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Zika Virus and Birth Defects

posted by martyb on Tuesday March 29 2016, @02:48AM   Printer-friendly
from the no-laughing-matter dept.

An Anonymous Coward writes:

The Zika virus has been known for quite some time, but it gained notoriety recently due to its possible linkage to birth defects.

Science News has a summary report on Zika virus:
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/special-report-heres-what-we-know-about-zika

A report on the studies of its possible linkage to microcephaly, a birth defect of babies with undersized and underdeveloped brains:
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/how-zika-became-prime-suspect-microcephaly-mystery

In short, studies are continuing, evidence is mounting, but still not quite a confirmation.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 29 2016, @04:12AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 29 2016, @04:12AM (#324216)

    In medicine this means they've cherry picked enough (usually about 5) positive/negative correlations that are consistent with some favored speculation (while ignoring the others that don't fit). We still won't know what happened decades after this, because there will be no model making falsifiable predictions ever tested.

  • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday March 29 2016, @04:41AM

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday March 29 2016, @04:41AM (#324225) Journal

    We still won't know what happened decades after this, because there will be no model making falsifiable predictions ever tested.

    And... do we really need to know [soylentnews.org]?

    --
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 29 2016, @04:53AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 29 2016, @04:53AM (#324232)

      Double blind just minimizes inaccurate measurements due to researcher biases. Unless that is the only other explanation for some observation it doesn't help much. Definately a cheap and useful tool that should be used wherever possible though.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 29 2016, @05:00AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 29 2016, @05:00AM (#324233)
        In biology, there always exist other possible explanations.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 29 2016, @05:17AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 29 2016, @05:17AM (#324237)

          As a group, biologists don't seem to put much effort into figuring out the consequences of their theories or designing studies to rule out as many explanations as possible. That is probably why.

        • (Score: 2) by deimtee on Tuesday March 29 2016, @10:49AM

          by deimtee (3272) on Tuesday March 29 2016, @10:49AM (#324307) Journal

          "Under the most carefully controlled conditions of light, temperature, humidity, pressure, and nutrient concentrations, the organism will do whatever it damn well pleases."
            - every biologist ever.

          --
          If you cough while drinking cheap red wine it really cleans out your sinuses.

          • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 29 2016, @11:03AM

            by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 29 2016, @11:03AM (#324312)

            That is just because hey are bad at their jobs. My experience was very similar to this:

            For example, there have been many experiments running rats through all kinds of mazes, and so on—with little clear result. But in 1937 a man named Young did a very interesting one...He finally found that they could tell by the way the floor sounded when they ran over it...That is the experiment that makes rat‑running experiments sensible, because it uncovers the clues that the rat is really using—not what you think it’s using. And that is the experiment that tells exactly what conditions you have to use in order to be careful and control everything in an experiment with rat‑running...he subsequent experiment, and the one after that, never referred to Mr. Young. They never used any of his criteria of putting the corridor on sand, or being very careful. They just went right on running rats in the same old way, and paid no attention to the great discoveries of Mr. Young

            http://calteches.library.caltech.edu/51/2/CargoCult.htm [caltech.edu]

            People in these areas do NOT want to do the necessary work, they prefer to come up with excuses about how it is all "so complicated".

            • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 29 2016, @02:45PM

              by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 29 2016, @02:45PM (#324385)

              Infectious disease is easier to demonstrate than psychology studies.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 29 2016, @07:10PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 29 2016, @07:10PM (#324462)

      We don't really want to know. Should it turn out that Zika is beneficial, the public health authorities who warned against it will be embarrassed.

  • (Score: 2) by bart9h on Tuesday March 29 2016, @02:33PM

    by bart9h (767) on Tuesday March 29 2016, @02:33PM (#324380)

    Fact is, Medicine is still in the stone age. We know very very little of how things actually work, 99% of the so called "science" in this area is just statistics.