Category: science

  • CDC ACIP Meeting on the RSV Vaccine and Some Dad Jokes

    CDC ACIP Meeting on the RSV Vaccine and Some Dad Jokes

    We watched the section of the CDC ACIP meeting about RSV vaccines on February 29, 2024. There was a lot of discussion on the safety of the vaccine. It looks like it will still have a requirement that you have a shared clinical decision-making meeting with your physician. I think that still implies you’d need…

  • CDC ACIP Meeting on Covid 19 Vaccine Additional Dose

    CDC ACIP Meeting on Covid 19 Vaccine Additional Dose

    The CDC ACIP meeting on February 28, 2024 on the proposal of a Spring booster of the Covid 19 vaccine was interesting and confusing. Initially right after the morning presentations, we were a little confused about whether the committee was targeting only those who got the vaccine booster last fall or everybody. That didn’t make…

  • Hot Mic in the NASA Control Room

    Hot Mic in the NASA Control Room

    By now, everybody probably knows about the Intuitive Machine lunar landing of the Odysseus space craft recently, broadcast from NASA. I happened to have a direct audio hookup to the control room during the hot mic episode which somehow didn’t get broadcast last week. Sam: OK, how’s Odysseus doing? Doug: Uh, we slightly overshot the…

  • Thoughts on Upcoming CDC ACIP Meeting

    Thoughts on Upcoming CDC ACIP Meeting

    Sena and I are talking about the upcoming CDC meeting on February 28th-29th next week. The agenda looks like they’ll be talking about an “additional dose” of the Covid-19 vaccine. Given the extent of vaccine fatigue going on, I tried to find a layperson-friendly article on the web about vaccine immunity with details about how…

  • CDC ACIP Meeting February 28-29, 2024 to Discuss Covid-19 and Other Vaccines

    CDC ACIP Meeting February 28-29, 2024 to Discuss Covid-19 and Other Vaccines

    There are news stories about a pending CDC-ACIP meeting (February 28-29, 2024) which might include information about a CDC recommendation to possibly add a 3rd additional Covid-19 vaccine booster this spring. The Covid-19 vaccine portion of the meeting is scheduled for February 28, 2024 at 8:30 AM EST. There will be a vote at 1:55…

  • New Large Covid-19 Vaccine Study Shows Association with Rare Side Effects Which Other Smaller Studies Have Found

    New Large Covid-19 Vaccine Study Shows Association with Rare Side Effects Which Other Smaller Studies Have Found

    I’ve seen a couple of news stories about the CDC supported large study across many countries which essentially shows that Covid-19 vaccines can be associated with rare side effects. The stories might tend to raise anxiety about the vaccines’ overall safety, which has been repeatedly proven in other studies. The study is published in the…

  • CDC May Change the 5 Day Covid-19 Isolation Guidelines

    CDC May Change the 5 Day Covid-19 Isolation Guidelines

    I see many news headlines reporting that the CDC may be planning to drop the 5 day Covid-19 isolation guidelines. For now I’m taking that as a rumor until the CDC website says something official about it. Word on the street is that we may know more in April.

  • Trips and Trip-Killers

    Trips and Trip-Killers

    I just read this JAMA Network article on trip-killers. It’s about using drugs to stop bad trips caused by hallucinogens. One mentioned was ketamine. When I was working as a consultation psychiatrist, I was called occasionally to evaluate patients in recovery rooms who were delirious from the ketamine that was sometimes used by anesthesiologists. I…

  • RESQME Car Escape Tool for Emergency Window Breaking and Seat Belt Cutting

    RESQME Car Escape Tool for Emergency Window Breaking and Seat Belt Cutting

    This is the follow up to my post about how to escape from a car sinking in a flood. Our new car escape tool arrived. It’s the RESQME window breaker and seat belt cutter. We checked our side windows and they are tempered glass on both the front driver and passenger side. The other way…

  • Thoughts on the Distinguished Education Lecture by Dr. Russell Ledet MD PhD

    Thoughts on the Distinguished Education Lecture by Dr. Russell Ledet MD PhD

    We enjoyed the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Distinguished Education (originally given on January 17, 2023) by Dr. Russell Ledet. He’s definitely a mover and a shaker and this is another recorded presentation that I wish was available for the general public. His bio is knockdown impressive. And even more interesting to me is that…