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last year I had a research assignment based on modifying our dna and transgenics, and it's quite an interesting subject, i won't be so arrogant as to link to that assignment, but I will post links to some of the articles i referred to..

http://www.mindfully.org/GE/Today-Food-Tomorrow-Hu mans.htm
http://www.fda.gov/cvm/index/fdavet/1999/july.html #transgenics
http://www.ifgene.org/proscons.htm
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0317,baard,43560, 1.html
http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=1640

and no, i did not RTFA.

http://www.unicat-communications.de/zentral/bildar /darlmcbride.jpg

http://www.fda.gov/oc/whiteoak/whiteoakdedication/ orrinhatch.jpg

http://hcc.musc.edu/images/hollings.jpe

"There are no FDA regulations that say you have to show the amount of transfatty acids, unlike everything else you see in the package."

Oh?

Maybe not, but there will be as of Januray 1, 2006:

http://www.fda.gov/oc/initiatives/transfat/

This is why you see more and more products in the grocry store advertising: "Contains NO transfats!" or something to that effect (instead, look for it's evil twin: modified food starch).

Until January 1, 2006, the easiet way to tell if your favorite junk-food, er, I mean food product, contains trans fats is by looking at the list of ingredients. If it says anywhere on that list "partially hydrogenated X" (where X is basically anything) congratulations! It's got trans-fats!

The FDA has been under considerable pressure to enact this regulation for years, but it delayed having the regulation take effect until the year 2006 in order to allow the food lobby *cough, cough* I meant to say food industry, time to adjust their food content to find a viable alternative to trans-fats, which have the convenient holy trinity of:

A) making foods taste good
B) being very cheap
C) acting as a preservative

There is no free lunch: Eat less, exercise more, eat more greens, less meat and less fat.

Just remember, It's those FDA restrictions (which I assume you mean as opposed to USDA which is the Department of Agriculture) that kept Thalidomide from being as widely used in the US as it was in Europe.

"But I don't think that the typical prescription drug ad on tv is false. Annoying, maybe, but that's it."

Well you are wrong. Those adds in effect are telling you their drugs are safe, with the caveat of all the often disturbingly dangerous side effects they quickly rush through at the end.

Well in the cases of numerous drugs they are pushing it turns out they are in fact dangerous, they had the data that showed they were safe and they've been colluding with corrupt officials in the FDA to suppress it. The short list Bextra, Cresto, Meridia, Serevent and Vioxx. Celebrex is under suspicion being in the same class as Vioxx and Bextra. Chances are high Vioxx has killed a substantial number of people, its impossible to tell because they all died of heart attacks and strokes. Many experts are reviewing the case for XOX-2 inhibitors and have concluded there is no actual rationale for them. Ibuprofen at a few cents a pill may be as effective versus COX-2 at 3 dollars a pill. Merck and Pfizer just marketed COX-2 as a miracle drug, brushed all the negative data under the rug with the help of the FDA. and conned everyone in to switching from a generic over the counter drug to a patented prescription drug that they've profited to the tune of billions on, and which have probably killed and people based on the suppressed data.

To retiterare what I posed when this started, all indications are Vioxx and Bextra should be banned but the FDA formed a committee stacked in the favor of Pfizer and Merck and lo and behold they voted to put them back on the market because it would have cost Pfizer and Merck billions to take them down and we value profits over killing people. 10 of the people on the committee have done consulting work for the drug companies in the past, had a of conflict of interest and shouldn't have been on the panel. They voted 9 to 1 for the drug companies. Without their votes Vioxx and Bextra would have been voted off the market.

A similar problem exists with antidepressants. All indications are some of them are causing more problems than they solve. Some were never tested on children but the drug companies successfully marketed them for children anyway. It was a huge growth market. What parent with a problem child wouldn't snap up a magic pill that fixed their kid. Unfortunately it turns out that in children, rather than curing depression they often push children in to hallucinations and suicidal tendencies.

"The Internet is a great communications medium, and it doesn't take billions to use it"

And it wont have any measurable impact against the power of drug companies. Television dominates the lives and thinking of most Americans and you have to be rich to exploit it.

My posting here is pissing in to the wind.

