#DDW2026 Moderating with my best (and most fashionable) friend

RT @anish_koka: x.com/i/article/203031182839…

I think this thread is posted in at least a simulacrum of good faith, so I'll give a substantive response. It is obviously true that in the moment of crisis, leaders face tremendous pressure to do something dramatic to address the crisis, and often those decisions turn out, in retrospect, to be wrong. In the case of the covid crisis, the problems were confounded by a determined unwillingness of scientific and public health leaders to respond to data -- in real time -- that showed that core assumptions underlying the lockdown strategy were wrong. Here is a short list of facts about covid that undermined these leaders' core assumptions: * covid is airborne, * covid spreads asymptomatically, * covid infection fatality rate << case fatality rate, * covid has a sharp age gradient in its infection mortality risk, * lockdowns cannot suppress covid spread or protect the vulnerable for long, * lockdowns crush the lives and well-being of children, the poor, and the working class, and almost everyone other than the laptop class * lockdowns cause a form of psychological terror that guarantee they could never last just two weeks The WHO and public health leaders got all of these facts wrong in 2020, which I suppose is understandable. What is not understandable is that these same leaders conducted "devastating takedowns" of even well-credentialed outside critics who pointed out that the WHO's core assumptions were incorrect, and accepted these assumptions as true even as overwhelming data to the contrary emerged in real time. What is not understandable is the utter confidence that the WHO and public health leaders expressed in these ideas and lockdown policies to the public as the only way to protect the population, going so far as to call for censorship of contrary voices on social media and elsewhere. The closest analogue I can think of is the set of "best and brightest" advisors who told Pres. LBJ that victory in the Vietnam War was just around the corner, based on a whole host of faulty information. Leaders who come out of such situations having embraced such a litany of catastrophically failed ideas and policies have a few choices on how to handle the post-crisis era. 1) They can, in good faith, admit their failures and work to reform systems so the disaster never happens again. This would be best, though I would understand why the public would want a new set of leaders to design and implement the reforms. I personally am very happy to work with and learn from public health leaders who choose this option. 2) They can pretend to have done nothing wrong, clinging to power for as long as they can, hoping against hope that history will vindicate them, crushing public trust in the institutions they lead. 3) They can try to pretend they never recommended or adopted the catastrophically failed policies, hoping that the public has a short memory. This is the current strategy that the @WHO is taking. 4) They can appeal to the difficulty of the job of handling a crisis under considerable uncertainty, not in a spirit of reform, but rather as an excuse to avoid responsibility for their failed crisis management. This is the approach that Koopmans is taking in her thread. I have very little sympathy for the covid crisis leaders who choose options 2, 3, or 4. Their job was to manage the uncertainty with wisdom and humanity, which they failed to do. They cannot, at this juncture, turn around and expect public sympathy because their job was hard, or expect the public to forget their failure. These leaders have destroyed public trust in public health, and should step aside as a new set of public health leaders works to fix the damage they caused.

I am pleased to share the peer-reviewed published manuscripts by Kuperwasser and El-Deiry “COVID vaccination and post-infection cancer signals: Evaluating patterns and potential biological mechanisms” and El-Deiry “Hypothesis: HPV E6 and COVID spike proteins cooperate in targeting tumor suppression by p53” both published today but censored due to cybercriminial attack on the @Oncotarget @OncotargetJrnl website. The authors are happy to share the full PDFs with any interested reader upon request by email.

Just a few days ago, Ella Cook was tragically murdered by a deranged psychopath at Brown University. Ella was an outspoken Christian and a patriot who truly loved this country. Though she is no longer with us here on earth, we know she is in heaven. Today I spoke on the Senate floor to honor her memory.

Approach to Weight Management in GI Practice Obesity contributes to many GI diseases and cancers, and gastroenterologists must take this on to help our patients. Here’s an easy guide mdedge.com/gihepnews/article…

FDA Commissioner Makary sits down for a conversation with the newly appointed director of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER) Dr. Vinayak “Vinay” Kashyap Prasad and Sanjula Jain-Nagpal, Associate Director of Policy & Research Strategy, Office of the Commissioner (OC). The trio talks about the current and future happenings at the FDA.

#Breaking: Vinay Prasad will be the next director of the FDA's Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, after Peter Marks was forced out. trib.al/fVbnX9G

A little breaking news on @Sensible__Med Vinay Prasad, Director of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER) at the US FDA sensible-med.com/p/sensible-…

Join us at the 1️⃣8️⃣7️⃣ research & clinical presentations by #BrighamGI faculty & fellows at Digestive Disease Week #DDW2025! 📊154 research abstracts including: 🗣47 podium presentations 📜107 posters 🎙33 invited clinical lectures For the full list: bit.ly/BrighamDDW2025

why is the sound of birds chirping in the morning the best thing to ever exist

Clinical Research Award: Colleen R. Kelly, MD, FACG Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School “Exploring Predictors of Relapse in Microscopic Colitis” @ckellymd

Eco Health alliance NIH directs $3,000,000 Indirects -$20,000,000,000,000

Honored to work with this IBD crew in reviewing grant applications 📝at @AmCollegeGastro! Proud of the great science! @DrJordanAxelrad @Marylandibddoc @EdBarnesMD , @DrBrianBosworth @bkocharmd, @AdamFayeMD @md_ayanna Colleen Kelly, Sid Singh, Kostas Papamichail @sarahrichman1

Grateful to share a lovely dinner with some of my favorite people in GI #ACG2024 @DrStollman

Research Committee lunch with fabulous colleagues @Khanna_S @JasmohanBajaj #ACG2024

Gavin Newsom - French laundry Neil Ferguson - violated lockdown Boris Johnson - partygate Nancy Pelosi - hair salon visit Deb Brix - Thanksgiving Pls add to list Is there a full list of covid hypocrites?

Our rulers are intellectually exhausted, all out of of good ideas to fix the inflation mess they helped create. We are now into the scapegoating and economic voodoo phase of policy making. God help us all, especially the poor.

We’re excited to introduce our new class of #BrighamGIFellows🥼🩺 (2/5) Muhammad Hashim Hayat, MD (@HashimHayat) came from Pakistan & completed residency research fellowship at @VanderbiltU, after obtaining his medical degree from @SIMS_edu_pk @BrighamWomens @harvardmed