One of the most notable scientific papers that first popularized hydroxychloroquine as a COVID-19 treatment was retracted from its journal due to ethical and methodological issues.
Retractions in scientific journals are rare and typically undergo an extensive investigative process. These retractions have been known to negatively affect the potential future employment, funding and reputation of researchers involved.
The paper, published in 2020 in the International Journal of Antimicrobial Agents, originally claimed that treatments with hydroxychloroquine, an anti-malaria drug, reduced virus levels in COVID patients and was more effective if used alongside an antibiotic, known as azithromycin.
A notice from Elsevier, which publishes the journal, said: “Concerns have been raised regarding this article, the substance of which relate to the articles’ adherence to Elsevier’s publishing ethics policies and the appropriate conduct of research involving human participants, as well as concerns raised by three of the authors themselves regarding the article’s methodology and conclusions.”
The notice was attached to the paper, which remains on the journal’s website with a watermark that says “Retracted.”
Category: Off-Duty
World Beekeeping Awards Removes Honey From Awards
People will cheat at anything.
The World Beekeeping Awards have announced that there will not be any prizes for honey next year because of concerns about fraud in the global supply chain.
It’ll be the first time that the popular cupboard staple has been excluded from the event.
Apimondia – the International Federation of Beekeepers’ Associations – said in a statement that the change was “necessitated by the inability to have honey fully tested for adulteration”.
This decision comes after previous years’ events proved that “adequate testing was impossible” as well as recent investigations which showed the sticky situation that importers have found themselves in.
Helene’s Devastation
Prayers for the folks reeling from Helene. Find your reputable charity and pitch in.
• Over 60 dead across 5 states: Deaths have been reported in South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, North Carolina and Virginia. At least 10 people are dead in North Carolina, a release from Gov. Roy Cooper’s office said Saturday evening. At least 23 are dead in South Carolina, including two firefighters in Saluda County, authorities said. In Georgia, at least 17 people have died, two of them killed by a tornado in Alamo, according to a spokesperson for Gov. Brian Kemp. In Florida, at least 11 people have died, Gov. Ron DeSantis said Saturday, including several people who drowned in Pinellas County. And in Craig County, Virginia, one person died in a storm-related tree fall and building collapse, Gov. Glenn Youngkin said Friday.
• Dozens unaccounted amid communications outage: More than 200 people have been rescued from floodwaters in North Carolina after Helene wrought “biblical devastation,” Gov. Roy Cooper said Saturday. Still, over 60 people were unaccounted for in Buncombe County – which includes the hard-hit city of Asheville – and over 150 search and rescue operations were underway. “This is looking to be Buncombe County’s own Hurricane Katrina,” county manager Avril Pinder said, adding the county’s emergency services were overwhelmed. Crews are conducting welfare checks as communication continues to be disrupted, with no cell phone service in the region for at least “several days,” according to officials. Emergency call volumes are also exceedingly high, with the county receiving over 5,500 911 calls and conducting more than 130 swift water rescues since Thursday. East of Buncombe County, over 20 air rescues have been conducted in McDowell County since early Saturday morning. The emergency center is also being inundated with calls, many of which involve patients “entrapped with severe trauma, running out of oxygen or essential medical supplies.” But emergency response efforts are hampered by massive landslides, downed trees, power lines and severely flooded roads.
Uptick in Covid in Several Wisconsin Sewersheds
Watch out for Sharks
It’s going to be a bitey season.
PORTLAND, Maine — Scientists with a Boston aquarium are encouraging beachgoers to report sightings of white sharks this holiday weekend after signs of shark bites were observed on multiple marine mammals.
Memorial Day weekend marks the unofficial start of summer in New England, and the region has been experiencing beach weather already. That’s a good reason to be on the lookout for the sharks, often referred to as great whites, said John Chisholm, an adjunct scientist at the New England Aquarium’s Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life.
The aquarium received a report of a minke whale with a white shark bite off Chatham, Massachusetts, recently, and this is also the time of year scientists expect to see the sharks head to inshore waters to hunt seals, the aquarium said Thursday.
Snakes (Almost) on a Plane!