All in all I appreciate your enthusiasm but you are pretty naive about how the real world works. It would be great if everything on Television was true and for the greater good but its not, its brainwashing propaganda designed to make rich companies richer. TV has turned in to the oracle of deception and doom for Americans if not the world. Its a fatal flaw in capitalism that most people will do anything they have to, to turn a profit and get rich, and they don't care who they hurt or the damage they cause.

The FDA index of treatments no longer mentions birth control or contraception.

FDA index

Considering the pilots in the Cessna got flashed three times, and a helicopter got flashed by the same guy, I'm pretty sure it was intentional.

Still, pre- and post-9/11 stories are interesting to read. Post 9/11 stories abound with "terrorists using lasers to possibly down planes" whereas pre-9/11 stories are about mischief, poor planning, and training pilots not to stare at the beam. Funny how things change.

Pre 9/11 laser-plane stories:
Problems with Laser Light Shows
Outdoor Laser Safety Is in the Hands of the FAA

As another note, we had some asshat firing a pellet gun at car windows back in the 90's. Someone was caught shining a laser pointer at a vehicle and arrested as a suspect. Funny (and scary) thing was listening to the idiot talking heads on TV speculating if a common laser pointer could shatter a car windshield. Yes, they were serious about it.

Post 9/11, they are going all out to hang some asshat out to dry for screwing with planes. The idiots who do this deserve to be punished, but what it really looks like is lasers are getting set up to be regulated and/or removed from public availability.

What's really interesting is that there is an FAA report (April 2001) documenting at least 150 instances of cockpit illuminations between 1996 and 1999. That's about once a week. It wasn't big news then.

I'd love to get one of those 100mW green lasers to mess around with, but now I can't. I would expect some kind of bill being introduced in Congress soon to address this issue now that they are back in session.

A little off-topic but still salient to the discusion: In your post, you don't say what country you live in the south of. If it's the US, be aware that there are two sets of rules that your software will have to live under. HIPAA of course, deals with access to protected medical information. 21CFR11 deals with software as a "medical device" and in many ways, is more difficult to work with than HIPAA. The problem with 21CFR11 is that it's a moving target without real specific rules.

The main things to keep in mind are version control, encrypted signatures, audit trails for everything, access logs for everything.

Here's a couple of other useful spam-reporting addresses:

• FDA (for Viagra etc. spam -- if it's a drug or medication being offered under its US brand name, the Food and Drug Administration enforcers want to know)
• SEC (for stock-pumping scams, hot insider tips, etc., shop them to the Securities and Exchange Commission).

Here's a couple of other useful spam-reporting addresses:

• FDA (for Viagra etc. spam -- if it's a drug or medication being offered under its US brand name, the Food and Drug Administration enforcers want to know)
• SEC (for stock-pumping scams, hot insider tips, etc., shop them to the Securities and Exchange Commission).

I suspect you're just trolling.

I'm trolling because you think I referred to the wrong agency? Give me a break.

Besides that I'm not even wrong. The FDA does deal with imports. The USDA controlls imports on an economic and agricultural level, but the FDA is responsible for the safety of imports.

Observe: http://www.fda.gov/ora/import/default.htm

And a quote from said page:

With the exception of most meat and poultry, all food, drugs, biologics, cosmetics, medical devices, and electronic products that emit radiation, as defined in the FD&C and related Acts, are subject to examination by FDA when they are being imported or offered for import into the United States. Most meat and poultry products are regulated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Now. Are you trolling?

Wow, I thought that might be actively thought up until I read:
http://www.fda.gov/cdrh/ode/primerf6.html

From now on, I take my tinfoil hat off during my cranial exams -- on the other hand, you'll have to pry my burger king crown out of my cold, dead hands.

83 cell phones have exploded or caught fire--but there are millions that haven't, so it is not a big deal.

Hmmm... How well did that logic work against Ephedra or Firestone Wilderness AT tires?

Rational people calcate risk with math.

Ephedra: 1% of all dietary suppliment sales, yet 64% of all adverse reactions. With an analysis of the data available at the time, there was enough indication of serious risks (heart attacks, strokes) that starting a clinical study to analyze the risks would have been unethical. Meta-analysis of the data available revealed that risk of serious side effects was 1 in 1000.

