The Dangers of Emailing, IMing, Texting, Calling ...

New studies show, yet again, that technology makes us stupid. Or at least less effective. And that the best way to accomplish something successfully -- whether it's driving a car, crossing a street, standing in a train station, or writing a book -- is to turn off the tech. I've blogged about the problems that come with constant emailing several times in the past. Now, today's New York Times reports on the newest studies into how multitasking messes with your brain:

"The human brain, with its hundred billion neurons and hundreds of trillions of synaptic connections, is a cognitive powerhouse in many ways. “But a core limitation is an inability to concentrate on two things at once,” said René Marois, a neuroscientist and director of the Human Information Processing Laboratory at Vanderbilt University.

"Mr. Marois and three other Vanderbilt researchers reported in an article last December in the journal Neuron that they used magnetic resonance imaging to pinpoint the bottleneck in the brain and to measure how much efficiency is lost when trying to handle two tasks at once. Study participants were given two tasks and were asked to respond to sounds and images. The first was to press the correct key on a computer keyboard after hearing one of eight sounds. The other task was to speak the correct vowel after seeing one of eight images."

There was no delay when participants did the tasks one at a time, but when researchers asked them to do tasks two at a time, both tasks were completed slower. This isn't surprising. What's interesting to me is that they actually pinpointed the area in the brain where this bottleneck takes place, and showed that this delay happens regardless of what multitasking you're doing, and which senses it involves. So listening to something (say, music with lyrics, or a television) while reading something causes the same bottleneck effect in the brain as trying to read two things at once. Which is very interesting. The solution, according to the Times:

"These experts have some basic advice. Check e-mail messages once an hour, at most. Listening to soothing background music while studying may improve concentration. But other distractions — most songs with lyrics, instant messaging, television shows — hamper performance. Driving while talking on a cellphone, even with a hands-free headset, is a bad idea."

No big surprise there. But still, very interesting.

Bush Pushes Genetic Privacy Legislation

Here's a newsflash I never thought I'd hear: Yesterday, with Frances Collins by his side, Bush began lobbying for Congress to pass the long-stalled Genetic Privacy Bill, which could help protect patients from genetic discrimination. This bill, in one form or another, has been in the works for about a decade, but has repeatedly been pushed aside over fears that it might inhibit research and industry. I'm very interested to see the version of the bill they're working with now, how it's changed since its last incarnation, and whether/how it will protect patients against insurance and other discrimination. If it does, passing it would be a huge step forward for the world of tissue research, one patients rights advocates have been fighting for endlessly.

Study Shows Patients Have Issues With Tissue Research

In my ongoing coverage of all things human tissue related, I came across this article about a recent study examining public attitudes toward tissue banks: "Tissue banking raises cloning fears." Interestingly, there was absolutely no coverage of this study in the U.S., where tissue research is a huge issue. The study, conducted by the Centre for Values, Ethics and the Law in Medicine at the University of Sydney, shows that Australians have many concerns over how their tissues are being used.

They're worried, for one, that scientists could clone them using stored tissue samples. There are many reasons people should question how their tissues are being used in research, but at this point, fear of being cloned isn't one of them (cloning humans isn't possible yet). But the study also found that people were opposed to tissues from their diagnostic samples -- like biopsies and blood tests -- being used "as a source of stem cells or by drug companies." to develop products. That is a very current and real issue worldwide: In the US, most people have their tissues in storage at this point, and the laws surrounding their use are unsettled and confused.

According to lead researcher Bronwen Morrell, this study shows exactly what I reported in my recent New York Times Magazine article: People want some level of control over how their tissues are being used in research and whether they'll be commercialized; they also want laws laying out requirements for consent, because at the very least, they want to know what's being done with their tissues.

Morrell also found that, when it came to the sticky issue of money, patients wanted to see profits funneled back into research, not into scientists' pockets (which is not standard practice now). Many said they trust the public sector more with their tissue than private companies: "As long as research was being done in a public hospital they would feel comfortable with that," she said. "But if it was a private company doing the research, especially drug companies, they wouldn't be that happy." This is interesting, in part because it indicates that the public isn't aware of how fuzzy the division between public hospitals and private companies can be these days.

