Venues, Top Beaches, Rio De Janeiro Governor Declares State of Financial Emergency Ahead of Olympics.
Perception trumps reality. – Truism [Cartoon]
* A Not So Brief History of Politics and the Olympics, Politics and the Olympics, Politics and its Affect on the Olympics, The Olympic Games as a Political Tool: Case Study Beijing 2008, London Olympics: Enhancing Disease Surveillance and Response, Race, How Race Recreated Jesse Owens' Victory at the 1936 Olympics in Nazi Germany. Real History vs. Reel History. This is a good place to emphasize again that parademic is based on data about behavior, spin, perception, interpretation, public face, beliefs, point of view, fads..... In short it is not based on real, consistent, verifiable, objective, fact. People behave as they expect and want reality to be, not the totality of what is real. This creates a real problem as people assume that oftlinethey are dealing in fact, which is rarely the case, and even if they are it is only part of reality, seeing through a glass darkly. From Zika to Antibiotic Resistant Superbugs: Welcome to the New Age of Contagions. Today’s deadly new pathogens aren’t just a scientific challenge, they’re a political one.
For those who have not been reading the weekly listicles, or are simply interested in getting a feel of the parademic scope of Zika, the curator can assemble the material related to the topic. Being new to the technical aspects of blogging I have not figured out how to receive e-mails, but one can make a request via the comments either as a general request or by citing the date at the top of each entry and the topic stub number. This assemblage of the stubs will not be with a full analysis. Deep analysis of the background, trends, emerging patterns, influencing topics, takes time and probably not finished until after Zika becomes mundane or disappears. By the way this simple (but long) assemblage of stubs product will predate Zika as health concerns were being expressed about Brazil and the Olympics well before the cluster of microcyphalic babies was noticed. Also I can point out that this is an advantage of the parademic listicle database, or a search engine. Search engines don’t do well with combinations of terms related to the different forms of “social” and “biodisasters”, not to mention that their algorithms can make it difficult to find relevant material.
5. This is the type of health diplomacy (Defining Health Diplomacy: Changing Demands in the Era of Globalization), which began during Ebola (140914-1.34, 141012-E.7.5, 141019-E.44.1↓), that is perhaps more significant than direct flight between the US and Cuba (These 5 American Cities Will Offer Direct Flights to Cuba), or opening of the US Embassy (150816-C.4↓). US Announces Health Collaboration with Cuba; Will Coordinate on Diseases, R&D. An agreement between the US and Cuba calls for "coordination across abroad spectrum of public health issues, including global health security, communicable and noncommunicable diseases, research and development, and information technology", according to the US Department of Health and Human Services.
6. A Single Species of Gut Bacteria Can Reverse Autism Related Social Behavior in Mice. The absence of a one specific species of gut bacteria causes social deficits in mice. By adding this bacteria species back to the guts of affected mice, the researchers were able to reverse some of their behavioral deficits, which are reminiscent of symptoms of autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) in humans. This observation that there is an apparent correlation of autism and microbes in the gut has been around for years, Differences Between the Gut Microflora of Children with Autistic Spectrum Disorders and That of Healthy Children (2005). Unfortunately this is a wicked problem with other factors involves (genetics, communication disorders, mental health problems that are classed as ASD but are not, uncertainty what autism is) and lead to wild statements of cures by adding microbes, removing microbes (with antibioitcs and bleach Autism: Potentially Lethal Bleach 'Cure' Feared to Have Spread to Britain), that have fueled medical scams and “natural” cures as being proof of quick/quack cures (and quick riches) Dietary Probiotics Modulate Brain Function, Study Proves. This type of exploitation of incomplete research unfortunately detracts from legitimate studies, slowing down the search to understand autism and potentially a cure.
7. Around The World, When It Comes To Health Advice Mom Knows Best. In the U.S., VapoRub goes on a sick child's chest. In Russia, it might go on the soles of the feet. Cultural norms have a big effect on how we diagnose and treat illnesses, especially at home. A Double Blind Efficacy Trial of Placebos, Extra Strength Placebos and Generic Placebos.
7.1. In today’s world much of this information is shared in the modern form of word of mouth, and FOAF via social media. Ya Burnt. 12 Year Old Marco Arturo Responds to Attacks by Antivaccine Bloggers, A Particularly Odious Antivaccine “Warrior” Doubles down on Her Attacks on a 12 Year Old Boy Who Made a Provaccine Video, Antivaccine Activists Gleefully Attack and Dox a 12 Year Old Boy Who Made a Provaccine Video, How to Destroy an Adult. Combining Childhood Vaccines at One Visit Is Not Safe. Wrong, Wrong, Wrong. For those interested in the Respectful Insolence blog curator, he is David H. Gorski, MD, PhD - Managing Editor of Science Based Medicine, How Low Antivaccine “Warriors” Will go: Of Facebook Harassment Reporting Algorithm Abuse and Publicly Attacking a 12 Year Old Boy. Normally the parademic blog tries to limit ad hominem attacks and identities when it appears the individual prefers to be circumspect. This case however Dr. Gorski appears to have long and major experience with being attacked. This possibility of being personally attacked myself is yet another reason why it took so long after I had sufficient research about parademic patterns to start a public blog. Now I am afraid that I will never deserve any scorn.
8. 5 Laws about Corpses That May Spook You. Death touches everyone at some stage during their lives, and usually more than once. It also triggers certain laws around what happens to the body after death – and some glaring omissions. Have touched on the issues of mass fatalities and mass grieving before, most of which society is not prepared for logistically, operationally, legally, planning and administratively.
9. The Disease Detective Who Speaks the Truth About Epidemics. In the wake of Ebola and the Zika outbreak, a new book maps out the best, smartest ways to combat man’s greatest killers. The Next Pandemic: On the Front Lines Against Humankind’s Gravest Dangers. Why Hasn't Disease Wiped out the Human Race. Fear of extinction is human. Thankfully, so is resilience. If You Thought Ebola and Zika Were Scary…just Wait.
10. Nothing in the social realm has a single cause. To look for a single cause is called blame and it not oriented to finding a solution. Did Infamous Tuskegee Study Cause Lasting Mistrust of Doctors Among Blacks. A study makes a leap to causality, but it’s not as if racism stopped: We should be careful about blaming a single incident in the past.
11. Have added an Introduction for the Parademic blog to the Navigation Bar (red rectangle). Future add ons to the Navigation bar will include how to use the weekly listicles and glossary.
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