Firestone Wilderness AT tires: 174 deaths, 700 injuries reported, out of roughly 20 million tires recalled. Roughly about one serious event in 20 thousand or so, and this is not counting blowouts that did not lead to bodily harm.

Cellphones: From the above story -- 83 have exploded or caught fire. Injuries? A few. Number of cell phones in use? 164 million phones were sold in the second quarter alone of 2004. Lets be generous and say that most people replace their phones once every 6 months. That's 83 injuries out of 300 million, or one out of ever 3.6 million.

So, to review:

Ephedra risk: 1 out of 1000. Firestone tires risk: 1 out of 20,000. Cell phone risk: 1 out of 3,600,000.

See the problem?

Now, if these were all the same brand of cellphones, I'd suggest a recall. There has been a few recalls of a few possible problem designs, but most of the cases seem to be bootleg batteries.

So what should we recall?

Speaking of risk, perhaps this old post to sci.environment would be helpful, even if some of the information is probably out of date.

You have a 1 in a million risk of dying from cancer if you live in a brick building for 2 months -- that is over 3x the risk of a cell battery exploding. You have roughly the same risk (1 in a million) from dying in your bathtub -- time to outlaw tubs, hope you like showers. 40 tablespoons of peanut butter also gives you a one-in-a-million risk, due to low levels of carcigens. There are a lot of deadly things out there.

Correct sir, which is why you are precisely wrong.

http://www.fda.gov/opacom/laws/fdcact/fdcact1.htm
FEDERAL FOOD, DRUG, AND COSMETIC ACT
CHAPTER II - DEFINITIONS
SEC. 201. [321]
(g)(1) The term ''drug'' means
(C) articles (other than food) intended to affect the structure or any function of the body of man or other animals; and

So I say again, other than the exceptions bought with tobacco money, why exactly should tobacco not be under the purvue of the FDA?

However, "On March 21, 2000, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration lacks the authority to regulate tobacco. Therefore, FDA no longer maintains its Children and Tobacco Website." (from here)

Hey, at least its a good excuse to take a vacation to Mexico, and, oh btw, stock up on presription meds like Amoxycilin.

I'm sure the original poster knows this, but a quick warning for others:

Please don't take antibiotics unless you are under a doctor's care, and when you do make sure to take all the antibiotics prescribed. Why? Because if you do it wrongly, you can help diseases evolve antibiotic resistance. Superbugs are a big problem, causing increased costs (as people have to use expensive new antibiotics when the old ones become useless) and medical problems up to and including death (when diseases don't don't respond to the expected antibiotics).

So buy all the Xanax and Viagra you need in Mexico, but unless you have a prescription in hand or a doctor in the family, leave that Amoxycilin alone.

Believe it or not, what you are reading about is just another day in the life of the FDA regulated pharmaceutical industry. I don't expect to win any friends for the industry here on slashdot, but you should at least be aware that the FDA has a very consistent (and expensive) "lower risk regardless of cost" policy which is a real component of our current drug price dilemma. I promise you that 20 cases of counterfeit drugs is more than enough reason for the FDA to impose a costly solution. Take a look yourself here (leave the search term blank for alist of all articles). They have been talking about RFID for a long time in the context of mistaken subscriptions, where patients get the wrong dose or the wrong drug. The counterfeit issue is relatively new, surely related to the drugs from Canada campaigns. Lastly, if you think the pharma companies are an unethical money grubbing pack of degenerates, wait 'til you meet the characters that peddle drugs in third world countries. Sick people are desperate people, and make easy targets for the unethical.

Well, I guess it's a good thing Vioxx and Phen-Fen are patented. I mean wow, what a money maker those 2 turned out to be.

Without a patent, drug companies face competition from those who put no money into research, trials, and FDA approval. Whoever pays for the drug research would incur severe losses. We'd depend almost entirely on government funding, academic research, chance, and philanthropy to develop new drugs.

When it becomes uneconomical to develop a promising drug, usually because it treats too rare of a disease, but sometimes due to other reasons, we call those orphan drugs. Sometimes the government intervenes and finishes the research. Maybe it'll happen this time.

