Podcasts about nejm

Featuring articles on pulmonary arterial hypertension, oral semaglutide and cardiovascular outcomes, giant-cell arteritis, the loss of subsidized drug coverage and mortality, and neutralizing venom toxins; a review article on cancer of unknown primary site; a case report of a man with fever, nausea, and respiratory failure; and Perspectives on primary care and the free market, federal cuts at the VA, the GINA gap, and the meaning of goodbye.

Send us a Text Message (please include your email so we can respond!)Episode 65! Though this is during ATS, this episode was pre-recorded so you will get some reactions to the conference in the coming episodes. Instead we have a short episode where we talk about risk factors for stress ulcers and transfusion threshold in upper GI bleeding!Risk factors: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/40315134/Transfusion threshold: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23281973/Transfusion threshold (NEJM): https://www.nejm.org/doi/10.1056/NEJMoa1211801If you enjoy the show be sure to like and subscribe, leave that 5 star review! Be sure to follow us on the social @icucast for the associated figures, comments, and other content not available in the audio format! Email us at icuedandtoddcast@gmail.com with any questions or suggestions! Thank you Mike Gannon for the intro and exit music!

This week's topics include USPSTF on screening for syphilis in pregnancy, when to take blood pressure medicines, comparing weight loss drugs, and a narrative intervention for PTSD after an ICU stay.Program notes:0:40 NEJM publication of comparison of obesity medications1:40 Tirzepatide versus semaglutide for 72 weeks2:41 Also had reduction in blood pressure3:26 Rise in congenital syphilis and screening4:26 Disparities among various groups5:26 Highest incidence in the last 30 years6:26 In 2023 210,000 cases of syphilis7:00 When to take blood pressure meds8:00 Monitored blood pressure in a subset8:40 Intervention for PTSD after ICU stay9:40 Self reported PTSD symptoms​​10:40 Must learn to deliver intervention11:40 Physician needed to spend 45 minutes per visit12:42 End

Featuring articles on multiple sclerosis, narcolepsy type 1, antiretroviral therapy in children with HIV, and porcine kidney xenotransplantation; a review article on Ph-positive acute lymphoblastic leukemia; a case report of a woman with peritonsillar swelling and bleeding; and Perspectives on the power of physicians in dangerous times, on community health centers, on AI-driven clinical documentation, and on driving Jackson.

Alice Chen is a primary care internist in Washington, DC, and former executive director of Doctors for America. Stephen Morrissey, the interviewer, is the Executive Managing Editor of the Journal. A.T. Chen and V.H. Murthy. The Power of Physicians in Dangerous Times. N Engl J Med 2025;392:1873-1875.

Evropský statistický úřad vydal každoroční zprávu o životních podmínkách ve členských zemích EU. Podle výsledků jsou nejméně ohroženi chudobou nebo sociálním vyloučením právě Češi. „Byla by to dobrá zpráva, kdyby byla pravdivá,“ komentuje výsledky sociolog Daniel Prokop. „V Česku je samozřejmě extrémní chudoby málo. Ale tento ukazatel je mimořádně zkreslující.“ V audiozáznamu se dostane také na téma volební kampaně anebo jestli bytovou krizi mohou vyřešit slevy na hypotékách.Všechny díly podcastu Jak to vidí... můžete pohodlně poslouchat v mobilní aplikaci mujRozhlas pro Android a iOS nebo na webu mujRozhlas.cz.

Evropský statistický úřad vydal každoroční zprávu o životních podmínkách ve členských zemích EU. Podle výsledků jsou nejméně ohroženi chudobou nebo sociálním vyloučením právě Češi. „Byla by to dobrá zpráva, kdyby byla pravdivá,“ komentuje výsledky sociolog Daniel Prokop. „V Česku je samozřejmě extrémní chudoby málo. Ale tento ukazatel je mimořádně zkreslující.“ V audiozáznamu se dostane také na téma volební kampaně anebo jestli bytovou krizi mohou vyřešit slevy na hypotékách.

Co stojí za tak rychlým poklesem, jak zamával s rodičovstvím covid a proč už není potomek podmínkou k naplnění života. Hostem Leonarda Plus je vedoucí katedry demografie a geodemografie Přírodovědecké fakulty UK Jiřina Kocourková, která příčiny poklesu porodnosti akuálně řeší v rámci výzkumného projektu "Příležitosti a rizika individualizace společnosti". Moderuje Renata Kropáčková.

In this first webinar of RheumNow's Lupus Unlocked campaign, Journal Club discussed two articles: Efficacy and Safety of Obinutuzumab in Active Lupus Nephritis. Furie R, et al. NEJM. 2025 Feb 7. doi: 10.1056 Efficacy and safety of voclosporin versus placebo for lupus nephritis (AURORA 1) Rovin BH. Lancet. 2021 May 29;397(10289) Speakers: Brad Rovin, MD Richard Furie, MD Jack Cush, MD

Featuring articles on high-risk smoldering multiple myeloma, M. tuberculosis infection, type 2 diabetes, uncontrolled hypertension, and lymphoma; a review article on the chemistry of food; a case report of a man with weight loss, weakness, and anorexia; and Perspectives on the dismantling of foreign-assistance efforts, on the crushing weight of nonclinical demands in primary care, and on the last dose.

Christopher Duggan is the director of the Center for Nutrition at Boston Children's Hospital, a professor of pediatrics at Harvard Medical School, and a professor in the Departments of Nutrition and Global Health and Population at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Stephen Morrissey, the interviewer, is the Executive Managing Editor of the Journal. C.P. Duggan and Z.A. Bhutta. “Putting America First” — Undermining Health for Populations at Home and Abroad. N Engl J Med 2025;392:1769-1771.

Aktuální dění očima Jana Krause každé ráno 5:00 – 9:00 vždy po zprávách v celou a v půl exkluzivně na Frekvenci 1. Vtipně, originálně a s nadhledem, tak to umí jenom Jan Kraus. Blondýna Miluška Bittnerová se ptá na vše, o čem se mluví, a Jan Kraus jí to vysvětlí.

會談地圖Podcast

Vamos abordar os dados do estudo ESSENCE, publicado agora em Abril de 2025 no NEJM.

Featuring articles on lipoprotein(a), familial polycythemia, leukocyte adhesion deficiency, COPD, and on policies on reducing alcohol consumption; a review article on addressing alcohol use; a Clinical Problem-Solving on gazing into a crystal ball; and Perspectives on death and taxes, on cancer metastases, and on a good innings.

A JAMA model warns measles could become endemic in the U.S. within 21 years if MMR vaccination rates don't rise, with over 850,000 projected cases. A Phase 3 NEJM trial found brensocatib reduced exacerbations in non-CF bronchiectasis. An EPIC study correlated higher breast cancer risk to higher education levels, beyond lifestyle and reproductive factors.

Arthur Robin Williams is an associate professor of clinical psychiatry at Columbia University and a research scientist at the New York State Psychiatric Institute. Stephen Morrissey, the interviewer, is the Executive Managing Editor of the Journal. A.R. Williams. Death and Taxes — Is Alcohol the Solution? N Engl J Med 2025;392:1665-1667.

Diabetes Core Update is a monthly podcast that presents and discusses the latest clinically relevant articles from the American Diabetes Association's four science and medical journals – Diabetes, Diabetes Care, Clinical Diabetes, and Diabetes Spectrum. Each episode is approximately 25 minutes long and presents 5-6 recently published articles from ADA journals. Intended for practicing physicians and health care professionals, Diabetes Core Update   discusses how the latest research and information published in journals of the American Diabetes Association are relevant to clinical practice and can be applied in a treatment setting. Welcome to diabetes core update where every month we go over the most important articles to come out in the field of diabetes. Articles that are important for practicing clinicians to understand to stay up with the rapid changes in the field.  This issue will review: 1.     Lepodisiran — A Long-Duration Small Interfering RNA Targeting Lipoprotein(a) - NEJM 2.     Diabetes and Anemia – Diabetes Care 3.     Efficacy and Safety of Finerenone in Type 2 Diabetes: A Pooled Analysis of Trials – Diabetes Care 4.     Cardiovascular and Kidney Outcomes and Mortality With Long- Acting Injectable and Oral Glucagon-Like Peptide 1 Receptor Agonists in Individuals With Type 2 Diabetes: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis of Randomized Trials – Diabetes Care 5.     Oral Semaglutide and Cardiovascular Outcomes in High-Risk Type 2 Diabetes - NEJM   For more information about each of ADA's science and medical journals, please visit Diabetesjournals.org. Hosts: Neil Skolnik, M.D., Professor of Family and Community Medicine, Sidney Kimmel Medical College, Thomas Jefferson University; Associate Director, Family Medicine Residency Program, Abington Jefferson Health John J. Russell, M.D., Professor of Family and Community Medicine, Sidney Kimmel Medical College, Thomas Jefferson University; Chair-Department of Family Medicine, Abington Jefferson Health

Featuring articles on bronchiectasis, influenza, clonal hematopoiesis of indeterminate potential, and metachromatic leukodystrophy; a review article on biology of the Fc neonatal receptor; a case report of a woman with sore throat and rash; and Perspectives on HIV preexposure prophylaxis, on fossil fuels, and on Medicaid's mandate for children and adolescents.

Lauren Jatt is an infectious diseases fellow at the University of Washington. Stephen Morrissey, the interviewer, is the Executive Managing Editor of the Journal. L.P. Jatt and Others. An HIV Vaccine in the Era of Twice-Yearly Lenacapavir for PrEP — Essential or Irrelevant? N Engl J Med 2025;392:1561-1563.

Send us a Text Message (please include your email so we can respond!)Episode 63! We talk about intermediate risk PE in "Large-Bore Mechanical Thrombectomy Versus Catheter-Directed Thrombolysis in the Management of Intermediate-Risk Pulmonary Embolism" by Jaber et al published in Circulation in February 2025. Then we talk about "Fibrinolysis for patients with intermediate-risk pulmonary embolism" by Meter et al in NEJM 2014.PEERLESS: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39470698/PEITHO: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24716681/PE Meta-analysis: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24938564/If you enjoy the show be sure to like and subscribe, leave that 5 star review! Be sure to follow us on the social @icucast for the associated figures, comments, and other content not available in the audio format! Email us at icuedandtoddcast@gmail.com with any questions or suggestions! Thank you Mike Gannon for the intro and exit music!

