What Adam is Reading

Week of February 27, 2023

Our family trip to Reno was a great mix of downtime and new experiences. We tried snowshoeing, learned about the entertainment options in an 1870s Nevada mining town (opera, alcohol, and bobcat vs. dog fights), and wandered the winter landscape around Lake Tahoe. The Donner Party Museum offered a good lesson about the delta between expectations and reality. The exhibits focused on the struggle and evolution of migrating across North America in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Cannibalism, while mentioned briefly, was discussed only in the context of the lack of evidence supporting the well-known stories. However, my kids and I noted the absence of a cafe (or other gift-shop snacks) at the museum. We postulated that this choice avoids many bad jokes and uncomfortable conversations. (I suspect you can only tolerate questions like, "what's in those chicken fingers?" a few times before you quit).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donner_Party

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donner_Memorial_State_Park

---

N.Y. Times Tracker

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/us/covid-cases.html

Financial Times Data

https://ig.ft.com/coronavirus-chart/?areas=eur&areas=usa&areas=e92000001&areasRegional=usny&areasRegional=usnm&areasRegional=uspr&areasRegional=usaz&areasRegional=usfl&areasRegional=usnd&cumulative=0&logScale=0&per100K=1&startDate=2021-09-01&values=deaths

------

Continuing the theme of headlines vs. data (a la the Donner party museum above), two topics continue to come up in conversations.

One of my more savvy patients asked me about the Cochrane Database metanalysis on the effectiveness of masking. Media outlets shared the Cochrane article without much analysis of the underlying studies or data. Dr. Trisha Greenhalgh compiled a comprehensive thread on the data regarding masks and why generating a meta-analysis of masking studies is so challenging. Short story- masks work.

https://twitter.com/trishgreenhalgh/status/1629827703330287618

and, thanks to a loyal reader, another deep-dive review of the meta-analysis

https://twitter.com/tomaspueyo/status/1630000803141255169

Another example of unnuanced headlines potentially distorting data appeared on Sunday in various new sources. The U.S. Department of Energy offered a report stating they had a low-confidence opinion that coronavirus resulted from an accidental lab leak (as opposed to a seafood market animal to human transmission). The data in numerous detailed, publicly available analyses on this topic are not convincing (one way or another). I think the New York Times did the best job capturing the range of opinions plus the underlying uncertainty:

"Lab Leak Most Likely Caused Pandemic, Energy Dept. Says The conclusion, which was made with "low confidence," came as America's intelligence agencies remained divided over the origins of the coronavirus."

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/26/us/politics/china-lab-leak-coronavirus-pandemic.html

Here is a more detailed discussion of this topic from a Canadian virologist:

https://mobile.twitter.com/angie_rasmussen/status/1629938451628843010

One last well-balanced discussion regarding data - Dr. Jeremy Faust discussed how he interprets the data on the role of antivirals in treating COVID. It is a good reminder of the importance of treating older adults and patients with chronic medical conditions with these medications.

https://insidemedicine.substack.com/p/covid-antivirals-not-shown-to-decrease?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

Medical Trends and Technology

I was very interested to learn about Apple's non-invasive continuous glucose monitoring technology. While currently proof of concept, using optics to indirectly measure blood levels of any molecule or electrolyte (glucose, sodium, potassium) are both remarkable and much needed.

https://www.medtechdive.com/news/apple-blood-glucose-technology-CGM-threat/643324/

Apple is not alone in these efforts, but incorporating such sensors in widely available and accepted consumer tech (iWatch) would be a huge step forward. Other articles on this topic, similar to the bio-electrical tattoos I have previously discussed:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S016599362200053X

and

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0956566322004523

Infographics

I enjoyed this "Price of Starbucks Tall Latte in Every Country" infographic.

https://www.cashnetusa.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/02/01_Big-Bucks-Coffee_Map_World_Hi-RES-1.png

It is part of a detailed blog post about how much money the world's consumers are spending on coffee drinks

https://www.cashnetusa.com/blog/starbucks-price-every-country/

Things I learned this week

I learned about Accidental Renaissance Photography this week. I attempted a few shots on our family trip, but my younger son pointed out that staging an accidental photo is not accidental.

https://petapixel.com/2021/05/27/how-to-create-accidental-renaissance-photos-light-and-composition/

and

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2014/aug/08/accidental-renaissance-photos-look-like-italian-paintings-in-pictures

P.R. is critical for fame. Alexander Graham Bell's story of inventing the telephone is far more complex and intertwined with other inventors than I realized.

https://www.livescience.com/who-invented-the-telephone

Living with A.I.

It looks like we are moving through the stages of grief regarding A.I.

A thoughtful N.Y. Times OpEd discusses how economics will shape A.I. and how, in turn, technology will shape human behavior.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/26/opinion/microsoft-bing-sydney-artificial-intelligence.html

Microsoft is merging ChatGPT with robotics.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/group/autonomous-systems-group-robotics/articles/chatgpt-for-robotics/

And two A.I. art scandals (of a sort):

A famous Instagram portrait artist admits to using A.I.-generated photos rather than a camera and real people (as he claimed).

https://news.artnet.com/art-world/fake-instagram-photography-ai-generated-joe-avery-2260674

And, it appears, ChatGPT is not yet ready to generate crochet patterns.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2023/feb/26/chatgpt-generated-crochet-pattern-results