According to an X post by the Transportation Security Administration, officers at the Miami International Airport found the small bag of snakes hidden in a passenger’s trousers on April 26 at a checkpoint.
The post included a photo of two small snakes that were found in what appeared to be a sunglasses bag.
Killing Owls to Save Owls
Maybe just let nature take its course. Every species was invasive at some point.
In a last-ditch effort to rescue the northern spotted owl from oblivion and protect the California spotted owl population, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has proposed culling a staggering number of barred owls across a swath of 11 million to 14 million acres in Washington, Oregon and Northern California, where barred owls — which the agency regards as invasive — are encroaching. The lethal management plan calls for eradicating up to 500,000 barred owls over the next 30 years, or 30% of the population over that time frame. The owls would be dispatched using the cheapest and most efficient methods, from large-bore shotguns with night scopes to capture and euthanasia.
Karla Bloem, the executive director of the International Owl Center in Minnesota, is conflicted over the prospect of killing one species to protect another. “The concept of shooting birds is awful — nobody wants that,” she said. “But none of the alternatives have worked, and at this late date no other option is viable. Extinction is a forever thing.”
WIAA considers implementing NIL
My column for the Washington County Daily News is online and in print. Here’s a part:
On Wednesday, the Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association, the voluntary governing body for high school sports in the state, will take up the question of whether high school athletes should be allowed to profit from their name, image, and likeness (NIL) as in college sports. I strongly urge the WIAA to reject this proposal.
To date, 31 other states have already allowed NIL in high school sports. Wisconsin’s high school athletic directors, who comprise the membership of the WIAA, have been reluctant to follow suit, but it appears that such reluctance may have been overcome.
At issue is the definition of “amateur.”
The simple definition is that if one is not directly paid to compete in a sport, then one is an amateur. For decades, high school and college sports insisted that their athletes be true amateurs to preserve the competitive balance of sports. We did not want rich schools to pay professional athletes to dominate a sport. The loophole in the system was that wealthy school supporters would give gifts or highly paid noshow/ low-show jobs to talented athletes to attract them to a particular school. To combat this, the WIAA, NCAA, and other athletic governing bodies banned athletes from profiting from the fact that they are athletes. These governing bodies tended to over-enforce the rules to the point that athletes were wary of even having a regular job for fear of losing their amateur status.
[…]
While I support NIL for college sports, high school sports are different for one significant reason. The athletes are minors.
They are dependents of their parents who are responsible for their care. Money made from the athletes’ NIL does not go to the athlete, but to the athlete’s parent or guardian.
This fact makes NIL at the high school level take on the attributes of exploitation of a minor rather than freeing the athlete from exploitation.
The other movement in sports that corrupts this issue is the spread of legal sports gambling. Americans have always gambled on sports, but it was relegated to shadowy corners of society. We shunned it from the light because of the corrosive nature of gambling on competition. The availability of online sports betting and a growing cultural acceptance has made sports betting a big business and many people participate.
The corrosive effect of gambling is already seeping into high school sports. Infusing NIL money and influences into high school athletics will only increase the incentives and abilities of bad actors to corrupt the games.
It is not difficult to imagine someone with a betting interest in a high school sport using NIL influence to change the outcomes. We have a long history of cheating on sports to win a bet.
It is important for high school athletes to be able to work a job or receive reasonable gifts without jeopardizing their amateur status and ability to compete. The WIAA should work to clarify those rules so that athletes can work and compete without fear. But the WIAA should reject implementing NIL in Wisconsin. The risks to the athletes and their sports are not worth the rewards.
Rescued Boater Wanted for Dropping Fish at Goonies House
What a strange world. If you haven’t seen the video of the boat being rolled, it’s stunning.
A man saved by a US coast guard rescue swimmer at the mouth of the Columbia river as a massive wave rolled the yacht he was piloting on Friday was wanted for a bizarre incident in which police said he left a dead fish at the Astoria, Oregon, home featured in the classic 1985 film, The Goonies.
Officers had been looking for the man since Wednesday, when an acquaintance alerted them to a video he posted on social media of himself leaving the fish at the house and then dancing around the property, said the Astoria police chief, Stacy Kelly.
