One afternoon, 12 years ago, I was doing some gentle exercises in the local gym. I was adjusting the rowing machine when, suddenly, my vision blurred and I fell sideways […]
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Richard Smith: Choosing among sorrows
“We live in a world of competing sorrows,” said Daniel Moynihan, the American senator. How can policy makers choose among sorrows? One way is with the help of the Copenhagen […]
Liz Wager: Guidelines for misconduct?
I’m generally a big fan of guidelines—in fact, I’ve written a few myself, but a recent conversation with a wise Indian researcher made me ponder their darker side. We were […]
Desmond O’Neill: Combating gerontological illiteracy
St Gallen is a fascinating small city in the north-eastern corner of Switzerland. Famed for its fabulous rococo monastic library (including the earliest extant manuscript of the Nibelung legend), the […]
John Davies on working at the Paralympics
I never thought that they would ask me back to help out during the Paralympics. But the call came, and it was for Eton Manor and the wheelchair tennis events. […]
Richard Smith: Of human bubbles
Financial history is full of bubbles, driven by “our innate inclination to veer from euphoria to despondency.” As I read an account of how bubbles happen in Niall Ferguson’s excellent […]
Daniele Dionisio: Overhauling the Global Fund
The Global Fund (GF) is a partnership between governments, civil society, the private sector, and relevant communities as an international financing institution for HIV, tuberculosis (TB), and malaria prevention, and […]
Tracey Koehlmoos: Self plagiarism
In the US there has been a spate of high profile plagiarism incidents. In some cases, the writers have been penalized and in others the adage that the stars are […]
Richard Lehman’s journal review—3 September 2012
NEJM 30 Aug 2012 Vol 367 787 Most medical research is boring and irrelevant. We take that for granted: most clinicians only read research papers if they urgently need to, […]
Julian Sheather and Vivienne Nathanson: Todd Akin, rape, and “doctors”
According to the historian Tony Judt, the Red Army, after raping and brutalising its way across Europe in the closing stages of the Second World War, left behind, in Germany […]