In this NEJM Outbreaks Update, Editor-in-Chief Eric Rubin and Deputy Editor Lindsey Baden are joined by Indiana Commissioner of Public Health Lindsay Weaver to discuss the current state of avian influenza in Indiana. Eric Rubin is the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal. Lindsey Baden is a Deputy Editor of the Journal. Lindsay Weaver is the Indiana Commissioner of Public Health. Stephen Morrissey, the interviewer, is the Executive Managing Editor of the Journal. E.J. Rubin and Others. NEJM Outbreaks Updates — H5N1 in Indiana. N Engl J Med. DOI: 10.1056/NEJMe2503583.

The FAME 3 trial 5-year results, TAVR at 5 years, pacers after TAVR, and mavacamten not a wonder drug are the topics John Mandrola, MD, discusses in this week's podcast. This podcast is intended for healthcare professionals only. To read a partial transcript or to comment, visit: https://www.medscape.com/twic I FAME 3 at Five Years Stents as Good as Surgery for Triple-Vessel Disease https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/noninvasive-stents-good-surgery-triple-vessel-disease-2025a10007l4 Main trial NEJM https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2112299 Circulation 3-years https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.123.065770 5-year results Lancet 10.1016/S0140-6736(25)00505-7 https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0140673625005057 II TAVR in Low-Risk Patients at 5 years 5-Year TAVR, Surgery Outcomes Similar in Low-Risk Patients https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/5-year-tavr-surgery-outcomes-similar-low-risk-patients-2025a10007zl EVOLUT Low-Risk 5 years https://www.jacc.org/doi/10.1016/j.jacc.2025.03.004 EVOLUT Editorial – We're Halfway There https://www.jacc.org/doi/10.1016/j.jacc.2025.03.428 PARTNER 3 Low-Risk https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2307447 NOTION at 5 years https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.118.036606 III The Matter of Pacemakers After TAVI JACC IV Study Badertscher https://www.jacc.org/doi/10.1016/j.jcin.2025.03.028 Assessing the quality of reporting of harms in randomized controlled trials published in high impact cardiovascular journals   IV Mavacamten Looks to Have Specific Indications EXPLORER HCM 10.1016/S0140-6736(20)31792-X External Link VALOR HCM https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamacardiology/fullarticle/2809050 BMS Press Release https://news.bms.com/news/details/2025/Bristol-Myers-Squibb-Provides-Update-on-Phase-3-ODYSSEY-HCM-Trial/ FINAL THOUGHTS PRAGUE 25 https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/12/6/e056522 You may also like: The Bob Harrington Show with the Stephen and Suzanne Weiss Dean of Weill Cornell Medicine, Robert A. Harrington, MD. https://www.medscape.com/author/bob-harrington Questions or feedback, please contact news@medscape.net

Featuring articles on obinutuzumab in active lupus nephritis, tecovirimat for mpox, treatments for paroxysmal atrial fibrillation, and gene therapy for hemophilia B; a review article on enteral nutrition in hospitalized adults; a case report of a woman with cough and weight loss; and Perspectives on withdrawal of the United States from the WHO, on what's next for nicotine, on the value zeitgeist, and on doctors in revolution and war.

Patricia Zettler is a professor of law at The Ohio State University Moritz College of Law. Stephen Morrissey, the interviewer, is the Executive Managing Editor of the Journal. P.J. Zettler, T.L. Wagener, and M.L. Berman. What's Next for Nicotine? The Coming Legal and Political Battles over an FDA Proposal. N Engl J Med 2025;392:1461-1463.

Welcome to Simulcast! In this special episode, Victoria Brazil is joined by Hege Ersdal and Benjamin Kamala, the joint first authors of a ground-breaking study just published in the New England Journal of Medicine. Their program aimed to reduce birth-related mortality in Tanzania, with spectacular success. The Safer Births Bundle integrated key elements: innovative simulation training, data-driven quality improvements, advanced clinical devices, and international collaboration and local empowerment. Neonatal mortality was reduced by 40 % and maternal deaths reduced by 75%. Congratulations to all involved.  The article:  Kamala BA, Ersdal HL, Moshiro RD, Guga G, Dalen I, Kvaløy JT, Bundala FA, Makuwani A, Kapologwe NA, Mfaume RS, Mduma ER, Mdoe P; Safer Births Bundle of Care Study Group. Outcomes of a Program to Reduce Birth-Related Mortality in Tanzania. N Engl J Med. 2025 Mar 13;392(11):1100-1110. doi: 10.1056/NEJMoa2406295. 

Featuring articles on cancer-associated venous thromboembolism, endovascular treatment for stroke, dapagliflozin in patients undergoing TAVI, screening for prostate cancer, and extrachromosomal DNA; a review article on otitis media in young children; a case report of a woman with flank pain, fever, and hypoxemia; and Perspectives on some efforts toward equity and on breaking the sacred promise.

John Patrick Co is vice president of education at Mass General Brigham and an associate professor of pediatrics at Harvard Medical School. Stephen Morrissey, the interviewer, is the Executive Managing Editor of the Journal. D.F. Weinstein, E. Olson, and J.P.T. Co. Addressing Socioeconomic Barriers to Residency Choice. N Engl J Med 2025;392:1353-1355.

Demografická krize v Česku! Nejméně narozených dětí od založení republiky! Tak straší čtenáře novinové titulky. A politici už si připravují do kampaně recepty, kterými jistojistě „rozrodí“ české ženy.Politické strany si to často představují jednoduše - zasypeme rodiny penězi, tu zvýšíme rodičák, tu přilepšíme na daních. „Jenže takhle jednoduché to není. Lidi se rozhodují podle jiných věcí. A naopak se ukazuje, že v největších problémech jsou nejbohatší státy,“ říká ve Vlevo dole Václav Dolejší.Že ekonomické pobídky nefungují, si vyzkoušeli například v Polsku nebo v Maďarsku (kam se jezdí učit například šéf ANO Andrej Babiš). Jenže podle statistik nejsou spásná ani řešení skandinávských zemí typu částečné úvazky, otcovská či školky.„Po těchto měkkých opatřeních volají hlavně liberálnější strany. Dlouho se myslelo, jak jim to na severu skvěle funguje, ale i jim porodnost klesá,“ popisuje Lucie Stuchlíková.Zkrátka ať se politici snaží, jak se snaží, všemožná podpůrná opatření mají jen omezený efekt. A očekávat od nich zázračné zvýšení čísel by bylo naivní. „Politici k tématu přistupují vlastně hrozně cynicky - děti je zajímají jen proto, aby se nám nezhroutil důchodový systém. Když se budoucí plátce narodí, už je jedno, jestli bude mít pediatra nebo jestli najde místo na střední škole. A na matku se mračíme, když s dítětem vystrčí nos z hřiště,“ dodává Lucie Stuchlíková.A nepřemýšlíme nad tím příliš nakonec my všichni? „Byl jsem na semináři v senátu, kde přednášely skoro samé expertky. A ty říkaly, že o pořizování jako společnost příliš složitě přemýšlíme. A že bychom k tomu měli přistupovat víc intuitivně. Prostě zavři oči a roď,“ říká s nadsázkou Václav Dolejší.Chtějí mladí příliš dokonalé hnízdo, nebo alespoň nějaké hnízdo? Co je to spermagedon? A který z českých politiků vyrobil nejvíce budoucích daňových poplatníků? Dozvíte se v čerstvé epizodě Vlevo dole!----Vlevo dole řeší politické kauzy, boje o vliv i šeptandu z kuloárů Sněmovny. Vychází každou středu v poledne.Podcast pro vás připravují Lucie Stuchlíková (@StuchlikovLucie) a Václav Dolejší (@VacDol), reportéři Seznam Zpráv.Další podcasty, ale taky články, komentáře a videa najdete na zpravodajském serveru Seznam Zprávy. Poslouchejte nás na webu Seznam Zpráv, na Podcasty.cz nebo ve své oblíbené podcastové aplikaci.Své názory, návrhy, otázky, stížnosti nebo pochvaly nám můžete posílat na adresu audio@sz.cz.Sledujte @SeznamZpravy na sociálních sítích: Twitter // Facebook // Instagram.Seznam Zprávy jsou zdrojem původních informací, nezávislé investigace, originální publicistiky.

In this episode, we add another article to our Rapid Fire Journal Club. Luke Hedrick and Dave Furfaro discuss the MIST 2 trial published in NEJM in 2011 evaluating enzymatic therapy for complex parapneumonic effusions and empyemas.   Article and … Continue reading →

V posledních dnech se odehrály dva incidenty, při kterých ozbrojenci Hamásu zabili člena některého z vlivných klanů v Gaze. Nejméně v jednom případě se příbuzní mrtvého pomstili, a veřejně popravili člena Hamásu, kterého označili za pachatele.

Featuring articles on HIV prevention, left atrial appendage closure after ablation for atrial fibrillation, timing of thrombolysis for stroke, congenital diarrhea and enteropathy, and the association between wealth and mortality in the United States and Europe; a review article on malaria; a Clinical Problem-Solving describing a “hot” cardiomyopathy; and Perspectives on physician shadowing, application overload, medical school grading, and impersonal personal statements.

In this episode of PICU DOC on Call, Dr. Rahul Damania and Dr. Pradip Kamat discuss the resurgence of measles in the United States. They explore the virus's pathophysiology, clinical features, diagnostic methods, treatment options, and complications. They emphasize the critical role of vaccination in preventing measles outbreaks and address the historical context and public health challenges related to vaccine hesitancy. The speakers highlight the severe complications of measles, especially in immunocompromised patients, and advocate for robust vaccination efforts to protect vulnerable populations and prevent the spread of this preventable disease. Tune in to hear more!Show Highlights:Resurgence of measles in the United StatesHistorical context of measles outbreaks and vaccination impactCurrent statistics and recent cases of measlesPathophysiology of the measles virusClinical features and progression of measles infectionDiagnostic approaches for confirming measlesDifferential diagnosis considerations for fever and rashTreatment options and the role of vaccinationComplications associated with measles, including severe outcomesPublic health challenges related to vaccine hesitancy and advocacy for immunizationResources:CDC Measles Info PageWHO Measles Global SurveillanceReferences:Fuhrman & Zimmerman. Textbook of Pediatric Critical Care, Ch. 52Long S et al. Principles and Practice of Pediatric Infectious Diseases, Ch. 227Moss WJ. Measles. Lancet. 2017;390(10111):2490-2502Paules CI, Marston HD, Fauci AS. NEJM. 2019;380(23):2185-2187

Rochelle Walensky is the Bayer fellow in health and biotech at the American Academy in Berlin, a senior fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School, and an executive fellow at Harvard Business School. Stephen Morrissey, the interviewer, is the Executive Managing Editor of the Journal. R.P. Walensky and L.D. Walensky. Application Overload — A Call to Reduce the Burden of Applying to Medical School. N Engl J Med. DOI: 10.1056/NEJMp2414572. D.B. Holt and E.A. Elster. Rethinking Shadowing for Aspiring Physicians. N Engl J Med 2025;392:1249-1251. A.A. Iyer, D.A. Hirsh, and R.M. Schwartzstein. Medical School Grading — Is “Good Enough” Good Enough? N Engl J Med 2025;392:1254-1257.

