The good news is that nurses rarely actually spend as long as that paper suggests for alcohol surface prep. The bad news is that it’s short enough to further call the effectiveness into question. At least they aren’t using iodine for it any more; I never saw a nurse wait the full 2 minutes that calls for. I don’t have the references at hand, but I wonder if chlorhexidine has a fast enough disinfection time to be practical; I know it is at most the same time-frame as alcohol, maybe shorter.
spqr0a1
Karma: 78
I used to use the same mask that Zvi’s friend recommends, but switched to 3M’s model 7502 respirator with model 7093 P100 filters. The mask I use is made of silicone and because of that is more comfortable for extended wear and easier to securely fit. The filter cartridges are less visually obtrusive than the pink ‘pancake’ filters and last longer before clogging (more of a concern for construction work than general covid wear).
I don’t have first-hand experience with the GVS Elipse series, but the most compact model looks easier to fit a surgical mask over, should you go somewhere that enforces that bit of theater.
I expect the 1.17x transmission advantage among unvaccinated to mainly be immune evasion as well. One might be able to get a sense of this from existing data by accounting for the proportion previously infected and the degree of protection that conferred toward delta.
I am surprised this writeup didn’t mention physical aspects of geophagy. I always thought that tooth-wear was the main hazard of eating dirt. There’s plenty of research on geophagy and tooth-wear, both direct like kaolin, and indirect like stone-milled grains which has a big impact in dental specimens in archeology.
40% of whitetail deer had a SARS-CoV2 infection by March 2021. https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.29.454326v1 I’d expect it to be predominantly Delta in them too by now. Given the population and reproduction rate of deer, I’d expect the virus to keep circulating in deer indefinitely.
Interested to see a historical analysis of luminous efficacy. Spans 3 orders of magnitude, similar timeframe to other topics covered, and also like other topics here includes many sequential innovations as opposed to mere iteration on a particular technology.
Check out metafilter.
Consider helminthic therapy. Hookworm infection down-regulates bowel inflammation and my parasitology professor thinks it is a very promising approach. NPR has a reasonably good popularization. Depending on the species chosen, one treatment can control symptoms for up to 5 years at a time. It is commercially available despite lack of regulatory approval. Not quite a magic bullet, but an active area of research with good preliminary results.
On the left is Willard Quine.
Activity in many niches could credibly signal high status in some circles by making available many insights with short inferential distance to the general public (outside any of your niches). Allowing one to seem very experienced/intelligent.
Moreover, the benefits to being medium status in several hobby groups and the associated large number of otherwise unrelated social connections may be greater than readily apparent. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_network#Structural_holes
If the commute is mostly flat, consider Freeline skates. They take up much less space than any of the mentioned wheels; the technique is different from skateboarding but the learning curve isn’t any worse.
Adipocyte count is essential to maintaining weight.
It is unclear to what extent weight is genetic rather than environmentally set at a later stage in development.
Given that in adulthood adipocyte number stays constant, and weight changes are predominantly accompanied by changes in adipocyte volume, one may conclude that at some critical point in development the final fat cell number is attained and after this point no fat cell turnover occurs. Analysis of adipocyte turnover using carbon-14 dating (for a detailed methodological description, see Ref. [5]), however, has recently shown that this is not the case, but rather that adipocytes are a dynamic and highly regulated population of cells. New adipocytes form constantly to replace lost adipocytes, such that approximately every 8 years 50% of adipocytes (...) are replaced (emphasis added).
I am unable to find whether fat cell count can be changed over this 8 year time scale, though my biochemistry professor was inclined to that hypothesis.
Obesity can be characterised into two main types, hyperplastic (increase in adipocyte number) and hypertrophic (increase in adipocyte volume). Obese and overweight individuals may exist anywhere along the cellularity scale, however on average certain trends appear. Hypertrophy, to a degree, is characteristic of all overweight and obese individuals. Hyperplasia, however, is correlated more strongly with obesity severity.
Heredity and weight:
at present, it is impossible to conclude whether the average increase in adipocyte number seen in obese and severely obese individuals is the result of adult adipocyte recruitment or rather a reflection of a population of people predisposed (by their pre-adulthood fat cell number) to be become obese/severely obese.
