Goodbye Crop Diversity
Here’s a picture from National Geographic showing a stunning decline in the genetic diversity of crops:
This is dangerous – diversity is key to avoiding crop failures from disease and pestilence.
Here’s a picture from National Geographic showing a stunning decline in the genetic diversity of crops:
This is dangerous – diversity is key to avoiding crop failures from disease and pestilence.
Back in June, I published a series of essays about efforts to fly people around the country to give them better access to life-saving organ transplants. For your convenience, I have pulled the three essays together into one PDF. As a teaser, I will remind you of the first few paragraphs of the essay. But…
The novel coronavirus has decimated our economy at the same time as it has directly threatened our health. As if that weren’t bad enough, the economic damage Covid-19 is causing could have an indirect impact on our health. Consider what we already know about economic downturns and opioid overdoses. A research team led by Atheendar…
Some medical services are unnecessary. Is it your first day of uncomplicated lower back pain? You don’t need an x-ray. But many patients continue to receive such services anyway, perhaps because they demand them or, perhaps, because their providers keep recommending them. But does the likelihood of unnecessary services depend on your insurance? Specifically, do Medicaid…
A friend of mine recently had a very sore throat. She knew how to manage her symptoms–lozenges, warm tea and the like. But she was worried she might have strep and would therefore need antibiotics. That should be a simple question to answer with a quick trip to the primary care clinic. Except that her…
I recently gave a talk about shared decision making at the annual conference for the National Comprehensive Cancer Network. Here is a nice write-up of that talk. For those of you silly enough not to travel to Florida to hear me pontificate! After listening to the treatment alternatives—surveillance, or active treatment with surgery and radiation—a…
Last year, I joined Zeke Emanuel and some other great people in publishing an article on how to use the insights of behavioral economics to nudge physicians towards providing high-value care. Here is a link to that article. To give you a teaser, here are some of the principles we drew upon: And here are…