Featuring articles on intensive blood-pressure control in patients with diabetes, IgG4-related disease, severe chronic rhinosinusitis, advanced breast cancer, and vaccinating against C. difficile infection; a review article on chronic cough in adults; a case report of a man with hepatocellular carcinoma; an editorial on order out of chaos; and Perspectives on health care bridges, on partnerships between pharmaceutical and telehealth companies, and on the definition of failure.

Erin Fuse Brown is a professor of health services, policy, and practice at the Brown University School of Public Health and a member of the Journal's Perspective Advisory Board. Stephen Morrissey, the interviewer, is the Executive Managing Editor of the Journal. E.C. Fuse Brown, O.J. Wouters, and A. Mehrotra. Partnerships between Pharmaceutical and Telehealth Companies — Increasing Access or Driving Inappropriate Prescribing? N Engl J Med 2025;392:1148-1151.

We've had many discussions about the technical aspects of vertebroplasty and kyphoplasty on BackTable MSK. However, in this episode, we take a deeper look into the history of these procedures, exploring early research controversies and the challenges that threatened their existence. Our host, Dr. Jacob Fleming, is joined in the BackTable Studio by interventional neuroradiologist Dr. Joshua Hirsch, who was in San Diego for the ASSR 2025 meeting. Dr. Hirsch is the Chief of the Interventional Spine Service at Massachusetts General Hospital. --- This podcast is supported by: Medtronic MVP https://www.medtronic.com/en-us/healthcare-professionals/products/spinal-orthopedic.html#aq=%40pagetype%3D%22product-model%22&cq=%40products_category%3D%22Spinal%20and%20orthopedic%22%20OR%20%40ontology_isa%3D%22Spinal%20and%20orthopedic%22 --- SYNPOSIS Dr. Hirsch begins by outlining the historical origins of radiologists using cement injection and how this practice evolved into vertebroplasty. He then highlights early research on the procedure, focusing on key 2009 NEJM papers that sparked both scientific and public controversy, leading to setbacks in research and disparities in access to life-changing care. Since that time, newer studies have demonstrated the clear benefits of spinal augmentation for patients with vertebral insufficiency fractures, including Dr. Hirsch's own research showing a mortality benefit compared to nonsurgical treatment. Overall, the doctors discuss how far this field has advanced and the exciting developments currently in progress. --- TIMESTAMPS 00:00 - Introduction 03:09 - Historical Origins of Vertebroplasty 07:08 - Development and Evolution of Vertebroplasty 10:21 - Controversy Over 2009 Randomized Control Trials 16:35 - Disparities in Access to Vertebroplasty 21:01 - Dr. Hirsch's Research on Mortality Benefit of Vertebroplasty 32:31 - Opportunities for Patient Education 35:29 - Vertebroplasty vs. Kyphoplasty 37:34 - Challenges in Research Interpretations and Insurance Coverage 42:26 - Future Directions in Vertebral Augmentation --- RESOURCES Percutaneous polymethylmethacrylate vertebroplasty in the treatment of osteoporotic vertebral body compression fractures: technical aspects (Jensen et al, 1997): https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8337380/ Simplicity of randomized, controlled trials of percutaneous vertebroplasty (Hirsch et al, 2003): https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16880881/ INvestigational Vertebroplasty Efficacy and Safety Trial (INVEST): a randomized controlled trial of percutaneous vertebroplasty (Gray et al, 2007): https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18096050/ A randomized trial of vertebroplasty for painful osteoporotic vertebral fractures (Buchbinder et al, 2009): https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19657121/ A Randomized Trial of Balloon Kyphoplasty and Nonsurgical Management for Treating Acute Vertebral Compression Fractures (FREE) (Meirhaeghe et al, 2013): https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3678891/ A Randomized Trial of Vertebroplasty for Osteoporotic Spinal Fractures (Kallmes et al, 2009): https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa0900563 A Randomized Trial of Epidural Glucocorticoid Injections for Spinal Stenosis (Friedly et al, 2014): https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1313265 Safety and efficacy of vertebroplasty for acute painful osteoporotic fractures (VAPOUR): a multicentre, randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial (Clark et al, 2016): https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(16)31341-1/abstract Number Needed to Treat with Vertebral Augmentation to Save a Life (Hirsch et al, 2020): https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6975314/ Major Medical Outcomes With Spinal Augmentation vs Conservative Therapy (McCullough et al, 2013): https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullarticle/1710123 Harvey L. Neiman Policy Institute: https://www.neimanhpi.org/

Featuring articles on breast cancer, bloodstream infection, subarachnoid hemorrhage, scrub typhus, and birth-related mortality; a review article on the evaluation and treatment of infertility; a case report of a woman with altered mental status and acidemia; and Perspectives on advancing transgender health amid policy threats, on evidence-based work design, and on what an oncologist had wished she had done for a grieving father.

Alex Keuroghlian is an associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and the director of the Division of Public and Community Psychiatry at Massachusetts General Hospital. Stephen Morrissey, the interviewer, is the Executive Managing Editor of the Journal. D.R.A. Coelho, A.L. Chen, and A.S. Keuroghlian. Advancing Transgender Health amid Rising Policy Threats. N Engl J Med 2025;392:1041-1044.

In this audio interview, Editor-in-Chief Eric Rubin and Deputy Editor Lindsey Baden are joined by state public health leaders Robbie Goldstein and Jennifer Shuford to discuss action against H5N1 in Massachusetts and Texas and across the nation. Eric Rubin is the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal. Lindsey Baden is a Deputy Editor of the Journal. Robert Goldstein is the Massachusetts Commissioner of Public Health. Jennifer Shuford is the Commissioner of the Texas Department of State Health Services. Stephen Morrissey, the interviewer, is the Executive Managing Editor of the Journal. E.J. Rubin and Others. NEJM Outbreaks Update — H5N1: A View from the States. N Engl J Med. DOI: 10.1056/NEJMe2502863.

BV is a vaginal dysbiosis resulting from replacement of normal hydrogen peroxide and lactic-acid producing Lactobacillus species in the vagina with high concentrations of anaerobic bacteria. Recurrent BV can occur in 50-70% of women after an initial diagnosis. The concept of treating the male partner for BV recurrence prevention is not new, and the results have been conflicting. However, a new publication from Australia (released 03/5/25, in NEJM) has sparked new interest and new conversations about male partner BV therapy. Listen in for details!

Featuring articles on bacterial vaginosis, diabetes prevention, Danon disease, chronic spontaneous urticaria, and VITT-like monoclonal gammopathy of thrombotic significance; a review article on micronutrients; a Clinical Problem-Solving on unveiling the unforeseen; and Perspectives on bankruptcy and genetic information, on drug development for rare diseases, on facing political attacks on medical education, and on sustaining equity efforts in the face of regression.

Sara Gerkeis an associate professor of law at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Stephen Morrissey, the interviewer, is the Executive Managing Editor of the Journal. S. Gerke, M.B. Jacoby, and I.G. Cohen. Bankruptcy, Genetic Information, and Privacy — Selling Personal Information. N Engl J Med 2025;392:937-939.