'Secondary smoke' is no more dangerous than anything else.

I suppose that's why I get a severe asthma attack from second hand smoke. The only other thing that gives me as bad an attack are sulfites - used to be used to preserve fresh foods. No longer generally recommended as safe. (GRAS)

But hey, I guess decades of studies could be wrong. Perhaps you know better.

Or perhaps you are simply in denial. Apply Occam's razor liberally over affected area until delusions subside. If conditions worsen, please see your local FDA representative.

-Adam

'Secondary smoke' is no more dangerous than anything else.

I suppose that's why I get a severe asthma attack from second hand smoke. The only other thing that gives me as bad an attack are sulfites - used to be used to preserve fresh foods. No longer generally recommended as safe. (GRAS)

But hey, I guess decades of studies could be wrong. Perhaps you know better.

Or perhaps you are simply in denial. Apply Occam's razor liberally over affected area until delusions subside. If conditions worsen, please see your local FDA representative.

-Adam

The term 'hypoallergenic' is not meaningful in any scientific sense whatsoever.

The FDA states that "There are no federal standards or definitions that govern the use of the term 'hypoallergenic'." Back in 1973, they tried to establish definitions for the use of the term hypoallergenic, but the regulation was overturned in court.

A little bit of googling returns this

It's a nonsense marketing claim, with no scientific standard or basis. People can be allergic to anything... even themselves.

I work in research now also, we had to take a full day seminar on ethics in research, it is was called Good Clinical Practice an FDA course. Some of the stuff people have done in the name of "science" are pretty scary.

inhibit proteasome activity. One might argue about how useful it is (it is certainly not a miracle cure) but vecade (bortezomib) is already FDA approved. It is pretty clearly the best treatment available for replased myeloma.

The FDA approved the first proteasome inhibitor last year (link) It is called velcade or bortezomib.

Class IIIa (>5mW) 532nm green laser pointer (ThinkGeek)

Class IIIb (>15mW) 532nm green laser pointer (MegaLaser)

Class IIIb 200mW handheld green laser (Information Unlimited)

It's even possible to get small, portable Class IV (potential instant severe eye damage, even from diffuse or reflected beams; this is the class of laser which also includes burning and cutting beams) lasers:

Various Class IV portable lasers, including a small battery powered 2W diode laser (Information Unlimited)

The front windows of a commercial aircraft and objects in the cockpit could easily reflect and refract a beam from the ground in ways that would be at a minimum very distracting and unsafe, and potentially damaging to eyesight.

Information about laser classes.

There was a 30-year study that found that for every person whose life was saved by the FDA, between 65 and 360 people died prematurely because new lifesaving drugs were still waiting for FDA approval.

Well that's just complete nonsense.

Do you know how many drugs make it through FDA testing? (And that's out of thousands and thousands of candidates which the drug companies weed out themselves?)

About 17% of all drugs which apply to do human studies eventually make it to market. (and again, that's a very small fraction of the candidates)

That means that 83% of drug candidates are eliminated by FDA testing. Eighty-three procent that either don't work, or give dangerous side-effects or are downright toxic.

And you talk about cherry-picking studies?!

Obviously you don't know the level of supervision the FDA has either. Every Single Thing is monitored by them. And not just during approval. They do random inspections of production plants around the world. Any place which makes drugs targeted at the US market.

Following the European system? The European system is a joke. (And I live in Europe and I have a good knowledge of the systems here.) Ask anyone in the pharma industry. They approve everything the FDA approves. That's it. All the pharma companies are completely commited to FDA regulations. The rest of the world is equal or more lax.

Besides that, the approval time has been going down for years.

Except that the guys running governments have far more power than corporations. If you don't trust corporate power why would you trust government power?

That depends, in a well functioning democracy, the government has to remain accountable to the populace, and may have checks and balances in place to prevent any one branch of government from having absolute control.

In a similar vein, in a properly functioning free market, the powers of any one corporation are limited by competition, and consumer knowledge. When either of these conditions are not present, the government ought to step in to prevent the rise of a powerful entity that is accountable to neither the public nor their consumers.

