News and Observer: UK to pressure social media companies to fight anti-vax info . “Britain’s government plans to call a summit of social media companies to discuss what more they can do to fight online misinformation about vaccines following a spike in measles cases.”
public health
UNAIDS: Mapping HIV laws and policies
UNAIDS: Mapping HIV laws and policies. “A new website that enables people to identify national laws and policies related to the AIDS response has been launched by UNAIDS. Covering areas as diverse as a country’s ability to diagnose HIV among young babies, the existence of laws that discriminate against transgender people and whether people are prosecuted for carrying condoms, the Laws and Policies Analytics website aims to give a full overview of a country’s laws and policies related to the HIV response. It also allows to view policy data jointly with other data on the HIV epidemic and response.”
News Central: Bangladeshis Use Social Media to Tackle a Dengue Outbreak
News Central: Bangladeshis Use Social Media to Tackle a Dengue Outbreak. “As government resources are seemingly overwhelmed by the severity of this recent spike in dengue cases, people are turning to social media to voice their complaints, share information about the spread of the virus, and to spread awareness about how people can protect themselves.”
University of Southern California: Tackling Lack of Diversity in Genetics Research
University of Southern California: Tackling Lack of Diversity in Genetics Research. “Genotyping, or determining which genetic variants an individual possesses, has paved the way for understanding how common variations in our DNA can be associated with health conditions like heart disease and diabetes. The hope is to determine your risk of developing a disease and, hopefully, prevent it. But if you’re not white, the science may fall short.”
Xinhua: Kenya launches data bank on pan-African public health facilities
Xinhua: Kenya launches data bank on pan-African public health facilities. “Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI) on Wednesday launched an inventory that captures the geographical distribution of public health facilities in 50 African countries. The inventory contains information on geographical location of 98,745 public health facilities managed by governments, local authorities and charitable organizations.”
The Jerusalem Post: Israeli researchers develop algorithm to predict infectious diseases
The Jerusalem Post: Israeli researchers develop algorithm to predict infectious diseases. “The algorithm was first tested in blood samples taken from healthy people from the Netherlands. Some samples were infected with Salmonella bacteria and the immune response recorded. While existing genomic analysis methods did not uncover differences between groups, the algorithm revealed significant differences that were tied to subsequent variations in bacteria-killing abilities.”
Niki Bezzant: Shining light on food facts (New Zealand Herald)
New Zealand Herald: Niki Bezzant: Shining light on food facts. “We still don’t have, for example, proper country-of-origin labelling on foods. We’re maybe halfway there — fresh and frozen fruits, vegetables, meats, fish and seafood will soon be required to display their country of origin, and that’s a great start. But we’re a long way from easily knowing where everything we eat has come from. A couple of good initiatives have recently started, though, which give us access to more information about some of our food if we want it.” One of the resources mentioned looks very NZ-oriented, but the other, about added sugars in foods, looks useful to everybody…