Dr. Gary Null provides a commentary on "Universal  Healthcare"       Universal Healthcare is the Solution to a Broken Medical System Gary Null, PhD Progressive Radio Network, March 3, 2025 For over 50 years, there has been no concerted or successful effort to bring down medical costs in the American healthcare system. Nor are the federal health agencies making disease prevention a priority. Regardless whether the political left or right sponsors proposals for reform, such measures are repeatedly defeated by both parties in Congress. As a result, the nation's healthcare system remains one of the most expensive and least efficient in the developed world. For the past 30 years, medical bills contributing to personal debt regularly rank among the top three causes of personal bankruptcy. This is a reality that reflects not only the financial strain on ordinary Americans but the systemic failure of the healthcare system itself. The urgent question is: If President Trump and his administration are truly seeking to reduce the nation's $36 trillion deficit, why is there no serious effort to reform the most bloated and corrupt sector of the economy? A key obstacle is the widespread misinformation campaign that falsely claims universal health care would cost an additional $2 trillion annually and further balloon the national debt. However, a more honest assessment reveals the opposite. If the US adopted a universal single-payer system, the nation could actually save up to $20 trillion over the next 10 years rather than add to the deficit. Even with the most ambitious efforts by people like Elon Musk to rein in federal spending or optimize government efficiency, the estimated savings would only amount to $500 billion. This is only a fraction of what could be achieved through comprehensive healthcare reform alone. Healthcare is the largest single expenditure of the federal budget. A careful examination of where the $5 trillion spent annually on healthcare actually goes reveals massive systemic fraud and inefficiency. Aside from emergency medicine, which accounts for only 10-12 percent of total healthcare expenditures, the bulk of this spending does not deliver better health outcomes nor reduce trends in physical and mental illness. Applying Ockham's Razor, the principle that the simplest solution is often the best, the obvious conclusion is that America's astronomical healthcare costs are the direct result of price gouging on an unimaginable scale. For example, in most small businesses, profit margins range between 1.6 and 2.5 percent, such as in grocery retail. Yet the pharmaceutical industrial complex routinely operates on markup rates as high as 150,000 percent for many prescription drugs. The chart below highlights the astronomical gap between the retail price of some top-selling patented pharmaceutical medications and their generic equivalents. Drug Condition Patent Price (per unit) Generic Price Estimated Manufacture Cost Markup Source Insulin (Humalog) Diabetes $300 $30 $3 10,000% Rand (2021) EpiPen Allergic reactions $600 $30 $10 6,000% BMJ (2022) Daraprim Toxoplasmosis $750/pill $2 $0.50 150,000% JAMA (2019) Harvoni Hepatitis C $94,500 (12 weeks) $30,000 $200 47,000% WHO Report (2018) Lipitor Cholesterol $150 $10 $0.50 29,900% Health Affairs (2020) Xarelto Blood Thinner $450 $25 $1.50 30,000% NEJM (2020) Abilify Schizophrenia $800 (30 tablets) $15 $2 39,900% AJMC (2019) Revlimid Cancer $16,000/mo $450 $150 10,500% Kaiser Health News (2021) Humira Arthritis $2,984/dose $400 $50 5,868% Rand (2021) Sovaldi Hepatitis C $1,000/pill $10 $2 49,900% JAMA (2021) Xolair Asthma $2,400/dose $300 $50 4,800% NEJM (2020) Gleevec Leukemia $10,000/mo $350 $200 4,900% Harvard Public Health Review (2020) OxyContin Pain Relief $600 (30 tablets) $15 $0.50 119,900% BMJ (2022) Remdesivir Covid-19 $3,120 (5 doses) N/A $10 31,100% The Lancet (2020) The corruption extends far beyond price gouging. Many pharmaceutical companies convince federal health agencies to fund their basic research and drug development with taxpayer dollars. Yet when these companies bring successful products to market, the profits are kept entirely by the corporations or shared with the agencies or groups of government scientists. On the other hand, the public, who funded the research, receives no financial return. This amounts to a systemic betrayal of the public trust on a scale of hundreds of billions of dollars annually. Another significant contributor to rising healthcare costs is the widespread practice of defensive medicine that is driven by the constant threat of litigation. Over the past 40 years, defensive medicine has become a cottage industry. Physicians order excessive diagnostic tests and unnecessary treatments simply to protect themselves from lawsuits. Study after study has shown that these over-performed procedures not only inflate costs but lead to iatrogenesis or medical injury and death caused by the medical  system and practices itself. The solution is simple: adopting no-fault healthcare coverage for everyone where patients receive care without needing to sue and thereby freeing doctors from the burden of excessive malpractice insurance. A single-payer universal healthcare system could fundamentally transform the entire industry by capping profits at every level — from drug manufacturers to hospitals to medical equipment suppliers. The Department of Health and Human Services would have the authority to set profit margins for medical procedures. This would ensure that healthcare is determined by outcomes, not profits. Additionally, the growing influence of private equity firms and vulture capitalists buying up hospitals and medical clinics across America must be reined in. These equity firms prioritize profit extraction over improving the quality of care. They often slash staff, raise prices, and dictate medical procedures based on what will yield the highest returns. Another vital reform would be to provide free medical education for doctors and nurses in exchange for five years of service under the universal system. Medical professionals would earn a realistic salary cap to prevent them from being lured into equity partnerships or charging exorbitant rates. The biggest single expense in the current system, however, is the private health insurance industry, which consumes 33 percent of the $5 trillion healthcare budget. Health insurance CEOs consistently rank among the highest-paid executives in the country. Their companies, who are nothing more than bean counters, decide what procedures and drugs will be covered, partially covered, or denied altogether. This entire industry is designed to place profits above patients' lives. If the US dismantled its existing insurance-based system and replaced it with a fully reformed national healthcare model, the country could save $2.7 trillion annually while simultaneously improving health outcomes. Over the course of 10 years, those savings would amount to $27 trillion. This could wipe out nearly the entire national debt in a short time. This solution has been available for decades but has been systematically blocked by corporate lobbying and bipartisan corruption in Washington. The path forward is clear but only if American citizens demand a system where healthcare is valued as a public service and not a commodity. The national healthcare crisis is not just a fiscal issue. It is a crucial moral failure of the highest order. With the right reforms, the nation could simultaneously restore its financial health and deliver the kind of healthcare system its citizens have long deserved. American Healthcare: Corrupt, Broken and Lethal Richard Gale and Gary Null Progressive Radio Network, March 3, 2025 For a nation that prides itself on being the world's wealthiest, most innovative and technologically advanced, the US' healthcare system is nothing less than a disaster and disgrace. Not only are Americans the least healthy among the most developed nations, but the US' health system ranks dead last among high-income countries. Despite rising costs and our unshakeable faith in American medical exceptionalism, average life expectancy in the US has remained lower than other OECD nations for many years and continues to decline. The United Nations recognizes healthcare as a human right. In 2018, former UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon denounced the American healthcare system as "politically and morally wrong." During the pandemic it is estimated that two to three years was lost on average life expectancy. On the other hand, before the Covid-19 pandemic, countries with universal healthcare coverage found their average life expectancy stable or slowly increasing. The fundamental problem in the U.S. is that politics have been far too beholden to the pharmaceutical, HMO and private insurance industries. Neither party has made any concerted effort to reign in the corruption of corporate campaign funding and do what is sensible, financially feasible and morally correct to improve Americans' quality of health and well-being.   The fact that our healthcare system is horribly broken is proof that moneyed interests have become so powerful to keep single-payer debate out of the media spotlight and censored. Poll after poll shows that the American public favors the expansion of public health coverage. Other incremental proposals, including Medicare and Medicaid buy-in plans, are also widely preferred to the Affordable Care Act or Obamacare mess we are currently stuck with.   It is not difficult to understand how the dismal state of American medicine is the result of a system that has been sold out to the free-market and the bottom line interests of drug makers and an inflated private insurance industry. How advanced and ethically sound can a healthcare system be if tens of millions of people have no access to medical care because it is financially out of their reach?  The figures speak for themselves. The U.S. is burdened with a $41 trillion Medicare liability. The number of uninsured has declined during the past several years but still lingers around 25 million. An additional 30-35 million are underinsured. There are currently 65 million Medicare enrollees and 89 million Medicaid recipients. This is an extremely unhealthy snapshot of the country's ability to provide affordable healthcare and it is certainly unsustainable. The system is a public economic failure, benefiting no one except the large and increasingly consolidated insurance and pharmaceutical firms at the top that supervise the racket.   Our political parties have wrestled with single-payer or universal healthcare for decades. Obama ran his first 2008 presidential campaign on a single-payer platform. Since 1985, his campaign health adviser, the late Dr. Quentin Young from the University of Illinois Medical School, was one of the nation's leading voices calling for universal health coverage.  During a private conversation with Dr. Young shortly before his passing in 2016, he conveyed his sense of betrayal at the hands of the Obama administration. Dr. Young was in his 80s when he joined the Obama campaign team to help lead the young Senator to victory on a promise that America would finally catch up with other nations. The doctor sounded defeated. He shared how he was manipulated, and that Obama held no sincere intention to make universal healthcare a part of his administration's agenda. During the closed-door negotiations, which spawned the weak and compromised Affordable Care Act, Dr. Young was neither consulted nor invited to participate. In fact, he told us that he never heard from Obama again after his White House victory.   Past efforts to even raise the issue have been viciously attacked. A huge army of private interests is determined to keep the public enslaved to private insurers and high medical costs. The failure of our healthcare is in no small measure due to it being a fully for-profit operation. Last year, private health insurance accounted for 65 percent of coverage. Consider that there are over 900 private insurance companies in the US. National Health Expenditures (NHE) grew to $4.5 trillion in 2022, which was 17.3 percent of GDP. Older corporate rank-and-file Democrats and Republicans argue that a single-payer or socialized medical program is unaffordable. However, not only is single-payer affordable, it will end bankruptcies due to unpayable medical debt. In addition, universal healthcare, structured on a preventative model, will reduce disease rates at the outset.    Corporate Democrats argue that Obama's Affordable Care Act (ACA) was a positive step inching the country towards complete public coverage. However, aside from providing coverage to the poorest of Americans, Obamacare turned into another financial anchor around the necks of millions more. According to the health policy research group KFF, the average annual health insurance premium for single coverage is $8,400 and almost $24,000 for a family. In addition, patient out-of-pocket costs continue to increase, a 6.6% increase to $471 billion in 2022. Rather than healthcare spending falling, it has exploded, and the Trump and Biden administrations made matters worse.    Clearly, a universal healthcare program will require flipping the script on the entire private insurance industry, which employed over half a million people last year.  Obviously, the most volatile debate concerning a national universal healthcare system concerns cost. Although there is already a socialized healthcare system in place -- every federal legislator, bureaucrat, government employee and veteran benefits from it -- fiscal Republican conservatives and groups such as the Koch Brothers network are single-mindedly dedicated to preventing the expansion of Medicare and Medicaid. A Koch-funded Mercatus analysis made the outrageous claim that a single-payer system would increase federal health spending by $32 trillion in ten years. However, analyses and reviews by the Congressional Budget Office in the early 1990s concluded that such a system would only increase spending at the start; enormous savings would quickly offset it as the years pass. In one analysis, "the savings in administrative costs [10 percent of health spending] would be more than enough to offset the expense of universal coverage."    Defenders of those advocating for funding a National Health Program argue this can primarily be accomplished by raising taxes to levels comparable to other developed nations. This was a platform Senator Bernie Sanders and some of the younger progressive Democrats in the House campaigned on. The strategy was to tax the highest multimillion-dollar earners 60-70 percent. Despite the outrage of its critics, including old rank-and-file multi-millionaire Democrats like Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer, this is still far less than in the past. During the Korean War, the top tax rate was 91 percent; it declined to 70 percent in the late 1960s. Throughout most of the 1970s, those in the lowest income bracket were taxed at 14 percent. We are not advocating for this strategy because it ignores where the funding is going, and the corruption in the system that is contributing to exorbitant waste.    But Democratic supporters of the ACA who oppose a universal healthcare plan ignore the additional taxes Obama levied to pay for the program. These included surtaxes on investment income, Medicare taxes from those earning over $200,000, taxes on tanning services, an excise tax on medical equipment, and a 40 percent tax on health coverage for costs over the designated cap that applied to flexible savings and health savings accounts. The entire ACA was reckless, sloppy and unnecessarily complicated from the start.    The fact that Obamacare further strengthened the distinctions between two parallel systems -- federal and private -- with entirely different economic structures created a labyrinth of red tape, rules, and wasteful bureaucracy. Since the ACA went into effect, over 150 new boards, agencies and programs have had to be established to monitor its 2,700 pages of gibberish. A federal single-payer system would easily eliminate this bureaucracy and waste.    A medical New Deal to establish universal healthcare coverage is a decisive step in the correct direction. But we must look at the crisis holistically and in a systematic way. Simply shuffling private insurance into a federal Medicare-for-all or buy-in program, funded by taxing the wealthiest of citizens, would only temporarily reduce costs. It will neither curtail nor slash escalating disease rates e. Any effective healthcare reform must also tackle the underlying reasons for Americans' poor state of health. We cannot shy away from examining the social illnesses infecting our entire free-market capitalist culture and its addiction to deregulation. A viable healthcare model would have to structurally transform how the medical economy operates. Finally, a successful medical New Deal must honestly evaluate the best and most reliable scientific evidence in order to effectively redirect public health spending.    For example, Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, a former Obama healthcare adviser, observed that AIDS-HIV measures consume the most public health spending, even though the disease "ranked 75th on the list of diseases by personal health expenditures." On the other hand, according to the American Medical Association, a large percentage of the nation's $3.4 trillion healthcare spending goes towards treating preventable diseases, notably diabetes, common forms of heart disease, and back and neck pain conditions. In 2016, these three conditions were the most costly and accounted for approximately $277 billion in spending. Last year, the CDC announced the autism rate is now 1 in 36 children compared to 1 in 44 two years ago. A retracted study by Mark Blaxill, an autism activist at the Holland Center and a friend of the authors, estimates that ASD costs will reach $589 billion annually by 2030. There are no signs that this alarming trend will reverse and decline; and yet, our entire federal health system has failed to conscientiously investigate the underlying causes of this epidemic. All explanations that might interfere with the pharmaceutical industry's unchecked growth, such as over-vaccination, are ignored and viciously discredited without any sound scientific evidence. Therefore, a proper medical New Deal will require a systemic overhaul and reform of our federal health agencies, especially the HHS, CDC and FDA. Only the Robert Kennedy Jr presidential campaign is even addressing the crisis and has an inexpensive and comprehensive plan to deal with it. For any medical revolution to succeed in advancing universal healthcare, the plan must prioritize spending in a manner that serves public health and not private interests. It will also require reshuffling private corporate interests and their lobbyists to the sidelines, away from any strategic planning, in order to break up the private interests' control over federal agencies and its revolving door policies. Aside from those who benefit from this medical corruption, the overwhelming majority of Americans would agree with this criticism. However, there is a complete lack of national trust that our legislators, including the so-called progressives, would be willing to undertake such actions.    In addition, America's healthcare system ignores the single most critical initiative to reduce costs - that is, preventative efforts and programs instead of deregulation and closing loopholes designed to protect the drug and insurance industries' bottom line. Prevention can begin with banning toxic chemicals that are proven health hazards associated with current disease epidemics, and it can begin by removing a 1,000-plus toxins already banned in Europe. This should be a no-brainer for any legislator who cares for public health. For example, Stacy Malkan, co-founder of the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics, notes that "the policy approach in the US and Europe is dramatically different" when it comes to chemical allowances in cosmetic products. Whereas the EU has banned 1,328 toxic substances from the cosmetic industry alone, the US has banned only 11. The US continues to allow carcinogenic formaldehyde, petroleum, forever chemicals, many parabens (an estrogen mimicker and endocrine hormone destroyer), the highly allergenic p-phenylenediamine or PBD, triclosan, which has been associated with the rise in antibiotic resistant bacteria, avobenzone, and many others to be used in cosmetics, sunscreens, shampoo and hair dyes.   Next, the food Americans consume can be reevaluated for its health benefits. There should be no hesitation to tax the unhealthiest foods, such as commercial junk food, sodas and candy relying on high fructose corn syrup, products that contain ingredients proven to be toxic, and meat products laden with dangerous chemicals including growth hormones and antibiotics. The scientific evidence that the average American diet is contributing to rising disease trends is indisputable. We could also implement additional taxes on the public advertising of these demonstrably unhealthy products. All such tax revenue would accrue to a national universal health program to offset medical expenditures associated with the very illnesses linked to these products. Although such tax measures would help pay for a new medical New Deal, it may be combined with programs to educate the public about healthy nutrition if it is to produce a reduction in the most common preventable diseases. In fact, comprehensive nutrition courses in medical schools should be mandatory because the average physician receives no education in this crucial subject.  