Researchers Warned About AIDS Grants 108
winksmith writes "The NYTimes (free registration, etc.) is
reporting
that scientists researching STD's (including AIDS) must be careful in the wording of reports and particularly of grant requests. many have been verbally warned that phrases like: "sex workers," "men who sleep with men," "anal sex" and "needle exchange," may cause the government to withhold grant money."
Is this really news? (Score:4, Insightful)
Go calculate [webcalc.net] something.
Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Look, there are lots of diseases that affect human beings. Everything from the common cold to ebola. Some of them are very rare, some widespread. Some are deadly, some place a heavy burden on our health care system, and some are mere nuisances.
Medical science is a zero-sum game. Every dollar or minute spent trying to find a cure for disease X cannot be spent on disease Y. There's only so much money and effort to go around.
Diabetes, stroke, cancer, heart disease, and trauma all kill more people every year worldwide than HIV. Not a few more, either; we're talking about millions of people every year.
Now, every educated person knows that HIV is not limited to gay people, or to drug users, or to people who have anal sex. HIV is out there, and everybody is at risk of contracting it, though for the vast majority of people that risk is statistically insignificant.
But the notion, correct or incorrect, that HIV is confined to a particular group or that it's only transmitted by a particular illegal or socially unacceptable activity gives one pause. Is it really right to spend $X on AIDS research when one hundred times more people die of cancer or heart disease or stroke every year?
If you want funding for your AIDS research, you're going to have to convince the organization offering you the money that your research is more important than research that will help tens, or even hundreds, of millions of people over the long term.
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Science is not a "zero sum" game. Studies of HIV have revealed important information about the immune system, for example, which may be of help in combating antibiotic resistant bacteria, or autoimmune diseases.
I'm a biologist but I don't study diseases at all. Is the pure knowledge I gain worth nothing?
Tens of millions of people in Africa DO have aids. Hundreds of millions of people in China COULD get AIDS - if we study how it spreads, which is what most of the NIH grants that mention gay people are actually about, we might prevent that.
Finally, there are serious diminishing returns in science when you tell the researchers what to work on.
1) There are only so many genuinely promising heart disease research projects for the NIH to fund. The bill to fund these projects (recall that the pharmaceutical industry provides a lot of funding, as well) is actually quite small - what should the NIH do with the rest of the money? Throw it at heart disease research projects which are NOT promising?
2) You can't just take an AIDS researcher, who presumably has come up with what he feels is unique insight into fighting AIDS, and move him into heart disease. He might accomplish something, but chances are he would have accomplished more doing the work he felt he was qualified to do. There is no question in my mind that science driven primarily by institutional goals is lousy science, but that science driven by the personal creativity of the scientists is good science.
3) The NIH exists to fund research that the pharmaceutical industry will not. In the long run, the pure knowledge gained has shown itself worthwhile, I assure you.
The article is not about avoiding AIDS research in favor of heart disease research. It is about avoiding "politically charged" AIDS research - research into how AIDS spreads, by and large, which is preventative research and has the highest yield per dollar spent - because of the politico-religious convictions of right wing zealots in congress who still think only gay people get AIDS.
Re:Good (Score:3, Insightful)
Like AIDS, right? According to the United Nations [disasterrelief.org], over the course of the last two decades 22 million have died because of AIDS. They currently estimate that there are another 34.1 million infected persons right now, the vast majority of them in developing nations. Most of those countries are extremely poor and have very limited educational opportunities both in general and to combat ignorance about STD's. Result: explosive growth and a plauge that is decimating their populations--in that most productive 15-45 age group. The World Health Organization [who.org] presents an even less rosy picture, as can be found here [who.int]. Wow. A 33% adult infection rate in Zimbabwe [who.int] for a disease that has what, a 99.9% or better fatality rate? Not even Ebola's fatality rate is that good. Another figure that I found in my very brief web search was that in 2000 alone there were an estimated 5.3 million people newly infected--infection rates are continuing to climb.
Complete and total ignorance (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course, your post is exactly how these idiots in Congress think. In their puny little brains, somehow it makes sense that the research done in NASA has lead to many other good things, and it should be funded, even though it's direct goals are completely useless to human beings; while the same should not be true in the biological sciences.
Why the Government Dislikes Those Phrases (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm not trying to troll, but it's just common sense that if you're concerned about the risks that come with an activity, you either don't participate in that activity or you (not your fellow citizens) accept the risks. You like Big Macs? You accept the risk of clogged arteries. You like to smoke? You accept the risk of lung cancer. You like games on Windows? You accept the risk of Outlook viruses. You like sex with prostitutes? You accept the risk of AIDS. Even my dog understands that there are consequences for certain actions.
