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NASA announces unprecedented return of sick ISS astronaut and crew

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Re: NASA announces unprecedented return of sick ISS astronaut and crew

#21
post #16
post #5

Why be so secretive? This is not a military mission. These missions cost a lot of taxpayer money (money well spend you may argue), but we deserve full transparency. You don't get to go to space on other people's money and expect privacy. We might want to learn from what went wrong here.

> Why be so secretive? This is not a military mission. These missions cost a lot of taxpayer money (money well spend you may argue), but we deserve full transparency. We deserve as much transparency as we can get on the science we as taxpayers paid for, not full de-anonymization of the bodily happenings of living crew. There's certainly valuable science here, but the crew member doesn't have to be outed for it. > You…

The full on dystopian take would be to require anyone receiving welfare or other public funds to fully disclose all of their private details.

You want Medicaid? Tell everyone about your hemorrhoids first.

Re: NASA announces unprecedented return of sick ISS astronaut and crew

#22
post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why be so secretive? This is not a military mission. These missions cost a lot of taxpayer money (money well spend you may argue), but we deserve full transparency. We deserve as much transparency as we can get on the science we as taxpayers paid for, not full de-anonymization of the bodily happenings of living crew. There's certainly valuable science here, but the crew member doesn't have to be outed for it. > You…

The full on dystopian take would be to require anyone receiving welfare or other public funds to fully disclose all of their private details. You want Medicaid? Tell everyone about your hemorrhoids first.

Might actually be a net benefit and lead to de-stigmatizing human health conditions

Re: NASA announces unprecedented return of sick ISS astronaut and crew

#23
post #15
post #5

Why be so secretive? This is not a military mission. These missions cost a lot of taxpayer money (money well spend you may argue), but we deserve full transparency. You don't get to go to space on other people's money and expect privacy. We might want to learn from what went wrong here.

The only medical condition I can think of which they would not disclose is pregnancy. That would lead to further questions and is controversial despite being very simple. Further evidenced by the fact that the affected crew member is unknown to the public.

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Re: NASA announces unprecedented return of sick ISS astronaut and crew

#24
post #5

Why be so secretive? This is not a military mission. These missions cost a lot of taxpayer money (money well spend you may argue), but we deserve full transparency. You don't get to go to space on other people's money and expect privacy. We might want to learn from what went wrong here.

Do you seriously believe that you should have the right to demand access to the private medical records of every teacher, soldier, judge, cop, etc. in the country because their pay comes from taxpayers? If yes I'm not quite sure how to respond, IMO that's an utterly absurd position. If no, why are astronauts being singled out for this treatment?

Re: NASA announces unprecedented return of sick ISS astronaut and crew

#25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What a strange take. Does this also apply to every soldier in the armed forces? Seems your criteria is equally applicable there. The relevant people that can do the research and write future policies based on the data obviously will have the information. Not sure what good you think that you personally having it can do.

A single soldier having a medical issue generally doesn't cancel a multi-month mission costing some X large sum of money, requiring another Y large sum of money to even finish cancelling it (returning their unit home). Therefore it's not relevant and not needed for the public to know.

Yes, I’m sure aircrew never get so violently sick as to affect millions or billions of dollars in crew and and supporting assets due to an emergency, and armed service members are never transported by emergency transportations for eye-watering costs. Technical inequity that ignores facts is the argument of those without arguments.

The specifics of “who” has zero relevance to what is necessary for an ongoing situation; you don’t get to dictate your access and timeline to information just because you contributed a fraction of a penny to something.

Re: NASA announces unprecedented return of sick ISS astronaut and crew

#26
post #5

Why be so secretive? This is not a military mission. These missions cost a lot of taxpayer money (money well spend you may argue), but we deserve full transparency. You don't get to go to space on other people's money and expect privacy. We might want to learn from what went wrong here.

What difference would this make to you? It would unnecessarily violate someone’s medical privacy for no actual benefit to the public other than satisfying someone’s curiosity.

> You don't get to go to space on other people's money and expect privacy.

Yes, everyone gets privacy. You don’t get to see their private communications back home. You don’t get their medical records.

They aren’t receiving money from taxpayers like a gift. They’re doing a job. It’s ridiculous to demand that they forfeit their privacy because tax money was involved.

> We might want to learn from what went wrong here.

NASA will learn what went wrong here because they’re in a position to act on

You are not in a position to do anything about it. Violating their privacy would make no difference.

Re: NASA announces unprecedented return of sick ISS astronaut and crew

#27
post #5

Why be so secretive? This is not a military mission. These missions cost a lot of taxpayer money (money well spend you may argue), but we deserve full transparency. You don't get to go to space on other people's money and expect privacy. We might want to learn from what went wrong here.

Without taking a side, I'll share the interesting detail that NASA did not historically grant much medical privacy to astronauts. You can read medical reports of the Apollo-Soyuz crew here (documenting their poisoning by toxic rocket fuel, dinitrogen tetroxide), https://ntrs.nasa.gov/citations/19770023791 ( "The Apollo-Soyuz Test Project: Medical report" (1977))

Since this is a special publication and since it was published in 1977 (after the Privacy Act of 1974), I'm wondering if NASA's condition for astronauts on this mission was to release mission-related medical science to the public.

Speculating:

If this is a condition of employment as an astronaut, then it probably wouldn't include conditions confirmed not to be caused by being in space, which means this'll stay confidential until NASA has fully diagnosed the crew member and figured out what likely happened.

And if it turns out the crew member's issue was entirely unrelated to the mission, it stays under wraps but new science or procedures are devised to better manage this and related conditions in space.

Re: NASA announces unprecedented return of sick ISS astronaut and crew

#28
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The full on dystopian take would be to require anyone receiving welfare or other public funds to fully disclose all of their private details. You want Medicaid? Tell everyone about your hemorrhoids first.

Might actually be a net benefit and lead to de-stigmatizing human health conditions

You go first, then. Let’s see your full medical records without redaction if you think it’s a net benefit.

I think there's value in reducing stigma around health conditions, but forcing poor people to reveal their medical conditions to the world isn't it.

Re: NASA announces unprecedented return of sick ISS astronaut and crew

#30
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The full on dystopian take would be to require anyone receiving welfare or other public funds to fully disclose all of their private details. You want Medicaid? Tell everyone about your hemorrhoids first.

Might actually be a net benefit and lead to de-stigmatizing human health conditions

By forcing the poorest to disclose their personal health issues?
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