Science & Society

Uninsured People Pay Far More For Cancer Drugs Than Medicare Patients

Uninsured cancer patients are asked to pay anywhere from 2 to 43 times what Medicare would pay for chemotherapy drugs, according to a new paper. Uninsured patients who did not negotiate the billed amounts could expect to pay $6,711 for an infusion of the ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 17 2015 - 2:18pm

Why Not Ask The Public What Works To Get People Into Clinical Trials?

While a debate was raging between scientists and government regulators on how best to explain to patients the risks of participating in clinical research studies that compare standardized treatments, a team of bioethicists boldly went where no experts had ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 16 2015 - 2:30pm

Physician Support For Obamacare In California Is Along Party Lines

A survey of California doctors found that a majority of the 525 who responded believe the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA, also called Obamacare) will steer the country's health care in the right direction, but California has only 28 ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 17 2015 - 9:00am

Active Aging Increases In EU Despite Economic Crisis

A healthy and active old age is a reality for many Europeans and is a genuine possibility for many more, despite the 2008 economic crash and years of austerity measures, according to a new United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) and European ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 21 2015 - 8:30am

Teens Try E-cigarettes, But Few Become Regular Users

There is concern about e-cigarettes that they may cause addiction rather than cure it- California advocates are spending millions claiming Big Tobacco is marketing them to children- but like nicotine patches and chewing gum, teens may try them but unless ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 19 2015 - 5:31pm

For Academic Grad School Advice, Women And Minorities Should Prepare To Be Ignored

The humanities are considered the least discriminatory academic discipline- known cases of discrimination do not reach statistical significance- but women and minorities are still collectively ignored at 1.4 times the rate of Caucasian males when seeking ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 16 2015 - 12:33pm

Do All These Health Awareness Day Campaigns Actually Help Anyone?

In 2014, there were almost 200 health awareness days, weeks or months on the 2014 U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' National Health Observances calendar.   Since there are only 250 days in a working year, that means one day each week was n ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 16 2015 - 4:44pm

Standards Needed For Post-Conviction Review Of Forensic Evidence

So what methods and professional standards are applied to the review of scientific evidence long after the original work was completed? Very few. This morning's Washington Post article titled FBI overstated forensic hair matches in nearly all trials b ...

Article - John M. Collins - Apr 22 2015 - 11:19am

Why Are More Boys Born At The End Of Wars?

More boys are born than girls: this is a fact. In the western world the ‘sex ratio’ is around 105 boys for every 100 girls, but this changes through history.  And rather remarkably, it peaks at the end of wars: another fact. So why are more boys born at th ...

Article - David Spiegelhalter - Apr 22 2015 - 9:00am

If Everyone Brings Potato Salad To The STEM Picnic, It's A Terrible Picnic

A new analysis of the "sub-workforces" population in the National Science Board's Science and Engineering Indicators 2014 report shows that the National Science Foundation, and likely the dozen other federal agencies evangelizing STEM career ...

Article - Hank Campbell - May 21 2015 - 9:58am