Tag: health

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Science Fraud

It is a big issue if publications in science in high reputation journals have managed to pass a rather lengthy and thorough peer review process and still contain evidence based on fraudulent data. The worst case scenario that based on this wrong evidence tests of useless drugs are performed on patients in hope of an honest concern for their health. In fact the financial rewards and even academic rewards have been achieved only through the successful publication of a bias introduced into the data and/or analyses of the data. The fraudulent researcher became subsequently Director of the institute of agingwhoch is part of the American National Institute of Health (NIH) and an academic reference in health sciences far beyond the USA. It is the merit of Charles Piller and his team to persist in challenging the treatment recommendations which were concerning Alzheimer and Parkinson diseases. The checks and balances in the academic research have failed and a serious reconsideration of the procedures should follow, not just business as usual. The reputation of scientific research is at stake beyond the natural sciences and medicine, although the normal way of proceeding is just to qualify such events as singularity and specific to a single discipline. Aging is also not just treated by one single discipline. Hence, there is a need to review the review process and publication practices. The Boeing airplane control failures were also indicating that reviews of technology are subject to high risks. Independent checks and control are hard to ensure in advanced subject matters, but sufficient time and resources have to be devoted to the process. (Image Repair Lab Deutsches Technikmuseum DTM2024).

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Happy Runner

The happy runner is a nice example of how hard it maybe to experience happiness through running. The so-called runner’s high is available to everybody, if you manage to run long enough already. Most predictions put the threshold distance at about a 1 hour run. The reward for this effort is a special feeling that exceeds the pain or it makes you forget or supress the pain at least temporarily. Special reinforcements can be achieved through the big city runs in exciting places with thousands of people cheering you on. This has become a big business as well. Training for such an event might raise your feeling of happiness substantially. The chemistry of the endogenous production of stimulants of happiness in our body has been enlightened substantially in recent years (partly as doping control). Most of the brain active drugs our body can produce itself, although this involves a lot of physical and mental effort. The rewards are pretty healthy for most runners contributing to their basic level of happiness. Running outside, has contributed more to happiness for me more than the same exercise on a treadmil. Maybe, the environment is part of the happy runner’s high effect.

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Happy Biology

At first glance happiness from a biological perspective is easy to understand. Its hormones, stupid, that regulates it all. Only problem, there are many of them that interact and, apparently, a lot depends on the right dosis and duration of exposure or deficiency. Oxytocin deficiency seems to be a corollary of anxiety and lack of pro-social behavior, potentially making people less happy – to put it bluntly. There are other complex interactions between hormones not only in the circadian circle of humans like for cortisol, but also related to differential reactions to stress. Genetics and epigenetics are involved as well stress regulation and early exposition to stress during the life course has longer lasting consequences later on. How much stress is good for you? Climbing Mountains induces physical stress, but most people report lasting happiness referring back to such singular events. Hormones seem to play tricks with us as well.
Some time after the novel “Klara and the Sun“, endocrinologists have documented the positive effect of a robot on oxytocin levels in humans. Improvements to mental health and well-being are apparently easy considering that oxytocin is a driver of feeling happy as well. Maybe we should take our depressors and drivers of oxytocin more seriously to be “biologically” happy.
(Image: Extrait Frans Hals 1660, Catharina Hooft and her nurse. Exhibition Gemäldegalerie Berlin 2024)

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Own Insulin

People who suffer from type 1 diabetes do not produce enough insulin themselves. The World Health organization estimated that „in 2017 there were 9 million people with type 1 diabetes; the majority of them live in high-income countries“ (WHO 2023). The report on successful reprogramming of stem cells of a person to produce insulin again and subsequently transplanting these cells into the same person allowed to produce own insulin again for that same person (Mallapaty, 2024). The hope for millions of people with type 1 diabetes is high that eventually there will be a cure to the disease. Scientists caution that there are no data yet for how long the transplanted own stem cells will produce insulin. Hence, the hope is driving research forward on a promising way forward. The case of type 2 diabetes is very different as additionally the absorption of insulin in the body causes problems. We keep walking and building muscles to facilitate the insulin absorption in the body to guard against the onset of type 2 diabetes. Interaction of diabetes and aging is another topic that needs our attention as rapidly aging societies are at higher risks to face many more people with various forms of diabetes.

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Buzzing free

It is always a chance to be in a city that bans cars for some time from streets and bicycles and pedestrians can walk freely in the city. On September 22nd 2024 this is the case in Brussels. In addition, the public transport system allows people to buzz around the city free of charge. Of course this is an invitation to get to know areas of the city where you normally don’t take the time to visit or mix with people. The police used the time to teach children how to cycle in a city in all security and respecting basic rules despite the enthusiasm for speed or going round in circles. Unfortunately, this happens only one Sunday out of 52 in a year. It is just amazing how the feeling of safety on the road changes again. The level of noise and pollution drops to levels of the countryside. Buses and trams pass the city easily and most people get around faster than they do on other days of the year. It is a bit like a coordinated health intervention for the stressed urban survivors. This experience is a modest reminder of how nice it was in Paris during the Olympic Games 2024 when prioritizing mobility beyond cars haa been effectively implemented for several weeks.

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Waiting time

A new report by Darzi, a former cancer surgeon and past minister of health in the UK, paints a dismal picture of the British health service (NHS) over the last 15 years under conservative rule. The public service has seen no increase in its budget accounting for population growth and the aging of the population. The service is no longer able “to give patients the timely care they need” (The Guardian 2024-9-12 title page). Increased waiting times lead to an estimated 14.000 premature deaths per year. Darzi presents data that show 300.000 persons had to wait longer than one year for a treatment that should have been performed within 18 weeks.

