Malaria breakthrough as scientists find ‘highly effective’ way to kill parasite • Hacker News Board

Re: Malaria breakthrough as scientists find ‘highly effective’ way to kill parasite

#31

Post by gerbilly » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 8:21 PM UTC

chongli wrote: post #11

webwielder2 wrote: post #7

>science journalism I think this is the case for pretty much every area of journalism. If you are a subject matter expert, you quickly realize that 90% of coverage of that subject is dreadful.

Yes, the Gell-Mann amnesia effect [1] needs to be made more widely known. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Crichton#GellMannAmnes...

Yeah, but we've heard ad-nauseam about the Gell-Mann effect.

I wish there were an equally clever idiom I could trot out when people criticise professions they probably know noting about.

Journalism is an incredibly difficult field to work in, and journalism as a profession is just barely still a thing due to loss of advertising revenue to online platforms.

Think about it, we've traded a profession that has historically been one of the few to tell truth to power for free cloud software.

And we paid for our cloud software and for our and social media¹ skinner boxes, by voluntarily giving our own surveillance data to private non-acountable entities² which probably collude with the government, and which lose our data to organised crime a few times a year³.

To me that doesn't sound so clever.

1: A kind of casino with the doors welded shut where the chips are the precious minutes of our lives.

2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surveillance_capitalism. See also: https://privacysos.org/blog/nsa-calls-the-iphone-using-publi...

3: Equifax, yahoo data breaches just off the top of my head.

Re: Malaria breakthrough as scientists find ‘highly effective’ way to kill parasite

#32

Post by ssully » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 8:34 PM UTC

ekianjo wrote: post #30

ssully wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know it's really popular these days to shit on journalists, and I agree that the quality of some outlets can be less then desirable, but it is an incredibly difficult field that involves a lot of work, little pay, little thanks, and terrible job security. Looking at this article, there is no Author by-line, but just the "Global Health" topic. Digging in, their Global Health topic is managed by their "Global develop…

What is incredibly difficult about being a journalist? It is the core of their job to read stuff and know better than the average how to make sense of things they read. Not "very difficult" by any measure, we are simply witnessing sheer laziness.

I provided four reasons as to why an average journalists job is difficult, and an entire paragraph as to why this particular journalists job might be difficult.

Also your description of a journalists "core" job is incredibly reductive. It would be like me saying a programmers job is to just "write code". It's accurate to a point, but fails to capture a majority of a programmers responsibilities and how they do it well.

Re: Malaria breakthrough as scientists find ‘highly effective’ way to kill parasite

#33

Post by ses1984 » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 8:34 PM UTC

mullingitover wrote: post #9

ChefboyOG wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This kind of experiment is called a gene drive, and there's a huge debate in scientific communities right now around whether it's responsible or not to use them, particularly around the mosquito problem. A professor of mine who works in the field was discussing this with us last week. The idea with mosquitoes specifically is that we can wipe out specifically the mosquito populations that carry most diseases. The deba…

> This is just my interpretation, but it seems like there is a sensible portion of detractors who simply want to derisk the experiment as much as possible by collecting more and more data. This is so infuriating. Many people will die during this extended hemming and hawing. Humans have driven countless important species to extinction with no thought, but we have to vacillate over a species that is responsible for mor…

When we drove species to extinction before, it was accidental, and it's usually viewed as a huge mistake.

I wouldn't want to be one of the people who advocates for it, and then it turns out to be a giant disaster. The potential risk seems huge and could affect generations. Although I it would be pretty easy to hedge against that risk by keeping some mosquitos/eggs alive in a lab, and if the experiment goes wrong, re-populate the mosquitos.

From an economic perspective, how does the cost of all this research compare to mass producing malaria medicine?

Re: Malaria breakthrough as scientists find ‘highly effective’ way to kill parasite

#34

Post by _Microft » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 8:36 PM UTC

Crazyontap wrote: post #28

ChefboyOG wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This kind of experiment is called a gene drive, and there's a huge debate in scientific communities right now around whether it's responsible or not to use them, particularly around the mosquito problem. A professor of mine who works in the field was discussing this with us last week. The idea with mosquitoes specifically is that we can wipe out specifically the mosquito populations that carry most diseases. The deba…

This was rather insightful. But seriously I cannot believe that this technology exists, has proven successful in lab test but the reason they're holding it back is because they are afraid of tampering with the eco-system. I'm glad they didn't feel that when eradicating polio and smallpox and other things. Anyway after reading some more I feel that part of it may be because it is modification to the gene. People are j…

It is not because of gene manipulations per se but because by design it is proliferating by itself. Contrast that to a vaccine that turns out to be not safe: administering the vaccine would then just be stopped. If these gene-drive mosquitoes, on the other hand, turn out to be a problem, then there is no easy way to stop that. So better get it right the first time and - as much as you do not seem to like that - that requires time for due diligence.

Re: Malaria breakthrough as scientists find ‘highly effective’ way to kill parasite

#35

Post by urbanjunkie » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 8:54 PM UTC

ekianjo wrote: post #30

ssully wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know it's really popular these days to shit on journalists, and I agree that the quality of some outlets can be less then desirable, but it is an incredibly difficult field that involves a lot of work, little pay, little thanks, and terrible job security. Looking at this article, there is no Author by-line, but just the "Global Health" topic. Digging in, their Global Health topic is managed by their "Global develop…

What is incredibly difficult about being a journalist? It is the core of their job to read stuff and know better than the average how to make sense of things they read. Not "very difficult" by any measure, we are simply witnessing sheer laziness.