A Sad Day: FDA Approves First Dog Obesity Drug

The FDA just announced that they've just approved the first-ever obesity drug for dogs, which really makes me cringe. Why? Because dogs don't have eating disorders -- their owners have feeding disorders.

This summer, I adopted a new dog after she ran in front of my car on an interstate. She was starved, so I took her home and fed her. And fed her. And fed her. She weighed 20 pounds and could eat a heaping cup of food in 28 seconds (yes, I timed her). But that was fine, because she needed all the extra calories she could get. Then, about three months later, during a good wrestling match, I realized I couldn't feel her ribs anymore. Suddenly, she'd gone from being emaciated to being pudgy. So I did exactly what everyone else with a pudgy dog should do: I started feeding her less. Instead of getting a heaping cup at each meal, she got 2/3 of a cup. Three weeks later, she wasn't pudgy anymore. That's the amazing thing about dogs and weight: Humans control their calorie intake, and there's nothing dogs can do about it. If your dog needs to lose weight, you feed it less food.

It's true that there's an epidemic of canine (and feline) obesity right now, just like there's an epidemic of human obesity. Which is no coincidence: People don't exercise, which means their dogs don't exercise. When people eat, they feed their dogs scraps, so the dogs gain weight right along with their owners. And don't even get me started on the ingredients in dog food.

But there are other less obvious problems: Owners often have no idea how much they should feed their dogs, and if they follow the guidelines on most dog food bags, they're probably going to have obese dogs, because pet food companies encourage overfeeding. I had a 125 pound dog who lived to be 16 and was never an ounce over or under weight. If I'd followed the guidelines for his food, he'd have eaten 2 1/2 times what I actually fed him, and surely become obese. My very healthy 17 year old dog Bonny eats 1/4 the recommended amount, always has.

During my years as a veterinary technician, I saw many dogs die or become paralyzed from obesity. Today, when I see an obese dog on the street, I want to walk up to its owner and say, You love your dog, right? Then why are you killing it?

If it's come down to this, and people are unable to control themselves when it comes to feeding their dogs, I'd rather see dogs medicated than dead. But I hope vets who prescribe this stuff paste a sticker on every bottle that says, Dogs don't need obesity drugs. They need owners who will feed them the right amount, cut back when necessary, and make sure they get exercise. (Perhaps the FDA should consider a self-control drug for humans with dog feeding disorders.)

Good News for the Future of Obesity

A stunning piece of news: The nation's three biggest soft-drink companies announced that they're removing Coke, Pepsi, sweet iced teas and other such drinks from school cafeterias and vending machines. Have they finally come to their senses and realized they're on one of the top causes of the current obesity epidemic among children and record rates of diabetes, heart disease and the like? Nope: They're worried about lawsuits. Which is great news. (Thanks to Ben for pointing this out!)

A Sad Day for Science Writers: Laura Van Dam's Obituary

Laura Van Dam was amazing; a tireless advocate of science writing and science writers, a brilliant woman -- she died this week after fighting lymphoma for years. This is a huge loss to science writing, and the many people like me who counted her as a friend. I just visited the website for the National Association of Science Writers -- which Laura was president of until her death. NASW members have posted incredible comments about Laura that really show the amazing impact she's had ... so many wonderful writers and reporters (Laurie Garrett, Joe Palca, Deborah Blum, Natalie Angier, Robin Marantz Henig, and on and on) credit Laura for encouraging -- and in some cases discovering -- them and their work. As do I. Laura and I spent many hours talking about my articles and my book over the years: She encouraged me when I hit hard spots, pushed me to write the best book I could, believed in it and me even when others didn't. The tragedy of young death robbing everyone of such a bright future applies to Laura in spades.

Her approach to the end was amazing and thoughtful. About two months ago, she called me to talk about her death. She hoped it wouldn't come for a few more years, because she desperately wanted to see her son off to college. Laura's own mother died after Laura went away to school; she knew that would probably be easier for him than the alternative. But she also knew the end might happen sooner than that. We talked for almost two hours about life and death, about living with brain damage (my father has written quite a bit about his own experience with brain damage, and Laura's illness caused extensive brain damage). All I can say is, Laura was one amazing woman many many people will miss -- those who knew her will miss her energy, her excitement and brilliance. Those who didn't know her will miss everything she did behind the scenes for the science writers of the world.

