What is the public health equilibrium? It’s a term I coined to describe the balancing act that is public health, which I’ll describe in this blog. This is my perception, vision, thinking and not anyone I work for or consult for. This blog was inspired by one of my recent tweets: I don’t think the […]
Running with Headlines: Headline Science Troubles:
Running with Headlines & Headline Science Troubles: For today’s musings in scicomms…What’s in a headline? And what do we do with headlines? To explain, let me share a Running with Headlines experience that happened: I recently had Dr. Shuji Ogino (Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School) on my Causes or Cures podcast to […]
The Ridiculous Panic over Misinformation
Even if you reside under a rock, you’ve heard about the problem of online misinformation. While discussions around online misinformation went mainstream during the 2016 presidential election, they exploded during the COVID-19 pandemic. At least for scientific misinformation, which is a reminder that we now have categories of misinformation…political, scientific, health…as if there is […]
Truth-Seeking: A Caveat to be Aware of
The Caveat of Truth-Seeking: By: Dr. Eeks I posted the following on Instagram and Twitter: “Criticize crony-capitalistic influences. There’s enough legitimate material there. Try to avoid conspiracy theories that will make it harder to be taken seriously and create viable, positive change. If you aren’t sure where something stands, ask more questions.” I don’t […]
It’s Not a Misinformation Problem. It’s a Trust Problem.
By Dr. Eeks This is my hypothesis, not anyone’s I work for. It’s also my dog’s hypothesis, and so you know, he’s quite bright. A recent poll conducted among healthcare workers showed that 72% of them state misinformation negatively impacts patients’ decisions about the vaccine, and 71% of them said it negatively impacts their decisions […]
War and the Art of the Napkin Risk-Benefit Analysis
By: Dr. Eeks The Art of the Napkin Risk-Benefit Analysis for COVID and the War on Misinformation: “Dear Bo, Once again, they are trying to get people vaccinated by calling them dumbf*cks. I’ll be here all winter.” Imagine if we were writing letters home from our various perspectives of the war on misinformation? What […]
Natural Immunity…Shh! Don’t Say Those Words
Natural Immunity…Shh! Don’t Say Those Words! by: Dr. Eeks This morning I flipped through a couple of my Epidemiology books from public health school, trying to figure out why “natural immunity” became taboo. I always just assumed that herd immunity included both natural immunity and if there was a vaccine available, vaccine-induced immunity. […]