The long-term weight loss cited in this review used a 1-2 year followup, during which time only <16% of adipocytes could have turned over.
it is clear that fat cell number does not decrease in adulthood, even following long-term weight loss. (emphasis added) In line with this, hyperplastic obese individuals have a poorer treatment outcome following diet-induced weight loss than hypertrophic individuals (when controlled for fat mass). Often for hyperplastic obese individuals, treatments other than diet and exercise are necessary if substantial and permanent weight loss is to be achieved. Successful, but invasive therapies include surgery to reduce the amount of calories ingested (e.g. gastric bypass) and/or surgical removal of fat tissue (e.g. reconstructive surgery or liposuction). The recent discovery of a high turnover of adipocytes in adult human white adipose tissue (approximately 10% annually) now establishes an additional therapeutic target for the pharmacological intervention of obesity [1].
What was bad about the Saxon program for you? I liked its spaced repetition; though being taught in a private school by a retired engineer probably masked any shortcomings in the textbooks. Should I stop recommending Saxon math?
On keyboard utility: I’ve been using the a mechanical keyboard for 3 years and enjoy typing on it more than a membrane switch (generic). Prior to this one regular keyboard lasted me about 8 months; at maybe $15 for a cheap keyboard compared to $70 for this, $15/8 months - $80/x months gives a breakeven time of 3.5 years. (IBM/unicomp Model M keyboards can last for decades)
If you have a problem with keyboard durability then mechanical keyboards have slight positive utility, otherwise I would only recommend them if you noticeably preferred typing on one.
Edited to add: The research on repetitive strain injury (thanks wgd!) along with anecdotes of faster typing definitely make this low hanging fruit. Updated to strong recommendation.
To prize every thing according to its real use ought to be the aim of a rational being. There are few things which can much conduce to happiness, and, therefore, few things to be ardently desired. He that looks upon the business and bustle of the world, with the philosophy with which Socrates surveyed the fair at Athens, will turn away at last with his exclamation, ‘How many things are here which I do not want’.
--Samuel Johnson, The Adventurer, #119, December 25, 1753.
How so? That is insight I would like to see. QM does not come readily to my mind from this post.
I am trying to access the full article through my library system but it will take some time. It is worth noting that my goal is for light to make me sneeze, if and only if I already feel like sneezing. This is different from ACHOO syndrome as generally described; so I am unsure whether my technique uses the same biological mechanism.
EDIT: Until reading your post I had not considered the possibility that I may be a carrier who had not yet expressed this trait. I thought that I would be able to acquire it through conditioning regardless. Lack of a response from my family suggests that this is an acquired trait for me.
UPDATE: Indeed, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7673597 was about to discriminate between this hypotheses. I have the article and it states that 39.3% of those affected reported no family history of photic sneezing. From this and other data they conclude that ”… in approximately 25% of cases the [photic sneeze response] may be inherited in an autosomal dominant manner, but the majority of cases appear to be related to environmental influences.” They did not identify any causal environmental factors for the formation of this response, but that it is primarily acquired is good news for anyone interested in trying it.
Primarily I was looking for an exercise in conditioning, any practical benefits are ancillary. If progress continues, I will not sneeze unless a specific trigger is present (staring at a very bright light); so it should be a passive benefit with no long-term upkeep. If you have better ways of control sneezing, I am interested in knowing them.
A friend of mine naturally exhibits exclusively photosensitive sneezing. So I thought it would be interesting to try. This study suggests it is primarily acquired and not inherited so I figured it was worth a shot.
The particular vaccine (MVA-BN / Imvanex / Jynneos) that has been shown to be effective for monkeypox is administered via injection[1] not scarification. Stored frozen, it has an approved shelf life of 36 months[1]. In 2014 the US had 24 million doses stockpiled[2]; As far as I can tell, the stockpile is around 1 million doses now[3].
There are also 100 million doses[3] of the scarifying (ACAM2000) vaccine that hasn’t been studied for monkeypox; Stored dry, that has an approved shelf life of 18 months[4]. It is not currently clear to me how much of the stockpile is beyond its expiration date.
If the FDA requires EUAs for the expired vaccines[5], how long that regulatory process will take and how useful vaccination will be by that point are open questions.
[1] https://www.fda.gov/media/131802/download
[2] https://www.niaid.nih.gov/diseases-conditions/smallpox-vaccine
[3] https://www.nbcnews.com/science/science-news/smallpox-vaccines-protect-against-monkeypox-stockpiled-rcna29919
[4] https://www.health.mil/Reference-Center/Policies/2008/01/31/Transition-to-ACAM2000-Smallpox-Vaccine
[5] https://www.fda.gov/emergency-preparedness-and-response/mcm-legal-regulatory-and-policy-framework/expiration-dating-extension