The University of British Columbia in Vancouver hosts The Therapeutics Initiative an independent group who evaluate all medicines for effectiveness, harms and value in a regular series of Drugs Bulletins dealing with new drugs or emerging problems with older drugs. They were set up in 1994 just when evaluations of this type and Drugs Bulletins were falling out of favour. … [Read more...] about Sex and Evidence Based Medicine
High Noon: Do Not Forsake Me, Oh My….?
In early December 2020, Ian and Tania Morgan had to attend the inquest of their son Samuel in Swansea, South Wales. Sam died in January 2020, a week after he had been put on citalopram by his family doctor, Dr Adams. Sam was pretty close to a healthy volunteer. A 25 year old, sporty, successful at College, with a girlfriend - there was very little wrong with him. He likely … [Read more...] about High Noon: Do Not Forsake Me, Oh My….?
Shipwreck of the Singular: Healthcare’s Castaways
Shipwreck of the Singular, which Samizdat has just published, took more time to write than all my other books combined. The others tumbled out - often in just a few weeks. Unpublishable Pharmageddon took 3 weeks. But it then took 4 years to find a publisher. I took on an agent to help get a publisher. Faced with Shipwreck, the same agent said it would never be published. She … [Read more...] about Shipwreck of the Singular: Healthcare’s Castaways
Sex, Drugs and a Leap Year Proposal
See Sex, Drugs and Bureaucrats for the start of this correspondence. You will need both posts to understand next weeks Suicide, Drugs and Bureaucrats. February 26 Rasi to Healy Thank you for your letter of 31st January 2020 regarding SSRIs and PRACs latest recommendation on the risk of persistent sexual dysfunction after treatment with serotonin and noradrenaline reuptake … [Read more...] about Sex, Drugs and a Leap Year Proposal
Sex, Drugs and Bureaucrats
This post accompanies a Health Canada Warns post on RxISK. The Health Canada statement is classic bureaucratise. They "could not confirm, nor rule out, a causal link between stopping SSRI or SNRI treatment and persistent sexual dysfunction" because "the available studies were not designed to assess this effect" Exactly - deliberately designed not to detect. So the … [Read more...] about Sex, Drugs and Bureaucrats
Shifting Vaccine Confidence
Before 1980 Roughly through to 1980, vaccines were public goods. They were mostly made by national bodies who were publicly funded, although pharmaceutical companies were dipping their toes in the water. They were used for diseases that a national community thought were serious and worth getting vaccinated against – like polio. Few national communities would have … [Read more...] about Shifting Vaccine Confidence
Religion, Technology and Management
Religion Mention religion and the links between individuals and their creator, if they think they have one, come to mind. We imagine an individual fasting, meditating, or kneeling in prayer. It was more common in the past however to think of a people, like the People of Israel and their God. Our rulers, whether Kings or Pharaohs, stood in loco divinitas as the person … [Read more...] about Religion, Technology and Management
The Fault Lies in Our Stars
The Fault lies in our Stars not in Ourselves: Randomized Controlled Trials & Clinical Knowledge In the Beginning In 1947, a trial of streptomycin introduced RCTs to medicine. From then, through to their incorporation into the 1962 amendments to the Food, Drugs and Cosmetics Act, occasioned by the thalidomide tragedy, there were questions about the epistemological link … [Read more...] about The Fault Lies in Our Stars
Fawlty Stars
The argument in The Fault Lies in our Stars features in Chapter 6 of the forthcoming Shipwreck of the Singular. It was sent out for comment to the following, who were chosen mostly by Mark Wilson. The responses received are below: Corrado Barbui, Lisa Bero, Alan Cassels, Angus Deaton, Jean-Francois Dreyfus, Andrew Leigh (author of Randomistas), Silvio Garattini (& … [Read more...] about Fawlty Stars
The Raine in June Falls Mainly in …
June Raine featured in the international media last week as the public face of Britain's MHRA (drugs regulatory agency) when they became the first agency to license a Covid vaccine. A journalist, who had unearthed a letter of mine from 20 years ago, got in touch with me asking to talk by phone about whether I would be confident about JR's claims that we all could have … [Read more...] about The Raine in June Falls Mainly in …