Cyclosporiasis Outbreak Sickens Hundreds

Cyclosporiasis is the name of the intestinal illness caused by the single-celled microscopic parasite Cyclospora cayetanensis. It is spread through ingestion of food or water contaminated by stool. (Oh, sorry. I hope you’re not reading this over lunch.) In the US, outbreaks of cyclosporiasis have usually been linked to contaminated imported fresh produce. It is not spread directly through contact from person to person. The onset of the illness occurs about seven days after ingest...
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Marie Curie Helps Patients with Metastatic Prostate Cancer

Anytime you or I feel particularly content with our achievements, we would be well advised to review the biography of Marie Curie. We would then quickly realize that we are unambitious mediocrities who should be much more productive. The magnitude of her accomplishments is dizzying. Virtually everything we know about radioactivity rests on the work of Madame Curie and her husband Pierre. The Curies coined the term radioactivity. She discovered the elements polonium and radium. She r...
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Even More Studies You Should Ignore

Back when I was a medical student (in the Cretaceous Period) we were taught that someone once did a study comparing folic acid levels in the blood of cancer patients compared to the blood of healthy patients. The cancer patients had, on average, significantly lower folic acid levels. And the ones with the largest, fastest growing tumors tended to have the lowest folic acid levels. “Aha,” they thought. “Something about folic acid deficiency predisposes them to cancer. We should give folic aci...
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