Hacker News: 2skep

New comment by 2skep in "100 People with rare cancers who attended same NJ high school demand answers"

2skep — Sat, 16 Apr 2022 22:24:02 +0000

No mention of how many kids go to this school and how big is its catchment. I don't buy the:

"Lupiano eventually arrived at a single linking factor between himself, his wife and his sister: they each attended Colonia High School in Woodbridge in the 1990s"

In addition to the school, he and his sister share their parents genes. He and his wife lived in the same neighbourhood so they shared many other things too.

New comment by 2skep in "South African medical association says Omicron variant causes ‘mild disease.’"

2skep — Sun, 28 Nov 2021 22:35:46 +0000

People on the flight were vaccinate OR tested negative. Not both. Don't yet know if the cases were in the tested negative group or in the vaccinated group.

New comment by 2skep in "How to Build a Healthcare Unicorn?"

2skep — Sat, 30 Nov 2019 17:19:15 +0000

Can I please ask you to consider the problems with the chart you have shared? The vertical axis is percent increase not actual increase. It is helpful to have that context before you load your argument on it.

New comment by 2skep in "Heart surgeons refuse difficult operations to avoid poor mortality ratings"

2skep — Sat, 21 Apr 2018 19:44:57 +0000

What would you prefer?

A surgeon who expects a poor outcome of your surgery:

a)decides to not operate on you? b)decides to operate on you nonetheless?

I am in camp a

New comment by 2skep in "UK has best health system in developed world, US analysis concludes"

2skep — Sat, 15 Jul 2017 08:01:57 +0000

Actually, I never understood this. Is demand and supply matched and this is just the lag in the system (ie 6-8 weeks remains 6-8 weeks forever) or demand is greater than supply and this number will grow. If it is the former then there doesn't seem to be a cost advantage for the wait. A temporary increase in supply could bring this waiting time to zero with just the cost of 6-8 weeks worth of x-rays outsourced. And then you have a steady state system with zero waiting.

New comment by 2skep in "Food as medicine"

2skep — Mon, 29 May 2017 17:04:38 +0000

This thread is just endless collection of n=1 observations. This is how it goes =

- I eat meat and I am healthy

- No, I am vegetarian and I can run faster than you

- No, I eat meat but I also eat peas and I can read better than you.

You know what? Maybe all of you are right and maybe all of us don't need exactly the same food that is good your somebody else.

Geez!! :-)

New comment by 2skep in "Monsanto Weed Killer Roundup Faces New Doubts on Safety in Unsealed Documents"

2skep — Thu, 13 Apr 2017 07:58:57 +0000

I don't recognise that as Ockham's (Sic) razor reasoning. In fact it may be the exact opposite of that

New comment by 2skep in "Time to Take a Stand"

2skep — Sat, 28 Jan 2017 19:11:14 +0000

I think as a non-US person, I think it may also be time to pay attention to executive powers in the US political system. It is one thing to have a system that will only rarely elect a nutjob but not having any safeguards once a nutjob is elected is too dangerous at a systems level.

New comment by 2skep in "The sociological religion of no biological differences between the sexes"

2skep — Sat, 22 Oct 2016 08:48:22 +0000

I think the article is making a valid point and your response is not the classic opposition but a more thoughtful sounding version of the taboo. :-)

Study of a average 5% statistical difference of a population would considered a valid scientific endeavour in many places yet a lot of people would only raise this criticism when applied to study of gender/race differences.

New comment by 2skep in "Passport Index 2016"

2skep — Mon, 18 Jul 2016 08:03:34 +0000

Other Kiwis I know have reported receiving great treatment in France. Some have pointed out that they still feel a bit guilty about this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinking_of_the_Rainbow_Warrior

New comment by 2skep in "UK scientists dropped from EU projects because of post-Brexit funding fears"

2skep — Wed, 13 Jul 2016 20:53:03 +0000

Of the 7 that did, only 3 were re-elected. Maybe because they were unelectable in the first place :-)

New comment by 2skep in "UK scientists dropped from EU projects because of post-Brexit funding fears"

2skep — Tue, 12 Jul 2016 14:21:32 +0000

As a result of majority voters voting in favour of Brexit and to recover the democratic deficit and negotiate UK's exit from the EU a new PM has been appointed who did not support Leave. She was selected by Westminster which is largely supportive of Remain

It would be very hard not to conclude that it is actually Westminster that is retarding democracy.