The staff seems desperate for changes as well as they have to spend more time on management of waiting times, time which is lost for real treatment. The quality of care is another issue which awaits urgent attention. Health cannot wait for most patients, but the neglect of investment in hospitals and people is expensive in the longer run. Even the reform efforts should not wait any longer. Time is a precious good and each life matters. (Image back cover of exhibition catalogue Käthe Kollwitz at MOMA 2024).

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Health GDP

A report by the WHO and the World Bank (2023) on universal health coverage and financial hardship has emphasized the difficulties to reach the goals defined by the strategic development goals (SDGs) by 2030 in this policy field. Moreover, the paper by Mazzucato and Ghebreyesus (2024) invites us to reconsider the importance of health in the overall assessment of development and progress. The authors ask us to “rethink the narrow focus on growth in gross domestic product (GDP) that typically dominates economic decision making”. There is of course a long debate on the status of health, GDP or wellbeing as major policy issues or even foundations of the a state’s major objective. For economists the question has been answered for decades to favor GDP growth and more or less the other objectives can be achieved with a time delay. Recently social scientists have highlighted the overall importance of wellbeing or happiness rather than GDP as stated in some constitutions. Health as an overall objective is another challenge to the existing economic framing of societies. In a traditional economic perspective the health sector is part of the GDP increasing public and private sector of the economy with insurers, equipment and persons contributing to it. On the other hand, health enters into the distribution or consumption part of the economy. Each country strikes its own balance between production and consumption. Put simply, in form of an equation where production equals consumption, health enters on both sides of the equation in each country. On the global, scale the distribution between costs and benefits of health have not narrowed over the past. The challenge for the world population remains steep. Considering unequal population growth across continents, the situation might get worse before it hopefully gets better. We still have to continue huge efforts to increase overall health on earth for example through large scale vaccination programs. (Image The tombstone of Molière in Paris 2024)

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Desertification

Since 2018 we have evidence of the progression of desertification into some Member States of the European Union. The mediterranean countries are concerned as well as regions of Bulgaria and Romania near the Black Sea. There are multiple sources of desertification. The 3 main reasons of desertification are soil erosion, loss of soil fertility and loss of natural and desirable vegetation besides wind or water erosion and salinization. We also know that man-made climate change is at the root of the past and recent problems. The statistical indicators of land degradation are collected by the European Joint Research Centre and these data show a dismal picture of land degradation in general and desertification as part of this process. A study by Ilea et al. published in Nature 2024 projects an intensification of extreme weather in the coming years. Higher temperatures will most likely enhance desertification and more frequent flooding will contribute to more soil erosion as well. It is a rather strange process that we know we are creating severe problems for some regions which endanger the roots of their existence and yet we do not act upon those undeniable facts (United Nations SDGs list). The amount and dynamics of land deterioration put the global South under severe pressure, but also the wealthy parts of the Mediterranean basin will be affected. It about time to acknowledge that we are all part of the global changes and challenges. (Image palm tree in Paris, Jardin du Luxembourg, 2024)

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Heat Stress

Heat causes cardiovascular and pulmonary stress. This has been well-known for a long time. A newly published epidemiological study for Germany reiterates this finding and adds more details to the picture of who is affected most by heat stress and heat-related mortality. Old age and being female increase the heat-related deaths in Germany according to the study by Zhang et al. (2024) published in the Lancet Regional Health. Our body’s thermoregular responses to heat stress like vasodilation or hyperventilation cause additional stress to our cardiovascular and pulmonary system. Excessive sweating and dehydration, possibly increased through medication, amplify heat-related risks. The study corrects the estimates by using fine particulate matter (PM2.5), ozone (O3), and nitrogen dioxide (NO2) data on the district level in the analysis. High concentrations of PM2.5 and NO2 increase heat stress and related deaths as well. Inner cities are, therefore, not the best place to be during the hot season. Most southern European inhabitants of big cities are aware of these health hazards and act accordingly. In Germany it is much less a habit to quit inner cities during the hot days in summer, but climate change will make this a major concern. Greening inner cities is an urgent necessity, which is not just nice to have, but saves lives. (Image Berlin Bears, Berlin City Center 2023)

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Olympic Nature

Nature and its biodiversity can teach us many lessons. This is made very explicit in the small exhibition in the “Jardin des Plantes” in Paris. The treasures of (lost) biodiversity are exposed in the adjacent “Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle”. In a pleasant environment within Paris you can stroll along rare flowers and trees to pass the posters that demonstrate the astonishing achievements of some species (Les champions of nature). For example ants would surpass us in weightlifting in relationship to own weight. A marathon of 42 km is a very short distance for birds flying across continents with rest. High jump or long jump is rather easy for frogs, but we struggle already to jump a little bit higher than our own body length. Lots of other examples are shown the exhibition and should make us a bit more humble concerning the sport accomplishments of humans. Beyond Darwin and Mendel there is a lot to see and experience in the Great Gallery of Evolution. After the question remains whether we are really at the top of the evolutionary ladder. In terms of marketing our successes irrespective of many species disappearing with rapid speed, we still appear rather unique in the evolution. Learning from other species as in bionics is a powerful strategy which is also quite effective to empower humans compared to other species.