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Guest Blog

Commentary invited by editors of Scientific American

Health

#NIHMiM12 the Spreading Shadow of Cancer Angst: 3 Things You Need to Know to Meet It Rationally

Cancer screening keeps spreading to more groups of people, pushed by a widely shared conviction that more and earlier must always be better. As the shadow of cancer widens to cover ever more people, and lengthens to cover longer stretches of their lifespans, cancer angst spreads far and wide, too.Barry Kramer wants to counteract irrational fear and actions by helping us get more rational about cancer screening...

October 18, 2012 — Hilda Bastian
Health

Dangerous Optimism: Risk, Bias and Smoking

Trails of acrid grey mist hang in the air. I use the front of my shirt as an impromptu gas mask as I cough out my drink order to the bartender. Passing through one of these repulsive clouds is an irritating game of “try not to breathe.” The saturated air inside has made it almost impossible for me to develop any knowledge of my city’s lively hole-in-the-wall bar scene, still skirting statewide smoking bans.For decades Surgeon General reports have communicated the health risks of smoking, and more recently the risks of second-hand smoke...

October 18, 2012 — Kyle Hill
Health

The $1,000 Genome Is Almost Here- Are We Ready?

The era of the $1000 genome, which is all but upon us already, is a new era of predictive and personalized medicine during which the cost of full genome sequencing for an individual or patient drops to roughly $1,000.Think about what personalized medicine can do: having access to your own genome information will open the doors to dozens of men and women wishing to find out if they have gene variants associated with Alzheimer’s, diabetes, heart disease or cancer...

October 15, 2012 — Ivan Karabaliev

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