If you're an NASW member, I urge you to read the tributes to her on the NASW site. Her obituary and the many responses to it are there:

"An independent book editor, Laura spent many years as a senior editor with Houghton-Mifflin, where she specialized in books related to science, technology, medicine, and health. She worked with authors including Natalie Angier (Woman: An Intimate Geography), Daniel Schacter (The Seven Sins of Memory), J. Richard Gott (Time Travel Through Einstein's Universe), and Steve Olson (Mapping Human History, a National Book Award finalist) ... Laura served as a senior editor with the MIT publication Technology Review and as a newspaper reporter.

She is survived by her husband, Howard Saxner, and son, David Saxner. A memorial service is planned for Sunday, April 30, at 2 p.m. at the First Parish Unitarian Church, Harvard Square, Cambridge, Mass. Donations may be made in Laura's name to the Pappas Center for Neuro-Oncology c/o Massachusetts General Hospital, Development Office, 165 Cambridge St., Suite 600, Boston, MA 02114."

There's also a wonderful detailed obituary in the Boston Globe.

Happy travels, Laura ... we'll miss you.

Big News For All Women of the World: HPV Vaccine May Prevent Cervical Cancer in Already-Infected Women

This is pretty stunning news ... so stunning, in fact, that I have nothing to say about it other than: Whoa! And hallelujah: For women infected with one of four cancer-causing strains of HPV, Merck's new vaccine appears to prevent 88% of all cervical cancer, 91% of all "external genital lesions" (aka: warts, cancerous and non), and 100% of all high-grade cervical pre-cancer and high-grade vulvar or vaginal pre-cancer.

This is huge news, since cervical cancer kills millions of women each year. In what may be the greatest understatement of the year, Marc Steben, a doctor involved in the study, says: "These strong results against serious illness will definitely interest sexually active women."

Science Meets Religion: The follow up

An update: Perhaps not coincidentally, moments after I got the press release I mentioned in my previous post, I got a second press release announcing the results of a multi-institutional study (of more than 1800 heart bypass patients), which failed to prove that prayers have healing power. A group of Catholics and Protestants did the study's praying -- they received the names of patients, and specific prayers to say for them immediately before surgery and for two weeks post-op.

In contrast to Sauvage's study, this study was "never intended to address the existence of God or the presence or absence of intelligent design in the universe." They were simply looking at the healing power of prayer (though, as they pointed out, it is difficult to distinguish "study prayer" from the "background prayer" of family and friends). As reported by Reuters, the results were perplexing: "some of the patients who knew they were being prayed for did worse than others who were only told they might be prayed for -- though those who did the study said they could not explain why."

Surely Sauvage knows why ... they should text him and ask.

More on Fake Blood and Research Ethics

A few days ago, I posted about some sketchy ethical practices in a clinical trial that's been testing fake blood without people's consent in 18 states. Well, it looks like things may get more interesting with that soon: Senator Charles Grassley has called on the FDA to tell the public (a) what's happening with this study and (b) how potential benefits of this blood substitute could outweigh the risks ... He called the trial unethical and said it never should have been approved. Grassley is accusing the FDA of disregarding their responsibility to "protect the public health," and saying the burden of opting-out shouldn't be on the public. "Equally outrageous," he said, "is the FDA's apparent failure to ensure that communities are fully aware of the risks, benefits, and nature of this experiment." I'm eager to hear their response.

For more information on all of this, see two publications from the ever-impressive American Journal of Bioethics -- their recent open letter to IRBs and their piece about race and Polyheme launched the media coverage of this issue and finally brought these questions to the public's attention. Bravo to them.