People can get screwed by either a misbehaving government or by misbehaving corporate monopolies. Unchecked power is evil in any context, I don't see how one is worse than the other. One of my reservations against voting for Badnarik (but I might anyways) is that I'm not sure that he understands that some industries lack natural competition and need to have government checks on their power. Good examples include industries where redundant competing infrastructure is prohibitively expensive, such as roads, delivery of electricity, and anything that relies on last-mile telecom infrastructure.

Quoting this wikipedia article (not sure what the original source is)

Badnarik opposes government regulation of the energy industry, instead arguing that the free market is more effective in controlling prices and maintaining stability. "All you need to know about economics is the law of supply and demand. When the supply of something goes down, the price of it will go up. And as the price of gasoline goes up, the consumerist at the pump is going to provide the incentive for finding alternative sources..."

Most consumers don't have much choice about the price of electricity - there's only one wire going to their house. Maybe I'm taking Badnarik out of context. Does anyone have any further insight on what he really thinks about government intervention in cases where the market lacks natural competition, due to high barriers of entry?

-jim

They may have indeed approved this rifapentine, but the vaccine (BCG is also , albiet not for TB, but the research supporting that is out there). This doesn't mean that it is necessarily succesful at treatment, but merely they believe in potentially is slightly beneficial and not adversely harmful. There have been many "treatments" for TB, but the success rate is quite questionable.

>Why doesn't someone sue Microsoft? After all people sue companies all the time even if the product in question has warning labels.

Did you know that there is a maximum acceptable level of insect parts in food products? (And it's not zero, either.) Why do you suppose this is?

It's for exactly the same reason no sues Microsoft (or Linus, for that matter) for having bugs in software: IT'S F***ING IMPOSSIBLE! Linux has bugs, the BSDs have bugs, the commercial Unices have bugs, Windows has lots and lots of bugs. Security software has bugs. Even NASA and the military have software bugs and they pay enormous sums of money for some of the most tightly-run development processes on the planet. Half of the programmers on the planet are below average by definition, why do would anyone expect perfection in software?

PowerBook 5300 batteries
G3 Power Adapters
iBook Logic Boards
Raw Whole Almonds ...
Mac OS X 10.2.8 Patch Am I forgetting anything else?

Thalidomide

The FDA has put itself in charge of computer security. Drug manufacturers now have to comply with 21 CFR part 11. http://www.fda.gov/ora/compliance_ref/part11/

21 CFR 11 does not apply to medical devices discussed in this article--medical devices usually have a much lower standard of QA than do drugs. I expect that there is a similar regulation for medical devices.

I think that this regulation is so vague and general that it cannot be complied with. If you take it literally, it would be extremely expensive to comply. Most of the drug companies that I know are pushing ahead with doing the best they can, but they are spending piles of money with little or no improvement of drug quality, safety, etc.

OK, now I'll tell you my personal experience (that's what GodLessOne is looking for, isn't it?). I got LASIK performed on my eyes back in December, 2001. At that time I lived in Colombia.

It turns out that, to the surprise of many of you, Colombian ophthalmologists are actually leaders in their field. Keratomileusis, the first refractive-correction surgery procedure was developed by Dr José Barraquer, and ALK (automated lamellar keratoplasty) by one of his students, Dr Luis Antonio Ruiz. ALK was very similar to LASIK, but the actual molding of the cornea was done mechanically. A Greek ophthalmologist was apparently the first one to use an excimer laser to do the molding, although I have read references that it was also Dr Ruiz's team who developed the automatic tracking mechanism that warranties that the laser will always burn the correct part of the cornea even if the eye moves. (The eye is not completely inmovilized. They ask you to look up, where there used to be a red light moments before, but if you do move your eyes it's OK.)

I barely knew about Barraquer back in 2001, and nothing else. Some friend of my family strongly recommended some Dr. Luis Ruiz when they found out I was interested in LASIK. Only a year later, when I was researching LASIK on the web for a friend who also wanted to get her eyes treated, did I find out that I had been operated by one of the inventors of the damned thing. By the way, my friend also lives in the USA and got her eyes operated by Dr. Ruiz during a holiday vacation trip. I recently talked to her and she told me that she went for a control appointment a few weeks back and she's still 20/20 (she went to Colombia for an unrelated reason).