Kelly identified the man as Jericho Labonte, 35, of Victoria, British Columbia. Labonte is also wanted in British Columbia on criminal harassment, mischief and failure to comply cases, Kelly said.
Early on Friday afternoon, the coast guard shared stunning video of a rescue made a few hours earlier in which a newly minted rescue swimmer lowered by cable from a helicopter swam to a 35ft yacht struggling in heavy surf.
As the swimmer approached the vessel, a large wave slammed into it, rolling the boat and throwing a man, later identified as Labonte, into the water.
Racoon Rescued After Testicles Froze to Track
A male raccoon was rescued after its private parts became frozen to a railway track in southern America.
A railway worker was braving -12C conditions in Cochran, Georgia, when he and a colleague came across the distressed animal on the line. It was seen straddling the rail with its testicles stuck to the metal.
Neil Mullis used warm water and a shovel to dislodge the raccoon in a process that took five minutes – after which the animal ran free.
He told local media: “I poured the warm water under his bottom while a co-worker worked the shovel under his butt to try and break him loose.
“After about five minutes of slowly working him loose, he was free. He jumped off the rail and ran in the woods, never looking back.”
No Good Cholesterol
Heh. It’s a good reminder that real science never considers itself “settled.” Keep learning. Keep exploring. Keep questioning.
There may be no such thing as ‘good’ cholesterol after all, a federally-funded study suggests.
Researchers found that high levels of high-density lipoprotein (HDL) were not associated with a lower risk of developing heart disease.
Marijuana is the New Tobacco
Huh. Who would have thought that burning one plant and inhaling the fumes into your lungs might have the same impact as burning another plant and inhaling it into your lungs. I expect that one would get similar results if one burned hay and inhaled it into one’s lungs.
Cannabis has been dubbed ‘the new tobacco’ by doctors after a raft of new research revealed it is as damaging to the heart as smoking cigarettes.
In regular users, the drug was found to increase blood pressure and heart rate significantly in a similar way that heavy smoking does, according to the results of one study.
In the trial, scientists in Canada – where recreational use is legal – gave 21 otherwise healthy volunteers who smoked cannabis frequently a ‘vape’ containing the drug.
A single session of inhaling it was enough to alter the part of nervous system responsible for blood pressure and pulse, according to scans.
The changes could be enough to increase the risk of a heart attack in less healthy patients, they warned.
Ian’s Rage
Fort Myers was one worst battered by Ian, with apocalyptic photos showing homes decimated by its wrath as roads turned into rivers with the tsunami of floodwater.
Naples and nearby Sanibel Island were also rocked by the ‘historic’ hurricane, with images of the latter showing a beachside pool overwhelmed by water as the region saw winds in the excess of 155mph.
The images show the current, embattled state of the Sunshine State’s southwest coast, with now nearly 2million out of power and forced to their home’s rooftops as water levels are still reported to be on the rise.
It always hits closer to home when you have a personal connection with a place. We spent about seven weeks in the Ft. Myers beach/Sanibel/Cape Coral area through December and January. We celebrated the new year while anchored on the backside of Sanibel. In the silence of the bay, we watched the fireworks in the distance while listening to the dolphins breathe as they fished in the bay. The places we called home for those seven weeks will never be the same.
More Pollution Leads to Fewer Hurricanes
Smog saves lives. If we could afford it, everyone should let their cars run in the driveways to prevent the unnecessary loss of lives.
Cleaner air in United States and Europe is brewing more Atlantic hurricanes, a new U.S. government study found.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration study links changes in regionalized air pollution across the globe to storm activity going both up and down. A 50% decrease in pollution particles and droplets in Europe and the U.S. is linked to a 33% increase in Atlantic storm formation in the past couple decades, while the opposite is happening in the Pacific with more pollution and fewer typhoons, according to the study published in Wednesday’s Science Advances.
NOAA hurricane scientist Hiroyuki Murakami ran numerous climate computer simulations to explain change in storm activity in different parts of the globe that can’t be explained by natural climate cycles and found a link to aerosol pollution from industry and cars — sulfur particles and droplets in the air that make it hard to breathe and see.