Fake Blood and Research Ethics

For some time now, I've been following the debate over clinical trials of a blood substitute called Polyheme, which was designed by a company called Northfield to use in trauma cases instead of human blood. To get this product out to market, it has to be tested on humans to see if it's safe and effective. The problem is, getting informed consent for that is impossible: When a person shows up hemorrhaging in an emergency room, they're in no condition to understand and consent to the potential risks of a study like this. But since the mid-90s, the FDA has allowed clinical trials of various things (including antidotes to potential biological warfare) without informed consent, if informed consent is "unfeasable" to get.

So, for the last two years -- without consent -- patients in emergency rooms around the country (including Chicago, Denver, San Diego) have been getting this blood substitute instead of real blood to test the product's effectiveness. Technically, patients can say they don't want this research done on them, but to do so they have to get and wear an opt-out bracelet, which tells people in emergency rooms that they want real blood instead. The problem is, if you want one of these bracelets, you have to know the study is happening before you go to the emergency room. Today, a Chicago Tribune article lays out some of the ethical concerns well:

"Medical ethicists and community leaders in some areas of the country where Northfield has been testing its product for the last year have said the process does not allow for enough community input. In some cases, ethicists have complained those running the trials have placed tiny legal ads in newspapers that resulted in town meetings attended by only a few people ... some critics of Northfield's trial have gone so far as to say the research protocol is racist because the testing is done in and around inner-city hospitals, and potential test subjects would have little way of knowing they could become part of a clinical trial. The San Diego Reader, a weekly newspaper, in July reported that Polyheme was being tested only on trauma patients too ill to consent in downtown San Diego and three minority neighborhoods.

In a January letter to Illinois congressional leaders, a Chicago-area surgeon involved in clinical trials, Dr. Raymond Pollak, compared Northfield's trial to the Tuskegee syphilis experiment--a 40-year clinical study in which African-American men with syphilis went untreated by government doctors. "The Tuskegee experiment ... is a painful reminder of the potential for the harm that can come from the unethical conduct of human experimental clinical trials," said Pollak, a former University of Illinois professor and current head of clinical trials at Edward Hospital in Naperville. "I believe that similar concerns have now emerged in regard to an ongoing clinical trial being conducted by Northfield Laboratories, with the tacit approval of the FDA.

The makers of Polyheme were, not surprisingly, unhappy about the recent bad press (They make a point in their press release to say that Polyheme is a promising treatment for people with sickle cell anemia, which African Americans suffer from disproportionatly -- surely an oblique (and inadequate) response to the accusations of racism and comparisons to Tuskegee?).

This case is disturbing on many levels. Of course, it's very important for science to advance, and for new therapeutics like this to be developed -- Polyheme could solve blood shortage problems and eliminate the need for blood-type-matching -- but we have endless historical examples illustrating precisely why this should only happen with full consent and disclosure to the public. There are ways to inform the communities surrounding the hospital so they (a) know this trial is happening, and (b) can exercise their legal right to opt-out if they don't want to participate (federal law mandates that all people be given that right). At this point, this doesn't seem to be happening. [It's also not clear that it will be enough if it does happen] This is precisely how we end up with Tuskegee-like problems in the first place. Which is why the researchers involved in this trial (and the FDA) should take the issue of consent very seriously and devise ways to move forward without violating people's right to not be used as research subjects.

[A side note: I've been off line lately because every waking moment (and most sleeping moments) have been consumed by a big story I just finished for the New York Times Magazine (it will be on the cover of the magazine in a few weeks -- I'll post more about it then). In the meantime, I have a huge backlog of things to post about ...]

Of Note: The Economics of Obesity

My friend Mike Rosenwald just published a very creepy story called Why America Has to be Fat, about the economics of obesity:

"I am fat," he writes. "Sixty pounds too hefty, in my doctor's opinion. Probably 80 pounds, in my fiancee's view. Being fat makes me a lot of things -- a top contender for type II diabetes, for instance, or a heart attack, or stroke, maybe even a replacement knee or hip. My girth also puts me in familiar company, with about two-thirds of the U.S. population now considered overweight. But in many ways, my being fat also makes me pretty good for the economy."

