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The Scary world of Science

Obscure bad-science stories (of the  'Wine, gives you cancer but makes you thin' variety) seem relatively thin on the ground at the minute. There are some lurking, but they are mostly playing second fiddle in the health sections to the very important NHS reforms and to 'Andrew Wakefield sues the BMJ'. Maybe I haven't been looking closely enough, or I am starting to shut out the noise. There hasn't been anything that has stirred the fury in me enough to blog about it. Or, and this might be the bigger reason... I am being distracted by something else...

Acne, a side effect of being a successful 'high flying' career woman? Not at all.

This is the latest blight to 'successful', 'high powered', 'bossy' women... According to The Telegraph , The Daily Mail , Marie Claire , and Female First : - 'Acne new problem for successful women' - 'Acne, curse of the high-flying career woman: Growing stress levels to blame for outbreak of pimples' - 'Stress causing acne in successful women'

Recognising Public Engagement

Universities in the UK have embraced 'Public Engagement'. There is a Public Engagement Manifesto . My university (University of Aberdeen) have signed it. But who carries this 'vital' work out and are they being recognised for it? “ The University of Aberdeen is committed to achieving distinctive excellence across all aspects of its activities including the vital objective of engaging with society. We are building on a considerable track record, where public engagement has become ever more embedded in our core business. Moving forward, our Strategic Plan 2011-2015 reflects our ongoing commitment to support and empower our staff and students to help deliver a diverse, creative and accessible programme of activities with a measurable public impact. Partnership is central to our strategy and our active involvement with the work of the NCCPE extends back to its inception. We therefore endorse the principles of the Concordat for Engaging the Public with Research and fully s

The Cervical Cancer Jab and the 'Waking Coma'

I read an extremely sad news story this evening about a girl who is trapped in a 'waking coma'. Sleeping for 23 hours a day she has been unable to open her eyes for several weeks. Her condition is according to the news reports undiagnosed, but her symptoms have been linked to ME/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Her story has been covered on The Daily Mail, Telegraph, Sun and many other major news websites after the local newspaper covered the story . Unfortunately, I feel that this story has only hit the big newspapers as her symptoms coincided with her receiving the cervical cancer vaccine and the headlines and articles all suggest that the cancer vaccine is the cause of the girls condition. These are some of the headlines: Daily Mail:  Girl, 13, left in 'waking coma' and sleeps for 23 hours a day after severe reaction to cervical cancer jabs Telegraph: Cervical cancer jab left girl, 13, in 'waking coma' The Sun:  Cervical cancer jab puts girl, 13, in 'wakin

Wine, gives you cancer but makes you thin

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Once again, reporters pick up on stories related to booze. There are two wine stories in the news at the moment. Both found on the Telegraph website (and others)  Booze, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bar_Hard_Rock_Cafe_Prague.png  Story 1, Red wine holds key to better health for obese patients Headline suggests drinking wine = good for health. The headline is misleading, but the study write up is pretty good. No 'scientists' in this article, only EXPERTS. Whoever they are... This article is written about a small study on humans (11 male obese patients). The patients were given the treatment for 30 days (so very short term). Treatment was an injection (not a glass of) resveratrol (compound found in grapes at low levels - according to The Telegraph you would have to drink 13 bottles a night to acheive a dose similar to that in the study - not sure where this figure comes from). Results were compared to placebo treatment (the participants were given a pla

Bring Back Board Games

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I LOVE board games. I get aggressive, grumpy and bossy (but I NEVER cheat, despite what my family say). A couple of years ago I found this beauty of a board game on Ebay, NORTH SEA OIL (I think it is from the 70s). I bought it for my boyfriend (who works in the oil industry) - It is FANTASTIC. It's like oil Monopoly. It has mini oil rigs and real life oil situations (bad weather = no oil production). Board games have always been 'big' in my family... we have this one ' ESCAPE FROM COLDITZ '.. for a million years, although we have no idea how to play it. Our Monopoly board was bought by my Grandma when she was a teenager (she likes to tell us every time we play) with real metal pieces... I usually buy a board game for Christmas, the weirder the better.. here are some suggestions from the lovely people on my Twitter feed. They all look FAB. LOOPING LOUIE - some kind of crazy German game where you fly 'Louie' round a crazy obstacle course... (@sulsa

No Grazie, Grazia

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A few weeks ago Dr Petra (@DrPetra) highlighted a story that was doing the rounds in the national press about 'bossy women have less sex' ... Google it under news and you will see the stories from around the globe (see here , safe to click). The story was formulated from a piece of research carried out with Sub-Saharan African Women, (freely available for all to read here ) This extract is taken from the abstract of the research article, 'Understanding how women’s position in the household influences their sexual activity may be an essential piece in protecting the sexual rights of women and helping them to achieve a sexual life that is both safe and pleasurable.' This weekend I picked up a copy of Grazia Magazine and found this story - I tweeted it because I was frustrated, I tweeted it at Grazia and Dr Petra. I was frustrated that a magazine, marketed at women, that aims to go beyond regurgitating the usual trashy gossip that other magazines print, found it a