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
The research *under discussion* is substantially social - do you think that it's impossible to study social trends, find which *educational* techniques successfully promote lower risk behavior and translate that information to China or Africa? I assume that you did not mean to suggest that we should avoid such an effort because of the genetic background of Africans.
Your cost/benefit analysis is flawed. Cardiovascular disease is the #1 killer; it does not follow that every single medical research dollar should be spent on it. You are mistaken about the ability of a scientist to productively switch research focus; even between what might seem to be related fields. Yes, we can have everyone, including me, work on heart disease research. People have been trying this for decades with cancer and it is NOT a good strategy.
The proposals discussed in the ORIGINAL ARTICLE are social in nature. They are VERY CHEAP, and can be quite effective. There is no way that a $25 million dollar search for anti-HIV compounds would mention who was gay!
Social studies are already being run and funded for most other diseases - sexually transmitted diseases are more complex, as social phenomena, than the flu, so studying their role in society is likely to be more productive, and more dollars should be spent. I'm all for maximising lives saved / $, but a lot more goes into that analysis than simply funding whichever disease kills the most people.
However, even the more expensive sort of HIV research ought to be done, if the research itself is good and will enable us to learn something. The quality of the science should be the controlling factor - because good science will teach us more about other disease conditions, down the road.
This is also true of the social research that was the focus of the *original article* - HIV is not the first sexually transmitted disease in human history, it won't be the last.
I don't think homosexuals, drug users and prostitutes form a single community, although of course there is considerable overlap here in NYC.
the simple fact is that AIDS will largely take care of itself if left alone.
Really? So, the infection rate among straight, non-drug using people who don't employ sex workers is going down? Oh, wait, it's not! It's going UP.
Even if it were not, I do not regard all these individuals death's as AIDS "take care of itself." Once they're dead, the problem becomes unsolvable, not solved. Saving their lives - that is taking care of AIDS. Do you see a crucial distinction between our assumptions here? In the future, we can screen embryos and no-one will ever have cystic vibrosis again. Ask someone who has it and see if they think the problem is taken care of.
I never mod anyone down but I can see how the moderator thought that was flamebait.
Sorry about my double post - it didn't show up for two hours so I posted again.
Re:Why the Government Dislikes Those Phrases (Score:3, Insightful)
The fact is that Tens of millions of people are infected. In parts of sub-saharan Africa, a boy born today has a 50% chance of getting AIDS, and thus probably dying from it. This is a serious problem, and invoking your dog doesn't make it less so.
Tell those who received blood transfusions that AIDS discriminates. Once it gets to such high percentages in the general population, your country is screwed Socially and Economically. So much for your working-aged population. Something has to be done, and passing judgement on them for having sex at all won't let them have their country back.
Re:Good (Score:1, Insightful)
Big whooping deal. More people than that die of diabetes worldwide every year.
Sorry, but AIDS simply isn't the most significant public health problem out there. Everything you said is more true of cancer, stroke, heart disease, diabetes, and trauma. Our efforts should be spent where they will do the most good.
So instead (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Except that it isn't at all. The old get the lion's share of cancer, stroke, and heart disease, not the most productive age bracket in society which AIDS hits. Stroke and heart disease are often synonyms for old age--when my 97-year-old grandfather and survivor of multiple strokes eventually passes away hopefully a good number of years from now, when the obituary lists cause of death it could just as easily put in old age for either stroke or heart attack. An estimated 150 million have diabetes, most commonly middle aged persons, but only in a handful of small isolated populations does its penetration level ever become comparable to Zimbabwe's 1 in 3 adult AIDS cases. In these small populations current research has implicated drastic recent changes in diet and excercise to be the dominant factor in diabetes cases.
Let's get back to that 1 in 3 level of adult AIDS penetration in Zimbabwe. Go out to the mall or to the university or anywhere people 15-45 are found in numbers. Now imagine that 1 in 3 is carrying a disease that will kill them unless something else gets them first. Now multiply that out to cover an entire nation. Factor in the low education levels and social stigma of AIDS that help it spread to even higher levels. Imagine what it's like when you're a 8-year-old kid who's got a 1 in 3 chance of in the next 5 years of having your teacher die, your mom die, your dad die, aunts, uncles, cousins too. This isn't some "won't somebody think of the children" crapola either. These kids if they grow up at all will have lower education levels plus whatever value you get from parenting and family, plus a society in ruins--things that foster the continuing spread of AIDS.