In addition, preventative health education should be mandatory throughout public school systems.   Private insurers force hospitals, clinics and private physicians into financial corners, and this is contributing to prodigious waste in money and resources. Annually, healthcare spending towards medical liability insurance costs tens of billions of dollars. In particular, this economic burden has taxed small clinics and physicians. It is well past the time that physician liability insurance is replaced with no-fault options. Today's doctors are spending an inordinate amount of money to protect themselves. Legions of liability and trial lawyers seek big paydays for themselves stemming from physician error. This has created a culture of fear among doctors and hospitals, resulting in the overly cautious practice of defensive medicine, driving up costs and insurance premiums just to avoid lawsuits. Doctors are forced to order unnecessary tests and prescribe more medications and medical procedures just to cover their backsides. No-fault insurance is a common-sense plan that enables physicians to pursue their profession in a manner that will reduce iatrogenic injuries and costs. Individual cases requiring additional medical intervention and loss of income would still be compensated. This would generate huge savings.    No other nation suffers from the scourge of excessive drug price gouging like the US. After many years of haggling to lower prices and increase access to generic drugs, only a minute amount of progress has been made in recent years. A 60 Minutes feature about the Affordable Care Act reported an "orgy of lobbying and backroom deals in which just about everyone with a stake in the $3-trillion-a-year health industry came out ahead—except the taxpayers.” For example, Life Extension magazine reported that an antiviral cream (acyclovir), which had lost its patent protection, "was being sold to pharmacies for 7,500% over the active ingredient cost. The active ingredient (acyclovir) costs only 8 pennies, yet pharmacies are paying a generic maker $600 for this drug and selling it to consumers for around $700." Other examples include the antibiotic Doxycycline. The price per pill averages 7 cents to $3.36 but has a 5,300 percent markup when it reaches the consumer. The antidepressant Clomipramine is marked up 3,780 percent, and the anti-hypertensive drug Captopril's mark-up is 2,850 percent. And these are generic drugs!    Medication costs need to be dramatically cut to allow drug manufacturers a reasonable but not obscene profit margin. By capping profits approximately 100 percent above all costs, we would save our system hundreds of billions of dollars. Such a measure would also extirpate the growing corporate misdemeanors of pricing fraud, which forces patients to pay out-of-pocket in order to make up for the costs insurers are unwilling to pay.    Finally, we can acknowledge that our healthcare is fundamentally a despotic rationing system based upon high insurance costs vis-a-vis a toss of the dice to determine where a person sits on the economic ladder. For the past three decades it has contributed to inequality. The present insurance-based economic metrics cast millions of Americans out of coverage because private insurance costs are beyond their means. Uwe Reinhardt, a Princeton University political economist, has called our system "brutal" because it "rations [people] out of the system." He defined rationing as "withholding something from someone that is beneficial." Discriminatory healthcare rationing now affects upwards to 60 million people who have been either priced out of the system or under insured. They make too much to qualify for Medicare under Obamacare, yet earn far too little to afford private insurance costs and premiums. In the final analysis, the entire system is discriminatory and predatory.    However, we must be realistic. Almost every member of Congress has benefited from Big Pharma and private insurance lobbyists. The only way to begin to bring our healthcare program up to the level of a truly developed nation is to remove the drug industry's rampant and unnecessary profiteering from the equation.     How did Fauci memory-hole a cure for AIDS and get away with it?   By Helen Buyniski   Over 700,000 Americans have died of AIDS since 1981, with the disease claiming some 42.3 million victims worldwide. While an HIV diagnosis is no longer considered a certain death sentence, the disease looms large in the public imagination and in public health funding, with contemporary treatments running into thousands of dollars per patient annually.   But was there a cure for AIDS all this time - an affordable and safe treatment that was ruthlessly suppressed and attacked by the US public health bureaucracy and its agents? Could this have saved millions of lives and billions of dollars spent on AZT, ddI and failed HIV vaccine trials? What could possibly justify the decision to disappear a safe and effective approach down the memory hole?   The inventor of the cure, Gary Null, already had several decades of experience creating healing protocols for physicians to help patients not responding well to conventional treatments by the time AIDS was officially defined in 1981. Null, a registered dietitian and board-certified nutritionist with a PhD in human nutrition and public health science, was a senior research fellow and Director of Anti-Aging Medicine at the Institute of Applied Biology for 36 years and has published over 950 papers, conducting groundbreaking experiments in reversing biological aging as confirmed with DNA methylation testing. Additionally, Null is a multi-award-winning documentary filmmaker, bestselling author, and investigative journalist whose work exposing crimes against humanity over the last 50 years has highlighted abuses by Big Pharma, the military-industrial complex, the financial industry, and the permanent government stay-behind networks that have come to be known as the Deep State.   Null was contacted in 1974 by Dr. Stephen Caiazza, a physician working with a subculture of gay men in New York living the so-called “fast track” lifestyle, an extreme manifestation of the gay liberation movement that began with the Stonewall riots. Defined by rampant sexual promiscuity and copious use of illegal and prescription drugs, including heavy antibiotic use for a cornucopia of sexually-transmitted diseases, the fast-track never included more than about two percent of gay men, though these dominated many of the bathhouses and clubs that defined gay nightlife in the era. These patients had become seriously ill as a result of their indulgence, generally arriving at the clinic with multiple STDs including cytomegalovirus and several types of herpes and hepatitis, along with candida overgrowth, nutritional deficiencies, gut issues, and recurring pneumonia. Every week for the next 10 years, Null would counsel two or three of these men - a total of 800 patients - on how to detoxify their bodies and de-stress their lives, tracking their progress with Caiazza and the other providers at weekly feedback meetings that he credits with allowing the team to quickly evaluate which treatments were most effective. He observed that it only took about two years on the “fast track” for a healthy young person to begin seeing muscle loss and the recurrent, lingering opportunistic infections that would later come to be associated with AIDS - while those willing to commit to a healthier lifestyle could regain their health in about a year.    It was with this background that Null established the Tri-State Healing Center in Manhattan in 1980, staffing the facility with what would eventually run to 22 certified health professionals to offer safe, natural, and effective low- and no-cost treatments to thousands of patients with HIV and AIDS-defining conditions. Null and his staff used variations of the protocols he had perfected with Caiazza's patients, a multifactorial patient-tailored approach that included high-dose vitamin C drips, intravenous ozone therapy, juicing and nutritional improvements and supplementation, aspects of homeopathy and naturopathy with some Traditional Chinese Medicine and Ayurvedic practices. Additional services offered on-site included acupuncture and holistic dentistry, while peer support groups were also held at the facility so that patients could find community and a positive environment, healing their minds and spirits while they healed their bodies.   “Instead of trying to kill the virus with antiretroviral pharmaceuticals designed to stop viral replication before it kills patients, we focused on what benefits could be gained by building up the patients' natural immunity and restoring biochemical integrity so the body could fight for itself,” Null wrote in a 2014 article describing the philosophy behind the Center's approach, which was wholly at odds with the pharmaceutical model.1   Patients were comprehensively tested every week, with any “recovery” defined solely by the labs, which documented AIDS patient after patient - 1,200 of them - returning to good health and reversing their debilitating conditions. Null claims to have never lost an AIDS patient in the Center's care, even as the death toll for the disease - and its pharmaceutical standard of care AZT - reached an all-time high in the early 1990s. Eight patients who had opted for a more intensive course of treatment - visiting the Center six days a week rather than one - actually sero-deconverted, with repeated subsequent testing showing no trace of HIV in their bodies.   As an experienced clinical researcher himself, Null recognized that any claims made by the Center would be massively scrutinized, challenging as they did the prevailing scientific consensus that AIDS was an incurable, terminal illness. He freely gave his protocols to any medical practitioner who asked, understanding that his own work could be considered scientifically valid only if others could replicate it under the same conditions. After weeks of daily observational visits to the Center, Dr. Robert Cathcart took the protocols back to San Francisco, where he excitedly reported that patients were no longer dying in his care.    Null's own colleague at the Institute of Applied Biology, senior research fellow Elana Avram, set up IV drip rooms at the Institute and used his intensive protocols to sero-deconvert 10 patients over a two-year period. While the experiment had been conducted in secret, as the Institute had been funded by Big Pharma since its inception half a century earlier, Avram had hoped she would be able to publish a journal article to further publicize Null's protocols and potentially help AIDS patients, who were still dying at incredibly high rates thanks to Burroughs Wellcome's noxious but profitable AZT. But as she would later explain in a 2019 letter to Null, their groundbreaking research never made it into print - despite meticulous documentation of their successes - because the Institute's director and board feared their pharmaceutical benefactors would withdraw the funding on which they depended, given that Null's protocols did not involve any patentable or otherwise profitable drugs. When Avram approached them about publication, the board vetoed the idea, arguing that it would “draw negative attention because [the work] was contrary to standard drug treatments.” With no real point in continuing experiments along those lines without institutional support and no hope of obtaining funding from elsewhere, the department she had created specifically for these experiments shut down after a two-year followup with her test subjects - all of whom remained alive and healthy - was completed.2   While the Center was receiving regular visits by this time from medical professionals and, increasingly, black celebrities like Stokely Carmichael and Isaac Hayes, who would occasionally perform for the patients, the news was spreading by word of mouth alone - not a single media outlet had dared to document the clinic that was curing AIDS patients for free. Instead, they gave airtime to Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases, who had for years been spreading baseless, hysteria-fueling claims about HIV and AIDS to any news outlet that would put him on. His claim that children could contract the virus from “ordinary household conduct” with an infected relative proved so outrageous he had to walk it back,3 and he never really stopped insisting the deadly plague associated with gays and drug users was about to explode like a nuclear bomb among the law-abiding heterosexual population. Fauci by this time controlled all government science funding through NIAID, and his zero-tolerance approach to dissent on the HIV/AIDS front had already seen prominent scientists like virologist Peter Duesberg stripped of the resources they needed for their work because they had dared to question his commandment: There is no cause of AIDS but HIV, and AZT is its treatment. Even the AIDS activist groups, which by then had been coopted by Big Pharma and essentially reduced to astroturfing for the toxic failed chemotherapy drug AZT backed by the institutional might of Fauci's NIAID,4 didn't seem to want to hear that there was a cure. Unconcerned with the irrationality of denouncing the man touting his free AIDS cure as an  “AIDS denier,” they warned journalists that platforming Null or anyone else rejecting the mainstream medical line would be met with organized demands for their firing.    Determined to breach the institutional iron curtain and get his message to the masses, Null and his team staged a press conference in New York, inviting scientists and doctors from around the world to share their research on alternative approaches to HIV and AIDS in 1993. To emphasize the sound scientific basis of the Center's protocols and encourage guests to adopt them into their own practices, Null printed out thousands of abstracts in support of each nutrient and treatment being used. However, despite over 7,000 invitations sent three times to major media, government figures, scientists, and activists, almost none of the intended audience members showed up. Over 100 AIDS patients and their doctors, whose charts exhaustively documented their improvements using natural and nontoxic modalities over the preceding 12 months, gave filmed testimonials, declaring that the feared disease was no longer a death sentence, but the conference had effectively been silenced. Bill Tatum, publisher of the Amsterdam News, suggested Null and his patients would find a more welcoming audience in his home neighborhood of Harlem - specifically, its iconic Apollo Theatre. For three nights, the theater was packed to capacity. Hit especially hard by the epidemic and distrustful of a medical system that had only recently stopped being openly racist (the Tuskegee syphilis experiment only ended in 1972), black Americans, at least, did not seem to care what Anthony Fauci would do if he found out they were investigating alternatives to AZT and death.    PBS journalist Tony Brown, having obtained a copy of the video of patient testimonials from the failed press conference, was among a handful of black journalists who began visiting the Center to investigate the legitimacy of Null's claims. Satisfied they had something significant to offer his audience, Brown invited eight patients - along with Null himself - onto his program over the course of several episodes to discuss the work. It was the first time these protocols had received any attention in the media, despite Null having released nearly two dozen articles and multiple documentaries on the subject by that time. A typical patient on one program, Al, a recovered IV drug user who was diagnosed with AIDS at age 32, described how he “panicked,” saw a doctor and started taking AZT despite his misgivings - only to be forced to discontinue the drug after just a few weeks due to his condition deteriorating rapidly. Researching alternatives brought him to Null, and after six months of “detoxing [his] lifestyle,” he observed his initial symptoms - swollen lymph nodes and weight loss - begin to reverse, culminating with sero-deconversion. On Bill McCreary's Channel 5 program, a married couple diagnosed with HIV described how they watched their T-cell counts increase as they cut out sugar, caffeine, smoking, and drinking and began eating a healthy diet. They also saw the virus leave their bodies.   For HIV-positive viewers surrounded by fear and negativity, watching healthy-looking, cheerful “AIDS patients” detail their recovery while Null backed up their claims with charts must have been balm for the soul. But the TV programs were also a form of outreach to the medical community, with patients' charts always on hand to convince skeptics the cure was scientifically valid. Null brought patients' charts to every program, urging them to keep an open mind: “Other physicians and public health officials should know that there's good science in the alternative perspective. It may not be a therapy that they're familiar with, because they're just not trained in it, but if the results are positive, and you can document them…” He challenged doubters to send in charts from their own sero-deconverted patients on AZT, and volunteered to debate proponents of the orthodox treatment paradigm - though the NIH and WHO both refused to participate in such a debate on Tony Brown's Journal, following Fauci's directive prohibiting engagement with forbidden ideas.    Aside from those few TV programs and Null's own films, suppression of Null's AIDS cure beyond word of mouth was total. The 2021 documentary The Cost of Denial, produced by the Society for Independent Journalists, tells the story of the Tri-State Healing Center and the medical paradigm that sought to destroy it, lamenting the loss of the lives that might have been saved in a more enlightened society. Nurse practitioner Luanne Pennesi, who treated many of the AIDS patients at the Center, speculated in the film that the refusal by the scientific establishment and AIDS activists to accept their successes was financially motivated. “It was as if they didn't want this information to get out. Understand that our healthcare system as we know it is a corporation, it's a corporate model, and it's about generating revenue. My concern was that maybe they couldn't generate enough revenue from these natural approaches.”5   Funding was certainly the main disciplinary tool Fauci's NIAID used to keep the scientific community in line. Despite the massive community interest in the work being done at the Center, no foundation or institution would defy Fauci and risk getting itself blacklisted, leaving Null to continue funding the operation out of his pocket with the profits from book sales. After 15 years, he left the Center in 1995, convinced the mainstream model had so thoroughly been institutionalized that there was no chance of overthrowing it. He has continued to counsel patients and advocate for a reappraisal of the HIV=AIDS hypothesis and its pharmaceutical treatments, highlighting the deeply flawed science underpinning the model of the disease espoused by the scientific establishment in 39 articles, six documentaries and a 700-page textbook on AIDS, but the Center's achievements have been effectively memory-holed by Fauci's multi-billion-dollar propaganda apparatus.     FRUIT OF THE POISONOUS TREE   To understand just how much of a threat Null's work was to the HIV/AIDS establishment, it is instructive to revisit the 1984 paper, published by Dr. Robert Gallo of the National Cancer Institute, that established HIV as the sole cause of AIDS. The CDC's official recognition of AIDS in 1981 had done little to quell the mounting public panic over the mysterious illness afflicting gay men in the US, as the agency had effectively admitted it had no idea what was causing them to sicken and die. As years passed with no progress determining the causative agent of the plague, activist groups like Gay Men's Health Crisis disrupted public events and threatened further mass civil disobedience as they excoriated the NIH for its sluggish allocation of government science funding to uncovering the cause of the “gay cancer.”6 When Gallo published his paper declaring that the retrovirus we now know as HIV was the sole “probable” cause of AIDS, its simple, single-factor hypothesis was the answer to the scientific establishment's prayers. This was particularly true for Fauci, as the NIAID chief was able to claim the hot new disease as his agency's own domain in what has been described as a “dramatic confrontation” with his rival Sam Broder at the National Cancer Institute. After all, Fauci pointed out, Gallo's findings - presented by Health and Human Services Secretary Margaret Heckler as if they were gospel truth before any other scientists had had a chance to inspect them, never mind conduct a full peer review - clearly classified AIDS as an infectious disease, and not a cancer like the Kaposi's sarcoma which was at the time its most visible manifestation. Money and media attention began pouring in, even as funding for the investigation of other potential causes of AIDS dried up. Having already patented a diagnostic test for “his” retrovirus before introducing it to the world, Gallo was poised for a financial windfall, while Fauci was busily leveraging the discovery into full bureaucratic empire of the US scientific apparatus.   