His story makes the case that the boom in the US economy following the Depression helped cause our current obesity epidemic, and that obesity now actually helps fuel our economy:

"The obesity problem is really a side effect of things that are good for the economy," said Tomas J. Philipson, an economics professor who studies obesity at the University of Chicago, a city recently named the fattest in America. "But we would rather take improvements in technology and agriculture than go back to the way we lived in the 1950s when everyone was thin. Nobody wants to sweat at work for 10 hours a day and be poor. Yes, you're obese, but you have a life that is much more comfortable."

[To which I say, As if those are the only two options: sweat at work and be thin but poor, or have a comfortable work life and be fat?! Please!]

"For many corporations, and even for physicians, Americans' obesity has also fattened the bottom line. William L. Weis, a management professor at Seattle University, says revenue from the "obesity industries" will likely top $315 billion this year, and perhaps far more. That includes $133.7 billion for fast-food restaurants, $124.7 billion for medical treatments related to obesity, and $1.8 billion just for diet books -- all told, nearly 3 percent of the overall U.S. economy."

Never mind the gazillions of dollars obesity-related illnesses cost in health care, disability payments and diminished workforces. People are cashing in on obesity, and those people certainly aren't obese ...

Of Note: Speaking of schizophrenia (and sex and art)

In my last post, I wrote about an interesting story my friend Mike Rosenwald wrote for Esquire, about a scientist who believes that schizophrenia is caused by house cats (you have to read the article to understand that one). Now, a group of scientists has come out with another fascinating explanation for schizophrenia (and it has nothing to do with house cats).

Daniel Nettle, a psychologist at the University of Newcastle, just published a study showing that people with schizophrenic-like personality traits (and therefore genes predisposing them to schizophrenia) are more likely to do two things: Become artists and have more sexual partners. And this, Nettle believes, is why schizophrenia hasn't vanished as a disease.

Evolutionarilly speaking, it's a bit baffling that scizophrenia hasn't been selected out of the gene pool, since scizophrenics don't tend to reproduce (they may be less able to have children physically, and their challenges relating to others can make it difficult to find mates). But scizophrenic genes don't always cause full-blown schizophrenia: People with a family history of schizophrenia can display varying degrees of scizophrenic-like behaviors (magical or mystical thinking, a decreased or distorted perception of self and others, etc), but not actually be scizophrenic themselves. Nettle believes that when a person's genetic tendency toward schizophrenia leads to creative thinking instead of full-blown schizophrenia, it gives them an evolutionary advantage, because they're more likely to become artists, and artists, he says, are more "sexually successful."

In a survey of 425 British adults, researchers found that serious poets and visual artists generally had more sexual partners than those who were either not artistic or only dabbled in the arts. Further analysis showed that one personality dimension -- a tendency toward "unusual" thoughts and perceptions -- was related to both creativity and sexual success. That tendency is also seen in people with schizophrenia. And the findings, according to the study authors, may help explain why schizophrenia -- a mental disorder that often runs in families -- has not been extinguished from the gene pool ...

It's all very interesting, though not entirely convincing yet: This connection between "unusual mental abilities" and scizophrenic tendencies and art and sex is pretty loose. I buy the claims individually -- that "successful creative types" (which he doesn't define) are "sexually successful," and that people with scizophrenic-like tendencies are likely to become artists (some brilliant artists have suffered from scizophrenia, like Pink Floyd's Syd Barrett, and many others). But it seems like a big jump to say this might explain the persistance of scizophrenia in the gene pool.

Here's something I find curious: Schizophrenic-like personality traits are the center of much non-scizophrenia-related research these days. I just wrote a story for New York Times Magazine's annual Year in Ideas issue (which hits newsstands on December 11th) about a scientist who's found an explanation for why yawning is contagious. He used these same schizophrenic-like traits to uncover the cause of contagious yawning (stay tuned, I'll post that story when it runs in the magazine in a few days) ...