Imagine it spreading to the nations next to you. Imagine that prevailing attitudes about AIDS have allowed people with HIV to donate blood, which is then mixed according to blood type with many others, contaminating 10's or 100's of units of blood--blood that is later used for transfusions, infecting the nation at large. This probably went on for years in China, where prevailing attitudes about medicine may be a culprit in the spread of SARS recently. It is an incontrovertible fact that AIDS is a contender for the next worldwide plauge. Heart disease, stroke, diabetes, cancer, and trauma are a pinprick even when combined in comparison to having 1/3 (and rising!) of your nation's workforce infected with something that will kill them. It'll be really interesting and I expect terrifying to see what happens to sub-Saharan Africa when it gets the coming population crash.
AIDS deserves heavy funding, and if you write a grant and have to worry that matter-of-fact descriptions like "sex workers" might be the factor in getting your grant rejected as opposed to its merits,that's just plain bullshit foisted upon the world by petty beaurocrats who are more interested in their myopic ideology than in fixing a major and growing problem.
Re:Why the Government Dislikes Those Phrases (Score:3, Insightful)
A famous one-liner for those who can't form an argument is "any (creature) understands there are consequences of actions." Of course. But understanding exactly what the consequences are of what actions is the summary of our entire human intellect is for. We aren't precognitive. You could have sex with fifty prostitutes and be fine, or you could be a highschool junior who has sex with a classmate and now you're both infected. Who knows whether the infection started at a prostitute or homosexual at some point down the line... But what really puts you at risk is the frequency with which you have sex with different partners, not whether you were paid to have sex or your sexual orientation.
Re:Why the Government Dislikes Those Phrases (Score:3, Insightful)
Assuming your statistics are correct, what is your point? That people who make one mistake, or even whose entire life is completely screwed up, "deserve" getting AIDS?
Sure, that is one way of thinking. It's a way of thinking as old as human-kind. Two thousand years ago, the story of Mary Magdalen was about that. It's a view, however, that lacks compassion and humanity.
The kind of utilitarian calculus of responsibility you engage in is chillingly cold and inhumane: "how much is this life worth, how much did this person know, what percentage of responsibility should he/she accept"? That's the kind of thinking that leads to death camps.
And, even in a purely utilitarian sense, before you know it, it may end up being applied to you. I mean, assuming you drive a car to work, why should I pay for your risky choice of mode of transportation? If you eat meat or drink sodas, why should I pay for your risky nutritional preferences?
how far should government go to protect these people from themselves?
Who said anything about "protecting people from themselves"? Several hundred thousand people in the US are sick and dying from HIV/AIDS, and we should help them with compassion and humanity. One way we help the sick in modern societies is through medical research. The annual cost to you and me is about the same as a couple of Espressos at Starbucks. Sure, these people may be fully responsible for what they did, but you don't even have that much compassion for them in you?
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Why the Government Dislikes Those Phrases (Score:3, Insightful)
First of all, while it is true that anyone can get AIDS, that doesn't mean that every person is equally likely to get it. As with anything else, some groups are more likely than others (it's called being an "at risk" group). Amazingly, money and effort tend to focus on those people who are in the greatest danger (spending the most money on help for those who need the most help... what a concept!)
Second, one thing which nobody here seems to realize is that if you look at too large of a population all at once, then demographic variables tend to become a problem (they become "nusiance" variables). In general, individuals who participate in research studies are assigned to groups (e.g. HIV+ vs. HIV-, male vs. female, or randomly assigned treatment conditions). Demographic variables such as age are generally controlled between groups as best possible. However, if you study "everybody", then there may be a huge number of variables which potentially need to be controlled. In the case of an AIDS study, sexual preference, age, gender, education, drug use history, geographic location (for many large studies), and even ethnicity may all influence an individual's data. Thus it is often a good idea to work with a subgroup of the population, if only to eliminate as many potential confounds as possible! If you can work with an "at risk" subgroup, even better.
Re:Why the Government Dislikes Those Phrases (Score:2, Insightful)
Tell me, where do we draw the lines at when we've "gotten the facts"? After all, a biology teacher seems a reasonable place to get the facts on a biological disease.. or maybe that's just me. Of course, if we can't trust the biology teacher, why should we trust the biology books? After all, they're what the teacher likely got the knowledge from. And if we can't trust the books, why should we trust the scientists?
The problem with your position is that you would put us in the place where we need to verify everything with our own two eyes before we take any action at all.. sorry, I just don't have the time for that, and frankly, neither do you.
Now, if he'd have gotten the information from kids in the schoolground, you might have a point. The thing is, he got his bad information from a source he should have been able to trust as having good information. The source is what makes the difference.
Re:Why the Government Dislikes Those Phrases (Score:1, Insightful)