While it would serve as the sole basis for all US government-backed AIDS research to follow - quickly turning Gallo into the most-cited scientist in the world during the 1980s,7 Gallo's “discovery” of HIV was deeply problematic. The sample that yielded the momentous discovery actually belonged to Prof. Luc Montagnier of the French Institut Pasteur, a fact Gallo finally admitted in 1991, four years after a lawsuit from the French government challenged his patent on the HIV antibody test, forcing the US government to negotiate a hasty profit-sharing agreement between Gallo's and Montagnier's labs. That lawsuit triggered a cascade of official investigations into scientific misconduct by Gallo, and evidence submitted during one of these probes, unearthed in 2008 by journalist Janine Roberts, revealed a much deeper problem with the seminal “discovery.” While Gallo's co-author, Mikulas Popovic, had concluded after numerous experiments with the French samples that the virus they contained was not the cause of AIDS, Gallo had drastically altered the paper's conclusion, scribbling his notes in the margins, and submitted it for publication to the journal Science without informing his co-author.   After Roberts shared her discovery with contacts in the scientific community, 37 scientific experts wrote to the journal demanding that Gallo's career-defining HIV paper be retracted from Science for lacking scientific integrity.8 Their call, backed by an endorsement from the 2,600-member scientific organization Rethinking AIDS, was ignored by the publication and by the rest of mainstream science despite - or perhaps because of - its profound implications.   That 2008 letter, addressed to Science editor-in-chief Bruce Alberts and copied to American Association for the Advancement of Science CEO Alan Leshner, is worth reproducing here in its entirety, as it utterly dismantles Gallo's hypothesis - and with them the entire HIV is the sole cause of AIDS dogma upon which the contemporary medical model of the disease rests:   On May 4, 1984 your journal published four papers by a group led by Dr. Robert Gallo. We are writing to express our serious concerns with regard to the integrity and veracity of the lead paper among these four of which Dr. Mikulas Popovic is the lead author.[1] The other three are also of concern because they rely upon the conclusions of the lead paper .[2][3][4]  In the early 1990s, several highly critical reports on the research underlying these papers were produced as a result of governmental inquiries working under the supervision of scientists nominated by the National Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Medicine. The Office of Research Integrity of the US Department of Health and Human Services concluded that the lead paper was “fraught with false and erroneous statements,” and that the “ORI believes that the careless and unacceptable keeping of research records...reflects irresponsible laboratory management that has permanently impaired the ability to retrace the important steps taken.”[5] Further, a Congressional Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations led by US Representative John D. Dingell of Michigan produced a staff report on the papers which contains scathing criticisms of their integrity.[6]  Despite the publically available record of challenges to their veracity, these papers have remained uncorrected and continue to be part of the scientific record.  What prompts our communication today is the recent revelation of an astonishing number of previously unreported deletions and unjustified alterations made by Gallo to the lead paper. There are several documents originating from Gallo's laboratory that, while available for some time, have only recently been fully analyzed. These include a draft of the lead paper typewritten by Popovic which contains handwritten changes made to it by Gallo.[7] This draft was the key evidence used in the above described inquiries to establish that Gallo had concealed his laboratory's use of a cell culture sample (known as LAV) which it received from the Institut Pasteur.  These earlier inquiries verified that the typed manuscript draft was produced by Popovic who had carried out the recorded experiment while his laboratory chief, Gallo, was in Europe and that, upon his return, Gallo changed the document by hand a few days before it was submitted to Science on March 30, 1984. According to the ORI investigation, “Dr. Gallo systematically rewrote the manuscript for what would become a renowned LTCB [Gallo's laboratory at the National Cancer Institute] paper.”[5]  This document provided the important evidence that established the basis for awarding Dr. Luc Montagnier and Dr. Francoise Barré-Sinoussi the 2008 Nobel Prize in Medicine for the discovery of the AIDS virus by proving it was their samples of LAV that Popovic used in his key experiment. The draft reveals that Popovic had forthrightly admitted using the French samples of LAV renamed as Gallo's virus, HTLV-III, and that Gallo had deleted this admission, concealing their use of LAV.  However, it has not been previously reported that on page three of this same document Gallo had also deleted Popovic's unambiguous statement that, "Despite intensive research efforts, the causative agent of AIDS has not yet been identified,” replacing it in the published paper with a statement that said practically the opposite, namely, “That a retrovirus of the HTLV family might be an etiologic agent of AIDS was suggested by the findings.”  It is clear that the rest of Popovic's typed paper is entirely consistent with his statement that the cause of AIDS had not been found, despite his use of the French LAV. Popovic's final conclusion was that the culture he produced “provides the possibility” for detailed studies. He claimed to have achieved nothing more. At no point in his paper did Popovic attempt to prove that any virus caused AIDS, and it is evident that Gallo concealed these key elements in Popovic's experimental findings.  It is astonishing now to discover these unreported changes to such a seminal document. We can only assume that Gallo's alterations of Popovic's conclusions were not highlighted by earlier inquiries because the focus at the time was on establishing that the sample used by Gallo's lab came from Montagnier and was not independently collected by Gallo. In fact, the only attention paid to the deletions made by Gallo pertains to his effort to hide the identity of the sample. The questions of whether Gallo and Popovic's research proved that LAV or any other virus was the cause of AIDS were clearly not considered.  Related to these questions are other long overlooked documents that merit your attention. One of these is a letter from Dr. Matthew A. Gonda, then Head of the Electron Microscopy Laboratory at the National Cancer Institute, which is addressed to Popovic, copied to Gallo and dated just four days prior to Gallo's submission to Science.[8] In this letter, Gonda remarks on samples he had been sent for imaging because “Dr Gallo wanted these micrographs for publication because they contain HTLV.” He states, “I do not believe any of the particles photographed are of HTLV-I, II or III.” According to Gonda, one sample contained cellular debris, while another had no particles near the size of a retrovirus. Despite Gonda's clearly worded statement, Science published on May 4, 1984 papers attributed to Gallo et al with micrographs attributed to Gonda and described unequivocally as HTLV-III.  In another letter by Gallo, dated one day before he submitted his papers to Science, Gallo states, “It's extremely rare to find fresh cells [from AIDS patients] expressing the virus... cell culture seems to be necessary to induce virus,” a statement which raises the possibility he was working with a laboratory artifact. [9]  Included here are copies of these documents and links to the same. The very serious flaws they reveal in the preparation of the lead paper published in your journal in 1984 prompts our request that this paper be withdrawn. It appears that key experimental findings have been concealed. We further request that the three associated papers published on the same date also be withdrawn as they depend on the accuracy of this paper.  For the scientific record to be reliable, it is vital that papers shown to be flawed, or falsified be retracted. Because a very public record now exists showing that the Gallo papers drew unjustified conclusions, their withdrawal from Science is all the more important to maintain integrity. Future researchers must also understand they cannot rely on the 1984 Gallo papers for statements about HIV and AIDS, and all authors of papers that previously relied on this set of four papers should have the opportunity to consider whether their own conclusions are weakened by these revelations.      Gallo's handwritten revision, submitted without his colleague's knowledge despite multiple experiments that failed to support the new conclusion, was the sole foundation for the HIV=AIDS hypothesis. Had Science published the manuscript the way Popovic had typed it, there would be no AIDS “pandemic” - merely small clusters of people with AIDS. Without a viral hypothesis backing the development of expensive and deadly pharmaceuticals, would Fauci have allowed these patients to learn about the cure that existed all along?   Faced with a potential rebellion, Fauci marshaled the full resources under his control to squelch the publication of the investigations into Gallo and restrict any discussion of competing hypotheses in the scientific and mainstream press, which had been running virus-scare stories full-time since 1984. The effect was total, according to biochemist Dr. Kary Mullis, inventor of the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) procedure. In a 2009 interview, Mullis recalled his own shock when he attempted to unearth the experimental basis for the HIV=AIDS hypothesis. Despite his extensive inquiry into the literature, “there wasn't a scientific reference…[that] said ‘here's how come we know that HIV is the probable cause of AIDS.' There was nothing out there like that.”9 This yawning void at the core of HIV/AIDS “science" turned him into a strident critic of AIDS dogma - and those views made him persona non grata where the scientific press was concerned, suddenly unable to publish a single paper despite having won the Nobel Prize for his invention of the PCR test just weeks before.  10   DISSENT BECOMES “DENIAL”   While many of those who dissent from the orthodox HIV=AIDS view believe HIV plays a role in the development of AIDS, they point to lifestyle and other co-factors as being equally if not more important. Individuals who test positive for HIV can live for decades in perfect health - so long as they don't take AZT or the other toxic antivirals fast-tracked by Fauci's NIAID - but those who developed full-blown AIDS generally engaged in highly risky behaviors like extreme promiscuity and prodigious drug abuse, contracting STDs they took large quantities of antibiotics to treat, further running down their immune systems. While AIDS was largely portrayed as a “gay disease,” it was only the “fast track” gays, hooking up with dozens of partners nightly in sex marathons fueled by “poppers” (nitrate inhalants notorious for their own devastating effects on the immune system), who became sick. Kaposi's sarcoma, one of the original AIDS-defining conditions, was widespread among poppers-using gay men, but never appeared among IV drug users or hemophiliacs, the other two main risk groups during the early years of the epidemic. Even Robert Gallo himself, at a 1994 conference on poppers held by the National Institute on Drug Abuse, would admit that the previously-rare form of skin cancer surging among gay men was not primarily caused by HIV - and that it was immune stimulation, rather than suppression, that was likely responsible.11 Similarly, IV drug users are often riddled with opportunistic infections as their habit depresses the immune system and their focus on maintaining their addiction means that healthier habits - like good nutrition and even basic hygiene - fall by the wayside.    Supporting the call for revising the HIV=AIDS hypothesis to include co-factors is the fact that the mass heterosexual outbreaks long predicted by Fauci and his ilk in seemingly every country on Earth have failed to materialize, except - supposedly - in Africa, where the diagnostic standard for AIDS differs dramatically from those of the West. Given the prohibitively high cost of HIV testing for poor African nations, the WHO in 1985 crafted a diagnostic loophole that became known as the “Bangui definition,” allowing medical professionals to diagnose AIDS in the absence of a test using just clinical symptoms: high fever, persistent cough, at least 30 days of diarrhea, and the loss of 10% of one's body weight within two months. Often suffering from malnutrition and without access to clean drinking water, many of the inhabitants of sub-Saharan Africa fit the bill, especially when the WHO added tuberculosis to the list of AIDS-defining illnesses in 1993 - a move which may be responsible for as many as one half of African “AIDS” cases, according to journalist Christine Johnson. The WHO's former Chief of Global HIV Surveillance, James Chin, acknowledged their manipulation of statistics, but stressed that it was the entire AIDS industry - not just his organization - perpetrating the fraud. “There's the saying that, if you knew what sausages are made of, most people would hesitate to sort of eat them, because they wouldn't like what's in it. And if you knew how HIV/AIDS numbers are cooked, or made up, you would use them with extreme caution,” Chin told an interviewer in 2009.12   With infected numbers stubbornly remaining constant in the US despite Fauci's fearmongering projections of the looming heterosexually-transmitted plague, the CDC in 1993 broadened its definition of AIDS to include asymptomatic (that is, healthy) HIV-positive people with low T-cell counts - an absurd criteria given that an individual's T-cell count can fluctuate by hundreds within a single day. As a result, the number of “AIDS cases” in the US immediately doubled. Supervised by Fauci, the NIAID had been quietly piling on diseases into the “AIDS-related” category for years, bloating the list from just two conditions - pneumocystis carinii pneumonia and Kaposi's sarcoma - to 30 so fast it raised eyebrows among some of science's leading lights. Deeming the entire process “bizarre” and unprecedented, Kary Mullis wondered aloud why no one had called the AIDS establishment out: “There's something wrong here. And it's got to be financial.”13   Indeed, an early CDC public relations campaign was exposed by the Wall Street Journal in 1987 as having deliberately mischaracterized AIDS as a threat to the entire population so as to garner increased public and private funding for what was very much a niche issue, with the risk to average heterosexuals from a single act of sex “smaller than the risk of ever getting hit by lightning.” Ironically, the ads, which sought to humanize AIDS patients in an era when few Americans knew anyone with the disease and more than half the adult population thought infected people should be forced to carry cards warning of their status, could be seen as a reaction to the fear tactics deployed by Fauci early on.14   It's hard to tell where fraud ends and incompetence begins with Gallo's HIV antibody test. Much like Covid-19 would become a “pandemic of testing,” with murder victims and motorcycle crashes lumped into “Covid deaths” thanks to over-sensitized PCR tests that yielded as many as 90% false positives,15 HIV testing is fraught with false positives - and unlike with Covid-19, most people who hear they are HIV-positive still believe they are receiving a death sentence. Due to the difficulty of isolating HIV itself from human samples, the most common diagnostic tests, ELISA and the Western Blot, are designed to detect not the virus but antibodies to it, upending the traditional medical understanding that the presence of antibodies indicates only exposure - and often that the body has actually vanquished the pathogen. Patients are known to test positive for HIV antibodies in the absence of the virus due to at least 70 other conditions, including hepatitis, lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, syphilis, recent vaccination or even pregnancy. (https://www.chcfl.org/diseases-that-can-cause-a-false-positive-hiv-test/) Positive results are often followed up with a PCR “viral load” test, even though the inventor of the PCR technique Kary Mullis famously condemned its misuse as a tool for diagnosing infection. Packaging inserts for all three tests warn the user that they cannot be reliably used to diagnose HIV.16 The ELISA HIV antibody test explicitly states: “At present there is no recognized standard for establishing the presence and absence of HIV antibody in human blood.”17   That the public remains largely unaware of these and other massive holes in the supposedly airtight HIV=AIDS=DEATH paradigm is a testament to Fauci's multi-layered control of the press. Like the writers of the Great Barrington Declaration and other Covid-19 dissidents, scientists who question HIV/AIDS dogma have been brutally punished for their heresy, no matter how prestigious their prior standing in the field and no matter how much evidence they have for their own claims. In 1987, the year the FDA's approval of AZT made AIDS the most profitable epidemic yet (a dubious designation Covid-19 has since surpassed), Fauci made it clearer than ever that scientific inquiry and debate - the basis of the scientific method - would no longer be welcome in the American public health sector, eliminating retrovirologist Peter Duesberg, then one of the most prominent opponents of the HIV=AIDS hypothesis, from the scientific conversation with a professional disemboweling that would make a cartel hitman blush. Duesberg had just eviscerated Gallo's 1984 HIV paper with an article of his own in the journal Cancer Research, pointing out that retroviruses had never before been found to cause a single disease in humans - let alone 30 AIDS-defining diseases. Rather than allow Gallo or any of the other scientists in his camp to respond to the challenge, Fauci waged a scorched-earth campaign against Duesberg, who had until then been one of the most highly regarded researchers in his field. Every research grant he requested was denied; every media appearance was canceled or preempted. The University of California at Berkeley, unable to fully fire him due to tenure, took away his lab, his graduate students, and the rest of his funding. The few colleagues who dared speak up for him in public were also attacked, while enemies and opportunists were encouraged to slander Duesberg at the conferences he was barred from attending and in the journals that would no longer publish his replies. When Duesberg was summoned to the White House later that year by then-President Ronald Reagan to debate Fauci on the origins of AIDS, Fauci convinced the president to cancel, allegedly pulling rank on the Commander-in-Chief with an accusation that the “White House was interfering in scientific matters that belonged to the NIH and the Office of Science and Technology Assessment.” After seven years of this treatment, Duesberg was contacted by NIH official Stephen O'Brien and offered an escape from professional purgatory. He could have “everything back,” he was told, and shown a manuscript of a scientific paper - apparently commissioned by the editor of the journal Nature - “HIV Causes AIDS: Koch's Postulates Fulfilled” with his own name listed alongside O'Brien's as an author.18 His refusal to take the bribe effectively guaranteed the epithet “AIDS denier” will appear on his tombstone. The character assassination of Duesberg became a template that would be deployed to great effectiveness wherever Fauci encountered dissent - never debate, only demonize, deplatform and destroy.    Even Luc Montagnier, the real discoverer of HIV, soon found himself on the wrong side of the Fauci machine. With his 1990 declaration that “the HIV virus [by itself] is harmless and passive, a benign virus,” Montagnier began distancing himself from Gallo's fraud, effectively placing a target on his own back. In a 1995 interview, he elaborated: “four factors that have come together to account for the sudden epidemic [of AIDS]: HIV presence, immune hyper-activation, increased sexually transmitted disease incidence, sexual behavior changes and other behavioral changes” such as drug use, poor nutrition and stress - all of which he said had to occur “essentially simultaneously” for HIV to be transmitted, creating the modern epidemic. Like the professionals at the Tri-State Healing Center, Montagnier advocated for the use of antioxidants like vitamin C and N-acetyl cysteine, naming oxidative stress as a critical factor in the progression from HIV to AIDS.19 When Montagnier died in 2022, Fauci's media mouthpieces sneered that the scientist (who was awarded the Nobel Prize in 2008 for his discovery of HIV, despite his flagging faith in that discovery's significance) “started espousing views devoid of a scientific basis” in the late 2000s, leading him to be “shunned by the scientific community.”20 In a particularly egregious jab, the Washington Post's obit sings the praises of Robert Gallo, implying it was the American scientist who really should have won the Nobel for HIV, while dismissing as “