Of Note: Finally, an Explanation for the Crazy Cat Lady in 5B

My good friend and ever-brilliant writer Michael Rosenwald has a must-read profile in the current issue of Esquire: It's about a scientist who thinks house cats cause schizophrenia. As a scientist, there are moments where this guy sounds like he's onto something, others where he sounds like a complete quack. And this, of course, makes him a fabulously interesting character:

"People frequently mischaracterize Dr. Fuller Torrey's feelings about cats. The other day, an acquaintance gave him a present—a framed five-by-seven photograph of a white kitten sitting on a windowsill, his front paws held up like he was being robbed, a semiautomatic handgun pointed at his head. "Isn't that just wonderful?" Torrey says, looking at the photo in an office full of similar cat jokes. Still, he swears no hostility toward cats. "I like them," he insists. "I actually enjoy being around them." People naturally assume Torrey would enjoy traumatizing cats because he believes that cats make us insane—that they are the leading cause of human schizophrenia. Torrey's theory has led his wife to one of her own: Her husband will one day be assassinated by a cat lover ..." (See the full article for more.)

Now, I must point out a few things. First, the title of the article is "Finally, an Explanation for the Crazy Cat Lady in 5B." I live in apartment 5B. I think this is no coincidence, though Mike swears it is. And second: Don't pack your cat off to the shelter just yet -- as the story points out, this guy's research has a long way to go. And third: My friend Mike is a great writer. If you agree and want more, check out his ASME finalist story "Yesterday They Would Have Died," from Popular Science, and his recent New Yorker story "Drawing Pitchers."

And in case you're wondering about the air silence since my last post: I've been on the road working on a complex science story for the New York Times Magazine, finalizing some details for my book, and giving talks about my book at the University of Wisconsin in Madison for their History of Medicine and Bioethics Program (an absolutely wonderful place and department, though it was inhumanly cold and snowy the whole time I was there).

Of Note: How Science Finally Vindicated My Hate of Showering

When I was a kid, I refused to shower. Not just once, but always. My parents spent much of my childhood trying to think up new and clever ways to trick me into showering (buying cool shampoos and body-paint soap, or calling the whole thing "shaking a tower" instead of "taking a shower"). But nothing worked. I'd lock myself in the bathroom, turn on the water, stick my hair under the faucet so it looked showered, give my dry body a quick rub with a bar of soap so it smelled showered, then sit on the toilet lid with the water running for a while to make the whole thing seem legit. Of course, I did end up in the shower fairly regularly, but it was always a fiasco of tears and whining and flailing arms and legs.

The thing is, honestly, I never got over hating showers. I mean, don't get me wrong ... I shower, and no one has to throw me in the tub. I just don't like it. Feels like a waste of time: The shaving, the hair washing and hair drying, it takes forever. So getting me into the shower is still a chore: I'll walk around the apartment all day saying "I'm about to get in the shower" while my boyfriend laughs at me saying, "yeah, right."

Needless to say, this is not something I usually discuss publicly. But ALL of this is necessary background to understand why I feel especially vindicated by the recent news that daily showers can actually cause brain damage.

Scientists believe that breathing in small amounts of manganese found in water may harm the central nervous system. Dr John Spangler, of Wake Forest University in New Carolina, said: "If our results are confirmed, they could have profound implications for the world. Inhaling manganese, rather than eating or drinking it, is far more efficient at delivering it to the brain." Manganese is in food and rocks and enters the air, soil and water. It damages the brain leading to learning difficulties, tremors and changes in behaviour. Dr Spangler's team claim that a 10-minute shower a day for 10 years would expose children to three times higher doses than would be needed to damage a rat's brain. Adults with more years in the shower would receive doses 50 per cent higher.

See! I knew there was a reason I hated showers! I read this and immediately emailed my best childhood friend, Quail, who also happens to hate of showers. I sent her the article and we emailed back and forth all day feeling brilliant about the whole thing: "All those people who made fun of us for hating showers are going to get manganese brain poisoning!"

It's actually not big news ... it's kinda just common sense: if there are things in the water, those same things are probably present in the water vapor, and you probably breathe them in when you shower. Just after high school, I worked in a natural pet food store in Oregon (yes, it's true) with a quirky high-strung woman named Nancy who was in her 70s but looked 40. She always swore that the secret to her youthful longevity was that she never took hot showers, because she didn't want to breathe in any vaporized chemicals from the water. Last time I talked to Nancy she was in her 80s and still hyper as ever. Maybe she was on to something.