Melissa Davey , The Guardian; French research centre behind controversial Covid paper found to have used questionable ethics processes
"A major French research centre that produced one of the most widely cited and controversial research papers of the Covid-19 pandemic has been found by an international research team to have used questionable and concerning ethics approval processes across hundreds of studies."
Amy Maxmen , The Washington Post; As pandemic raged, global south lacked vaccines. Never again, researchers vow.
"Once it became clear that wealthy nations would help themselves to coronavirus vaccines long before poorer nations had access, researchers across Africa, Asia and South America banded together with the World Health Organization. Never again, they vowed, would they allow themselves to be at the mercy of the Western world while a deadly pathogen tore through their regions...
Called the mRNA vaccine technology transfer hub, a mouthful meant to reflect their intention to share mRNA technology, the initiative is distinct from the typical, competitive mode of drug development in which companies keep discoveries secret."
Christopher Shea, The Washington Post; When schools went virtual, online bullying declined
"(According to one 2019 study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, some 20 percent of American high school students reported being bullied in person in the previous year; 16 percent reported being bullied online.) Bacher-Hicks and four colleagues at B.U. — associate professors Joshua Goodman, Jennifer G. Green and Melissa Holt — tackled the question using an unusual approach: They first established, by examining past data, that Google searches for such terms as “bullying” and “cyberbullying” closely track real-world trends, as measured in surveys. They then looked at what happened to search trends during the pandemic. The results, which appeared in a National Bureau of Economic Research working paper in December, weren’t what many people expected. This interview has been edited for length and clarity...
Q: If I understand it right, in your interpretation online bullying is largely an outgrowth of in-school bullying.
A: Absolutely. I think that bullying that occurs online may in many cases just be an extension of bullying that started in person. We know from prior research that many of the same individuals — that is, both the victims and the aggressors — are involved in in-person and in cyberbullying. So there are clear links between the two. And I think an important contribution of our paper is to show that when you disrupt one form of bullying, there is a clear reduction in both forms.
Q: Your paper suggests there might be lessons for this and for the post-pandemic world. What might those be? Because kids eventually will be all back in these chaotic physical environments again.
A: The lessons might come out of this question: Why do we think that even when schools reopened in fall 2020 during the pandemic, bullying was lower in those schools than we would have predicted? One reason is that schools put additional structures in place to prevent the spread of covid-19. And many of those structures likely helped to reduce bullying when students were back in person. We know from prior studies that a lot of bullying occurs during unstructured time — that is, time spent passing other students in the hallway, time at lunch, etc. During the pandemic, there has been a lot less flexibility in offering that type of unstructured time. And there is a lot more supervision during the school day. I don’t think that we should necessarily maintain all of these new structures moving forward, but I think it does suggest there’s something that we can learn about how providing additional structured time might reduce bullying."
; The Conversation ; How the intellectual property monopoly has impeded an effective response toCovid-19
"As of October 2021, only 0.7% of all manufactured vaccine doses had gone to low-income countries. Manufacturers had delivered 47 times as many doses to high-income countries as they had to low-income countries.
Since its inception, COVAX, the UN-backed initiative dedicated to promoting access to Covid vaccines, has struggled to obtain doses. It recently passed the 1 billion doses delivered – half way to its goal of delivering 2 billion doses by the end of 2021. Indeed, AstraZeneca, Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson have delivered between 0% and 39% of their already inadequate commitments to COVAX in 2021.
The Global Commission for Post-Pandemic Policy, meanwhile, estimates that while Asia and Europe will be able to fully vaccinate 80% of their populations by March 2022 and North America by May 2022, Africa will not reach 80% at current rates until April 2025."
The New York Times ; Covid News: Pope Warns Against ‘Infodemic’
The Catholic leader is urging journalists, scientists and others to build bridges with those who believe misinformation. The world has topped 10 billion vaccine doses but distribution has been unequal.
"Pope Francis says access to truthful information on vaccines is a ‘human right.’"
Susan Davis and Kerri Miller, Minnesota Public Radio (MPR); When it comes to vaccines, is it time to abandon the carrot for the stick?
"Incentives like gift cards aren’t working to get people vaccinated. Rates have stalled or dropped, and public health officials all over the country are nervous.
As omicron spreads, infection rates soar and hospitals are once again overwhelmed, do we need to rethink how we motivate people to get vaccinated? Would denying access to the public sphere increase the number of people getting their shots?
Guest host Kerri Miller speaks with two public health researchers on motivating the masses to get vaccinated for the common good."