In this NEJM Outbreaks Update, Editor-in-Chief Eric Rubin and Deputy Editor Lindsey Baden are joined by veterinarian and virologist Yoshihiro Kawaoka to discuss avian influenza and its current impact on chickens, cows, cats, and humans. Eric Rubin is the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal. Lindsey Baden is a Deputy Editor of the Journal. Yoshihiro Kawaoka is a veterinarian and virologist and a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the University of Tokyo. Stephen Morrissey, the interviewer, is the Executive Managing Editor of the Journal. E.J. Rubin and Others. NEJM Outbreaks Update — H5N1. N Engl J Med. DOI: 10.1056/NEJMe2502267.

Featuring articles on H5N1 infection, chronic subdural hematoma, achondroplasia, and B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia; a review article on carceral health care; a case report of a woman with weakness, back pain, and pancytopenia; and Perspectives on the changing approach to addiction, on the moral injury of inhaler prescribing, and on how one size fits … some.

John Kelly is the director of the Recovery Research Institute at Massachusetts General Hospital and a professor of psychiatry in addiction medicine at Harvard Medical School. Stephen Morrissey, the interviewer, is the Executive Managing Editor of the Journal. J.F. Kelly, N.D. Volkow, and H.K. Koh. The Changing Approach to Addiction — From Incarceration to Treatment and Recovery Support. N Engl J Med 2025;392:833-836.