Ignorant and arrogant. What a dick you are, you pathetic, incel waste of oxygen.

Re: Malaria breakthrough as scientists find ‘highly effective’ way to kill parasite

#36

Post by Medicalidiot » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 8:58 PM UTC

I'm wondering when we start using biologics to attack parasites. We've started using bacteriophages in trials to serious success, but I cannot wait until we start using something analogous to that to take out malaria.

The reason I say this is malaria is a nasty pathogen whose ability to develop resistance is well documented so even though this is an exciting breakthrough, we will always need another exciting breakthrough on the horizon to continually fight it.

Re: Malaria breakthrough as scientists find ‘highly effective’ way to kill parasite

#37

Post by projektfu » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 9:28 PM UTC

arkades wrote: post #2

This article can’t seem to decide whether it’s discussing ivermectin - an old antiparasitic derived from the avermectin produced by streptomyces - or bacteria. It vacillates between “ivermectin effective” and “bacteria killed parasite,” which are in no way equivalent. The latter suggests something like “strep killed plasmodium, so maybe we can find the compound used and use it for malaria.” The latter suggests, well,…

A lot of the strangeness seems to be in quotes from Dr. Karikuri. Did the author of the article misquote him or are his statements that confused?

Re: Malaria breakthrough as scientists find ‘highly effective’ way to kill parasite

#38

Post by grecy » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 9:34 PM UTC

Havoc wrote: post #23

About time. Story: Grew up in an area that is close to but not in Malaria country. One day my mom comes back from visiting a friend that had malaria. Reports he was in tears due to suffering. ...that severely rattled me as a kid. Because I knew he's the kind of man that sews himself together again with fishing line. People like that do not as a general rule cry.

I contracted Malaria twice while driving around Africa for three years.

The first time in Mali was like the worst cold/flu I've ever had. The "cure" medicine (Coartem [1]) helped a lot. I was alright.

The second time I was in remote Angola and it was B.A.D. I was only 35 and very fit and strong. For five days I did not walk, talk, eat, sleep or function in any way. My friends were injecting me with the stronger version of Coartem twice a day, and I thought my head was going to split open from the severe headache. I did not think I was actually going to die, but mighty close. I lost 20lbs in those 5 days.

After that I was severely paranoid about covering up and using bug spray in the evenings, and I'm extremely happy I didn't get it again all through Southern and Eastern Africa for the 18 months after that.

I've been reading up on the drugs that are supposed to permanently remove it from your system, but they seem to function best on the Asian strain of Malaria. Maybe I'll take it anyway to prevent a relapse.

TLDR: I don't recommend getting Malaria.

[1] https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/drugsatfda_docs/label/2009/02...

Re: Malaria breakthrough as scientists find ‘highly effective’ way to kill parasite

#39

Post by RcouF1uZ4gsC » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 9:35 PM UTC

dctoedt wrote: post #14

mullingitover wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is just my interpretation, but it seems like there is a sensible portion of detractors who simply want to derisk the experiment as much as possible by collecting more and more data. This is so infuriating. Many people will die during this extended hemming and hawing. Humans have driven countless important species to extinction with no thought, but we have to vacillate over a species that is responsible for mor…

Wanting any creature to suffer seems ... problematic. That goes for wanting humans to suffer too: even the most "evil" among us are doing the best they know how, for some value of "best" that their brains arrive at as a result of the genetic lottery and the "programming" that they've had as a result of their lifetime of experiences. That certainly doesn't mean that we shouldn't vigorously oppose some of the things th…

>As a certain Middle Eastern sage is reputed to have said circa 2,000 years ago: Love your enemies.

That Middle Eastern sage also reputed to have talked about those who would not listen to him being cast into outer darkness where there was weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth, and the worm never dies, and the fire is never quenched.

Re: Malaria breakthrough as scientists find ‘highly effective’ way to kill parasite

#40

Post by projektfu » Wed, Sep 11, 2019, 9:38 PM UTC

_Microft wrote: post #34

Crazyontap wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was rather insightful. But seriously I cannot believe that this technology exists, has proven successful in lab test but the reason they're holding it back is because they are afraid of tampering with the eco-system. I'm glad they didn't feel that when eradicating polio and smallpox and other things. Anyway after reading some more I feel that part of it may be because it is modification to the gene. People are j…

It is not because of gene manipulations per se but because by design it is proliferating by itself. Contrast that to a vaccine that turns out to be not safe: administering the vaccine would then just be stopped. If these gene-drive mosquitoes, on the other hand, turn out to be a problem, then there is no easy way to stop that. So better get it right the first time and - as much as you do not seem to like that - that…

There is some chance that a modified live vaccine can mutate into a superpathogen that becomes immediately widespread and deadly. There is a theory that this happened with the feline panleukopenia vaccine and that this became canine parvovirus, with rapid, worldwide distribution of the new pathogen. Something to think about when we put 250,000 human lives on one side of the balance and a big question mark on the other, and telling people that there's no good reason to be cautious.