Back to my story:

• I got the procedure made on both eyes. I had myopia and slight astigmatism in both.
• Weeks before the procedure, I was checked by Dr Ruiz and his collaborators (at least two other ophthalmologists and three optometrists performed different tests on me). Normally these exams can be made just a few days before the operation, but I needed to synchronize my operation with other things.
• It is important to stop using contact lenses (specially hard ones, but also soft ones) several days before the exams and the operation. I think I used glasses for 20 days before, and I was wearing soft lenses. (Or was 20 days the recommended time for hard/gas permeable ones? I don't remember).
• For three days before the operation and three after, I was told to use drops with an antibiotic.
• I was absolutely terrified during the procedure. Although I am usually brave, almost perversely interested in the gory details of medical procedures performed to me, this were my eyes they were working on! For that reason I was hurting myself with the brackets they use to keep your eye open. (No, you can't blink, that's very comforting to know). That was with the first eye. The doctor scolded me softly to make me realize that I was only making things worst, and the left eye went on much more smoothly.
• But the procedure doesn't really hurt! (In part because they put anesthetic drops in your eyes minutes before).
• Recovery was fast. In two days, I was back to my normal life.
• For a few months afterwards, my vision fluctuated slightly. Now it's more stable, and is diminished only when I'm tired, underslept, stressed, etc. That's normal, even if you don't have LASIK done.
• For six months, I saw halos around light sources at night. I no longer do.
• For a few months, my eyes were drier than normal, so I had a bottle of lubricating eye drops with me all the time. I don't need them anymore.

So my recommendations are:

• Read all the risks mentioned in the article linked above. Make sure you understand them. A

• After numbing the patient's eyes, an incision is cut along the outer tissue of the eye immediately outside of the pupil.
• After folding back the tissue, exposing the pupil, the laser is fired into the patient's eye, removing corneal (sp?) tissue, which takes about 30 seconds per eye.
• The tissue covering the eye is put back into place using what I can only describe as a micro-squeegy.

You're probably considering LASIK. At this time, the Air Force bans anyone who's had this surgery, due to concerns over possible flap movement.

If you're not planning to fly jets or go scuba diving (similar concerns) any time soon, then you should probably go for the absolute latest equipment available: the FDA list of approved lasers with approval dates is here. Keep in mind that we can't yet replace entire eyes, so now is not the time to save money. I recommend wavefront-guided "custom" LASIK.

Finally, if you get to feeling risk-averse, Ophthonix is introducing wavefront-guided custom eyeglasses later this year, which will give you 20/15 vision with none of the risks of letting some guy slice up the only eyes you have using a procedure with less than ten years of results.

The FDA offers this article: Laser Eye Surgery: Is It Worth Looking Into?

What about mono?

Lead crystal glassware may leach lead. "The crystalware industry has established voluntary lead-leaching limits for crystalware," says Kashtock, "that most foreign and domestic manufacturers follow." As a precaution, children and pregnant women should avoid frequent use of crystal glassware. Lead crystal baby bottles should never be used.

I'm sure you were joking about those power ranges, but anything above a few milliwatts requires warning labels and anything above about 100 mW (I think) requires safety mechanisms so that people don't hurt themselves. Of course, things like wavelength, whether the laser light is scattered or directed, etc. come into account.

Go here to see how the government classifies lasers.

Oh, and shame on the US for not approving hydergine for use. It's one of the safest drugs there is, and useful to most anyone. Unfortunately, like many good drugs, the patents are owned by non-US companies, so no US company stands to profit, and so the FDA doesn't approve it. If it were the case that nootropics weren't useful, then Nobel laureate Eric Kandel wouldn't have announced devoting the remainder of his career to creating them.

Yes. At least, they certainly do for recent patents. Google for "sequencing facility". Most largish universities will sequence supplied bits of DNA; prices are on the order of pennies per base pair. Any biotech company of moderate size can afford the equipment to do it themselves, too.

The genetic modifications to Roundup Ready corn are listed here; the insertions (up to two per strain) are of sizes less than 23 kilobases. The whole sequencing job would run less than a few thousand dollars--chump change for Monsanto.

Most people don't understand why hospitals would use this: every hospital I have worked in would be interested.