Returning to the show, Drs. Vincent Rajkumar and Aaron Goodman engage in a dynamic debate over the evolving landscape of smoldering multiple myeloma, focusing on the highly anticipated study recently co-authored by Dr. Rajkumar and published in The New England Journal of Medicine after being presented at ASH 2024. They dissect the study's findings, which highlight the impact of early intervention with daratumumab in delaying disease progression for patients classified as high-risk. The discussion explores the nuances of smoldering myeloma classification, the controversy surrounding risk stratification, and the historical context of prior studies that failed to change clinical practice. With their expert insights, Drs. Rajkumar and Goodman break down the implications of this research, questioning whether it truly shifts the standard of care and what it means for future treatment approaches. View the NEJM publication. https://www.nejm.org/doi/abs/10.1056/NEJMoa2409029 Check out Chadi's website for all Healthcare Unfiltered episodes and other content. www.chadinabhan.com/ Watch all Healthcare Unfiltered episodes on YouTube. www.youtube.com/channel/UCjiJPTpIJdIiukcq0UaMFsA

Send us a Text Message (please include your email so we can respond!)Episode 59! We finish our CCR down under coverage with TRAUMOX2 or "Early Restrictive vs Liberal Oxygen for Trauma Patients" published in JAMA by Arleth et al and then switch to SAHARA or "Liberal or Restrictive Transfusion Strategy in Aneurysmal Subarachnoid Hemorrhage" by English et al published in NEJM. We then frustrate Todd with questions from our mailbag, a good episode!TRAUMOX2 (pubmed): https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39657224/TRAUMOX2 (JAMA): https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/2827980SAHARA (pubmed): https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39655786/SAHARA (NEJM): https://www.nejm.org/doi/10.1056/NEJMoa2410962If you enjoy the show be sure to like and subscribe, leave that 5 star review! Be sure to follow us on the social @icucast for the associated figures, comments, and other content not available in the audio format! Email us at icuedandtoddcast@gmail.com with any questions or suggestions! Thank you Mike Gannon for the intro and exit music!

Featuring articles on ventricular tachycardia, chronic lymphocytic leukemia, chronic kidney disease, kidney allografts, and a low-dose yellow fever vaccine; a review article on tubal ectopic pregnancy; a case report of a man with abdominal pain; and Perspectives on reducing the financial toxicity of rapidly approved drugs, on resilience, and on the death of an unlikable man.