Couple Dies from Fractal Burning Accident
“Foul play has been ruled out and the deaths were found to be accidental in nature and are believed to be caused by electrocution from fractal wood burning — a technique in which high-voltage electricity is used to burn lightning or tree-like patterns into wood that has been soaked in a chemical solution,” the department said in the statement.
“Through the investigation, it was determined that the fire started in the garage before spreading to the home,” the department continued. “We believe that the fractal wood burning equipment that caused the electrocutions likely caused the fire.”
The technique — which involves using a high-voltage transformer, often repurposed from a microwave — is employed by woodworkers to decorate various wooden items, including decor items and wooden cutting boards.
Earth Day Event Cancelled Due to Inclement Weather
Oh, c’mon. That’s funny.
BARABOO, Wis. – Due to incoming inclement weather, all Earth Day events scheduled for Friday, April 22, at Devil’s Lake State Park are canceled.
Pilot Fakes Qualifications
I desperately want to know what that button was.
Between April 2016 and March 2018, he was employed as a pilot by BA CityFlyer, operating out of London’s City Airport, and by the now-collapsed Irish regional airline Stobart Air, which was owned by Aer Lingus. He was with each carrier for a year, per court documents reported by the newspaper.
Officials at BA CityFlyer first became suspicious after an incident “on the ground” in Switzerland when the pilot pressed a button “no qualified pilot would,” a source told The Times, without providing further details.
He was investigated by the CAA, which took legal action.
The Times reported that the pilot manipulated the log recording his flight hours while working for a previous employer, Hangar 8 Management, which operates the same Embraer 190 jet as BA CityFlyer. He also falsely said he’d held a private pilot’s licence since 1998, according to court documents quoted by The Times.
Monkeys On the Loose
This sounds like the beginning of a horror movie.
Jamie Labar was working at the front desk at a Super 8 hotel in Montour County, Pennsylvania, on Friday when she heard that there had been a crash on the highway nearby.
“I thought it was just another car accident because there’s always accidents there,” she said.
But it was not just another accident. The Pennsylvania State Police said that a pickup truck with an enclosed trailer full of 100 monkeys had collided with a dump truck and that four of the monkeys had escaped.
Tornadoes Tear Up Midwest
Prayers for all those affected. Mother Nature can be a B sometimes.
A devastating tornado outbreak has killed dozens of people across multiple states, with Kentucky possibly seeing its deadliest tornado system ever, officials said.
As many as 70 people are believed to have been killed in western Kentucky, and the death toll could exceed 100, according to Gov. Andy Beshear. Those numbers “could rise significantly,” he said Saturday afternoon.
[…]
The Associated Press has confirmed the deaths of 30 people across five states, including 22 in Kentucky, from the storms, as search and rescue missions are ongoing.
“Dozens” were killed at a candle factory in Mayfield, where 110 people were working when the storm hit Friday night, Beshear said at a 4 a.m. press conference. Around 40 people were evacuated, although the facility had major structural damage from the storm and housed dangerous equipment, he said late Saturday morning.
We just recently spent a fair amount of time in Western Kentucky. It’s a wonderfully beautiful area with good people. Horrible to see this happen.
Vaccinated Are Dying
Again, the real value of the vaccine appears to be that it lessens the severity if you are infected.
More than 2,500 fully vaccinated over 50s have died from COVID-19 in the past month in England, new data shows.
In a report published by the UK Health Security Agency analysis revealed 2,683 fully vaccinated over 50s have died within 28 days of positive COVID test in the last four weeks.
Some 511 unvaccinated people died in the last four weeks of COVID-19.
The figures reflect the fact that the vast majority in this age group has had at least two COVID vaccines.
Death rates among the unvaccinated are significantly higher.
For people aged over 80, the unvaccinated have a death rate of 125.4 per 100,000 compared to the vaccinated 54.9 per 100,000 in the past four weeks.
For 70-79 the gap is even wider, with the unvaccinated death rate at 103.8 per 100,000 compared to 16.2 for the vaccinated.