Cell phones, even by being on can affect drug infusion pumps: it is not good to have the infusion rate spontaneously jump from 1 mL/min to 100mL/min. What's worse is that some people don't know the difference between "standby" and "off" - they think just not using it will turn off the transceiver. (Yeah, yeah, Snopes says it's not a big problem. They're FOS on this one: it really does happen).

Some visitors argue it is a problem with the medical equipment and they should get to keep their phone on: 1) possibly a valid point, but the fact is that patient health is threatened by the phone, and 2) the historic FCC position is that RF shall not interfere with other equipment. (Incidenally, new medical equipment is better shielded (hinted at on the FDA website).

Finally, to the genius who wants to point out that many hospitals are using wireless for notebook computing and wireless monitoring: 1) those in use are on different frequencies than cell phones, and 2) they are very carefully tested before implementation, (Also, I'm not sure on this point, but I believe they are probably less powerful than cell phones; this is why repeaters are in every hallway rather than just one on the roof. If the wallpaper is just on the exterior of the building, I doubt it would not interfere with current use).

Teidou

I know this is offtopic, but you have to be fucking kidding me. This stuff is a biological contamination timebomb waiting to go off. You're basically making a giant tea / sugar / fungus culture, and then drinking the stuff that comes out the bottom.

Now I know Slashdotters aren't always the brightest of people, but surely you see why this isn't a good idea. Here's an FDA bulletin about contamination risks, a CDC article on possible related illness resulting in death - possibly a result of lactic acidosis brought on by this extremely acid drink. Finally, from my faithful companion the Australian Adverse Drug Reactions Bulletin, another report including such delights as rashes, fever, rigors, nausea, vomiting, impaired liver function, elevated white cell count and hepatitis.

Please don't try this at home.

My girlfriend used to suffer from frequent migraines. The drug you're referring to, I think, is Imitrex (PDF document). She received a prescription of a nasal spray of the stuff - the only thing that was effective, and then only if she caught it early enough. If not, she had to be brought to the hospital for treatment via IV or injection.

The website that comes up is long on scare and short on details. Most of the details it has are over a decade old. Sounds to me like a scare the fizzled out. I'll trust the FDA on this one.

Decent study ideas, but is undersea exploration and nutrition studies really the function of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration?

Perhaps the other branches of government, such as the U.S. Food & Drug Administration and the National Oeanic and Atmospheric Administration should start X Prizes of their own?

Why should any one believe your statement. Because you brashly proclaim "That's a fact." ?

I (and I'd guess I'm not alone in this) am not interested in your or anyone else's proselytizing about the evils of aspartame (or anything else for that matter). If you have strong, verifiable facts that back your claim please share them. Otherwise, please shut up.

Here are some useful links on the safety of aspartame and some of the more common "complaints" spewed about by people who apparently have nothing better to do.

A link from MIT

A link from Harvard with a reprint of an article from TIME magazine.

One, two links from the "evil" FDA.

And a reprint of an article from "The Lancet" posted at aspartame.net. These links were all from this page at snopes.com. That took me a whole 3-5 minutes to find.

I also found a lot of pages making claims about formaldehyde and brain tumors and multiple-sclerosis. All of the "aspartame alarmist" pages lacked links to any scientific studies, any papers by third-party organizations, etc..

Why should any one believe your statement. Because you brashly proclaim "That's a fact." ?

I (and I'd guess I'm not alone in this) am not interested in your or anyone else's proselytizing about the evils of aspartame (or anything else for that matter). If you have strong, verifiable facts that back your claim please share them. Otherwise, please shut up.

Here are some useful links on the safety of aspartame and some of the more common "complaints" spewed about by people who apparently have nothing better to do.

A link from MIT

A link from Harvard with a reprint of an article from TIME magazine.

One, two links from the "evil" FDA.

And a reprint of an article from "The Lancet" posted at aspartame.net. These links were all from this page at snopes.com. That took me a whole 3-5 minutes to find.

I also found a lot of pages making claims about formaldehyde and brain tumors and multiple-sclerosis. All of the "aspartame alarmist" pages lacked links to any scientific studies, any papers by third-party organizations, etc..