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Rachel Thomas Profile picture
@math_rachel
Oct 26, 2021 • 12 tweets • 4 min read • Read on X
- Millions of people are disabled with long covid (a horrific illness)
- This is going to be VERY expensive
- There are big financial incentives to downplay the severity & prevalence
- Concerted efforts similar to the climate denial playbook

fast.ai/2021/10/12/med… 1/
It is critical for physicians, scientists, & public health officials to realize they are not dealing with an orthodox scientific debate, but a well-funded sophisticated denialist campaign based on ideological & corporate interests -- @GYamey @gorskon

blogs.bmj.com/bmj/2021/09/13… 2/
Many of the lessons from climate denialism debates apply to covid as well 3/

There has been misleading & irresponsible coverage of Long Covid in outlets like the New Yorker. Read some responses here @itsbodypolitic 4/
wearebodypolitic.com/bodytype/2021/…
There is not some clean break from the past where medicine stopped involving biases: racial, gender, anti-fat, ableist 5/

Medical data is not objective truth. It can be missing, biased, or incorrect 6/

“While being misdiagnosed with the wrong *physical* disease doubled the time it took to get to the right diagnosis, getting a *psychological* misdiagnosis extended it even more – by 2.5 up to 14 times, depending on the disease.” 7/

bbc.com/future/article…
Multiple sclerosis “was called hysterical paralysis right up to the day they invented a CAT scan machine” and white spots of demyelination could be viewed on the brain 8/

theguardian.com/books/2020/sep…
Activists of ACT UP forced the government & pharmaceutical companies to stop neglecting the AIDS crisis through a two pronged approach: creative and confrontational acts of protest, and informed scientific proposals 9/

npr.org/sections/healt…
Science does not just progress inevitably, independent of funding and politics and framing and biases 10/

It is a pivotal time for how societies will address the many disabled w/ long covid. I hope we will center patient partnerships in research for complex & multi-system diseases, and strengthen inadequate disability support to improve life for all disabled people. 11/
Medicine is inherently political. 12/

fast.ai/2021/10/12/med…

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More from @math_rachel

Rachel Thomas Profile picture
Nov 12
The human immune system is impressive, but so are the mechanisms pathogens use to evade it. In my new post, I cover 5 surprising and ingenious ways that viruses & bacteria can subvert our defenses. 1/ Image
Our cells contain microscopic motor proteins that transport cargo along microtubules. The virus (HSV-1) that is increasingly being linked to Alzheimer's Disease uses our motor proteins to transport its viral DNA to the nucleus, so that it can start replicating faster. 2/
T cells are a crucial part of the immune system. A single-celled organism (T. cruzi, cause of Chagas disease) blocks the signal which coordinates T cell response. With no T cell response to it, T. cruzi can survive 10-30 years in a person, before wreaking havoc or death. 3/ Image
Read 9 tweets
Rachel Thomas Profile picture
Oct 28
My daughter is constantly creating– her passions include making art, writing fiction, coding interactive games, and composing music. Some might say my husband & I are terrible parents… because she does all these things on screens 1/ Image of colored boxes. Text: In defense of screen time. Pundits say my husband and I are parenting wrong. Rachel Thomas. Oct 29, 2024
I am concerned by how these false interlocking points are being repeated by politicians & pundits: that screentime is very harmful for children, that it is essential for kids to attend in-person school every day (even when sick), and that workers must return to the office. 2/ Collection of headlines: - Got a cold, runny nose, the sniffles? No worries! Come to school, LAUSD says - Cough? Sore throat? More schools suggest mildly sick kids attend anyway - Parents told to send sniffly children to school in government crackdown on sick days - Sickness-related school absences to be targeted under government plan
Overemphasizing in-person school attendance overlooks the many kids whose needs aren’t met by in-person school. It also overlooks the many online & screen-based options opportunities to build skills, express creativity, and form friendships. 3/

fast.ai/posts/2024-10-…
Read 8 tweets
Rachel Thomas Profile picture
Aug 12
There is much confusion about the "hygiene hypothesis" (what kind of microbes are beneficial vs. harmful?)-- a clearer refinement of it is the framing of "old friends" vs. "crowd infections"

Our immune systems evolved in a different world, without 100,000 flights per day 1/ Image
Some people compare the immune system to a muscle that gets stronger with use. Yet some infections leave lasting harm. Viruses are increasingly linked with multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer's, type 1 diabetes, cancer, & more...

My new post: 2/rachel.fast.ai/posts/2024-08-…
Allergies are a misfiring of immune system– when it attacks harmless environmental substances, e.g. pollen or dust. Autoimmunity is a different type of immune misfiring– when it attacks our own cells. Both are on the rise.

All the diseases in below chart are autoimmune. 3/ Image
Read 7 tweets
Rachel Thomas Profile picture
May 16, 2023
Friends with no previous interest in AI ethics have been asking me about it recently, so I want to share several underlying concepts about AI & power that are important to understand. 🧵 1/
AI and Power: The Ethical Challenges of Automation, Centralization, & Scale

Based on 20-min talk:

Blog post version: rachel.fast.ai/posts/2023-05-…
2/
In Australia, automation was used to scale putting poor people into debt (often illegally). The govt went from creating 20,000 new debts PER YEAR to creating 20,000 new debts PER WEEK, many of them bogus, but hard for people to appeal. 3/
Read 10 tweets
Rachel Thomas Profile picture
Mar 21, 2023
Viruses: The Silent Triggers of Autoimmune & Neurodegenerative Diseases (how a simple cold can lead to life-changing disease) 1/

My new post: rachel.fast.ai/posts/2023-03-…
Rheumatoid arthritis, Crohn's disease, Multiple sclerosis, Type 1 Diabetes, Lupus, Hashimoto's, & Psoriasis impact a range of body systems, but all are autoimmune diseases.

Developing a lifelong autoimmune disease is often first triggered by an infection. 2/
Medicine is very siloed, and autoimmune diseases have often been treated in separate silos, based on which body system they impact, limiting our broader understanding of common threads. 3/
Read 8 tweets
Rachel Thomas Profile picture
Mar 6, 2023
Even common viruses can have long-reaching, surprising, & devastating consequences. Fortunately, there are simple steps we can take to reduce transmission. 1/

My new post: rachel.fast.ai/posts/2023-03-…
The idea that a common childhood virus can quietly hang out in your nervous system, reactivate decades later to cause shingles, and then months AFTER shingles blisters clear up cause blood clots & strokes is mind-boggling to me 2/

theconversation.com/chickenpox-and…
VZV (chickenpox virus) is not just linked to strokes, but also linked to multiple sclerosis or vascular dementia (my note: possibly through reactivating other viruses).

Numerous common viruses increase risk of Alzheimer's or Dementia. 3/ cell.com/neuron/fulltex…
Read 8 tweets

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