Ruth Marcus, The Washington Post; Opinion: Where was Justice Neil Gorsuch’s mask?
"The sad part here is that Gorsuch is more emblem than outlier. The pandemic has brought out the best in some of us, but the worst — the most selfish and irresponsible — in too many others. This “you’re not the boss of me” immaturity has made a difficult period even harder.
Actions that should be understood as minor inconveniences desirable for the greater good have somehow been transformed into intolerable incursions on liberty. Being required to wear a mask has assumed symbolic resonance far in excess of any reasonable objection.
No one is the boss of Justice Gorsuch. Like his colleagues, he had a choice about whether to wear a mask. Unlike them, he chose poorly."
Liz Clarke, The Washington Post; The self-belief that made Novak Djokovic a champion has put him in limbo in Australia
"Two qualities in particular set the 6-2, 170-pound Djokovic apart:
A fanatical adherence to a strict gluten-free diet and a program of stretching and exercise that has transformed his otherwise unremarkable physique (much like Tom Brady) into a purpose-built, pliable winning machine.
And profound self-belief and self-determination that have pulled him from the brink of defeat in countless high-stakes matches. Djokovic’s inner belief is arguably his greatest asset, but it doesn’t necessarily mesh with decision-making for the greater good — such as complying with vaccine mandates amid a global pandemic."
, The Conversation; Has the pandemic fundamentally changed our ethics?
"Ethics became more visible
In daily life, ethical decision-making often isn’t front of mind. We can often just coast along.
But the pandemic changed all that. It highlighted our human inter-connectedness and the effects of our actions on others. It made us re-litigate the basic rules of life: whether we could work or study, where we could go, who we could visit."
12/21/21 email from Cleveland Clinic:
A Plea from Cleveland Clinic
"This past month has been sobering for many of us in healthcare. Nearly two years after the COVID-19 pandemic began, we’re seeing some of the highest volumes of patients with the disease in hospitals throughout the Midwest.
"Here at Cleveland Clinic, we’re caring for more than 800 patients with COVID-19 at our Ohio hospitals. Of these patients, more than 200 are in the intensive care unit. The majority of these patients are unvaccinated., The Washington Post; My family sacrificed to fight covid. Many Americans didn’t. Now my mom is dead.
"And while part of me wants to wallow in my anger and grief, I know my mother wouldn’t want that for me. Instead, she would want me to take action. So now I volunteer as a vaccinator, helping to keep willing Americans and their families from suffering her fate — and ours.
When I give members of my community in Arlington, Va., their coronavirus vaccines, almost all of them thank me for my service. I want to cry, upset that it’s too late for my mother. Instead, I try to smile and thank each person getting vaccinated for doing their part. It’s what my mother would have wanted."
C. Thi Nguyen, The Washington Post; Zoom classes felt like teaching into a void — until I told my students why
"In the end, I see this as a question of informed choice. Given who I am, it’s very predicable that my teaching will get worse as more cameras go off. Students deserve to know that, and take that into account, in their own choices. I suspect that honesty is the best we can do right now.
This experience has also changed how I behave when I’m on the other side of the exchange — in the audience of an online lecture. In that situation, I would almost always prefer to turn my camera off. But now I go camera-on most of the time, because of my understanding of the impact of my decision on the speaker.
Right now, our knowledge of one another’s lives is slim, gathered as it is through impoverished channels like Zoom. When our connections are so tenuous, a little trust can go a long way."
University of Pittsburgh Institute for Cyber Law, Policy, and Security ; Pitt Cyber Presents: Battling the Infodemic: Covid-19 Mis- and Disinformation
"February 16, 2021 -
2:00pm to 3:30pmBattling the Infodemic: Covid-19 Mis- and Disinformation
Please join Pitt Cyber for a timely conversation about how mis- and disinformation could jeopardize control of the pandemic. Disinformation and medical experts will discuss what’s happening, what to expect, and what we can do.
The discussion will feature:
Michael Colaresi, Pitt Cyber Research and Academic Director and Professor of Political Science, University of Pittsburgh
Beth Hoffman, Research Assistant, Center for Research on Behavioral Health, Media, & Technology; PhD student, Department of Behavioral and Community Health Sciences, Graduate School of Public Health, University of Pittsburgh
Jaime Sidani, Assistant Professor of Medicine; Core Faculty of the Center for Research on Behavioral Health, Media, & Technology; and Pitt Cyber Affiliate Scholar, University of Pittsburgh
Todd Wolynn, CEO, Kids Plus Pediatrics
February 16 | 2-3:30 pm
