4 Comments
Oct 25Liked by Rebecca Culshaw Smith

Here's a fun one:

https://www.nih.gov/news-events/news-releases/isolated-viral-load-test-may-generate-false-positive-results-people-using-long-acting-prep

So, when a "viral load" test (which replaced the western blot as the confirmatory in 2014 because there were too many western blot positives with "undetectable viral loads") comes back positive in someone on PrEP, they call it a false positive by default, whereas if you are not on PrEP, they call it a true positive and immediately start you on ARV's so when the second test comes back negative they say it's because of the ARV's.

Expand full comment

Science, especially medical research, is the real high tech industry. Electronics research and their many new technology innovations of past decades pale in comparison to the discovery by medical researchers of thousands of new diseases and an equivalent number of accompanying treatments over the same short time period. One major difference between electronics and medical discoveries- electronics discoveries are not based in fantasy.

Expand full comment

Ka ching, ka ching! But if Pharma really wanted to make more money and reduce toxicities of these useless treatments, why not just churn out various versions of placebos and claim they are the next wonder drug to stop HIV?!! The gullible public and captured medical establishment would still gobble it up, all the while proclaiming that the naked emperor is surely wearing fine clothes!

Oh and what's with the descriptions of the research subjects: "assigned female at birth" ?! "Latine"?! is that even more politically correct than Latinx?

Expand full comment