Medicine Archives

The Pernicious Folly of Pursuing Zero Covid

I often return from my hospital rounds as an infectious disease consultant having seen zero COVID-19 patients. Over the past few months, this has become a common occurrence—not only when…

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5 min

Science & Tech

Brain Enhancement: Is It Ethical?

Our scientific advancements have made it possible to alter brain function and to monitor and manipulate the human mind. Neurocognitive interventions can assist those who seek to regain normal brain…

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6 min

A Blood Alcohol Guessing Game and a False Accusation of Racism

A number of years ago, I worked as a low level emergency responder. When allegations surfaced in June that ER workers across British Columbia were playing a blood alcohol level…

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9 min

Science & Tech

A First World Plague: Medical Error in the United States

Error and its more malignant cousin malpractice are quietly epidemic in the American medical industry. Read even a few of the chilling anecdotal reports that flood online forums and a…

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8 min

Science & Tech

The Need for Transparency in Drug Information

One of the few things Americans are united on is the need to curb the high cost of prescription drugs. Novartis recently made headlines, after a $2 million drug was…

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6 min

Science & Tech

The Myth of the Natural

If you want people to buy your product just label it natural. If you want to disapprove of something just label it unnatural. Yet, to embrace the idea that everything…

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8 min

Reproductive Rights in the Transhuman Future

I was recently asked to film a talk by David Pearce, philosopher and co-founder of international transhumanist organization Humanity+. The presentation, entitled “Towards the Abolition of Suffering,” outlined a future…

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9 min

Science & Tech

Aesthetic Norms, Germs and the Medicalization of Ugliness

Medicalization is the process of bringing social, legal or political problems under medical authority: this is how human problems become medical problems. The concept is typically used to refer to…

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8 min

Psychology

No, You Don’t Have a Disorder. You Have Feelings

The London Times recently carried a story about an avalanche of self-harm among British school children. According to the article, “school nurses are dealing with panic attacks, self-cutting, overdoses and…

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5 min

Science & Tech

“Nothing Human Is Foreign to Me”: On the Nobility of Science and the Humanistic Instinct

Only recently did I realize there was a word for the desire to understand and prevent disease, and, more generally, to help people flourish: humanism.

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Medicine

The Pernicious Folly of Pursuing Zero Covid

Brain Enhancement: Is It Ethical?

A Blood Alcohol Guessing Game and a False Accusation of Racism

A First World Plague: Medical Error in the United States

The Need for Transparency in Drug Information

The Myth of the Natural

Reproductive Rights in the Transhuman Future

Aesthetic Norms, Germs and the Medicalization of Ugliness

No, You Don’t Have a Disorder. You Have Feelings

“Nothing Human Is Foreign to Me”: On the Nobility of Science and the Humanistic Instinct

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