New comment by 2skep in "A deportation at the UK border"

2skep — Fri, 10 Jun 2016 16:32:37 +0000

Enough has been said about bad treatment by border guards about every country on earth so don't need to repeat it but I had the following exchange with a Canadian visa officer.

Visa Officer:Your Name? How can I help you Me: Dr XYZ. I would like to apply for a visitor visa to Canada Visa Officer: Why would you like to go to Canada Me: I have been invited to speak at a conference Visa Officer: Hmm I see. Me: Is there a problem? Visa Officer: You see, you are not allowed to do public speaking on a visitor visa. You will have to apply a visa for public speaking which takes longer and requires additional formalities and checks. Me: Oh, I see. I am surprised that is the case, I go around the world to conferences and it seems unusual in Canada. Visa Officer: Can I ask you a question Me: Sure Visa Officer (with a smile): Would you say that your main purpose of applying the visa is to attend the conference and you will be sharing your professional and not political views. Me: Yes. Absolutely! Visa Officer: You should then get a visitor visa which will be ready tomorrow after 4. Remember, when asked say that you are attending the conference. Enjoy Canada

New comment by 2skep in "Why do we have allergies?"

2skep — Mon, 23 May 2016 13:45:50 +0000

This article is a very good example of the genre of science reporting I find very uninteresting and even boring. The way the writer builds up to the punch line by weaving in his own life and by overemphasiaing the trope of the 'maverick scientist challenging group think' is so contrived that it probably wrote itself.

Maybe I am different that I want to read science articles to learn new things and not to be entertained. The writer proves how hard it is to do both.

New comment by 2skep in "When the Doctor Must Choose Between Her Patients and Her Notes"

2skep — Sat, 30 Jan 2016 12:13:12 +0000

You may have misunderstood. I was not trying to explain the $5000 gap. Administrative costs is one example of the cost difference. Research shows that 'socialised' health systms spend up to $ 800-900 less per patient per year on admin. (I think it was diff between USA and Canada) I am not sure of other systems but in NHS England there is no tracking of actual number of patients seen in primary care and details of each patient's complaint. The last audit done on that was over 5 years ago which was also based on data sampling and no such audit is currently planned. There are other reasons for high cost - one of the is the list pricing of actual products used (socialised systems pay less for products, UK pays about 20% less for pharmaceutical products than many other industrial nations). UK consultants and surgeons are not paid for how many procedures they do, 'coincidentally' UK surgeons operate less frequently. I am sure there are several other reasons that explain the $5000 gap but these are just a few.

New comment by 2skep in "When the Doctor Must Choose Between Her Patients and Her Notes"

2skep — Mon, 25 Jan 2016 14:58:51 +0000

I think this is a good example where the usual association government run = bureaucratic ; privately run = straightforward breaks down because bureaucracy/non bureaucracy is not a function of the economic model but that of the inherent simplicity of the model. One of the reasons why many soicialised systems of healthcare are 'simpler' is because they have universal coverage which means that the whole process of checking who is eligible to see a doctor, does their plan cover this doctor, did they pay their premium, which treatments they are eligible for, how much of their spending limit they have exhausted do not exist because everyone is eligible and everyone is eligible for everything. It is like going to an all you can eat buffet and wondering why is no one writing down what I am eating :-). I could add more examples to it e.g. If all surgeons are paid a fixed salary there need not exist an infrastructure to count how many stitches they applied this quarter and so on..

New comment by 2skep in "The Great British Curry Crisis"

2skep — Wed, 13 Jan 2016 10:53:51 +0000

Diwana is popular among vegan students from SOAS. There would be no point going to Raavi for vegans :-)

New comment by 2skep in "The Great British Curry Crisis"

2skep — Tue, 12 Jan 2016 11:01:38 +0000

You get points for knowing Raavi Kebab near Euston

New comment by 2skep in "How Stories Deceive"

2skep — Sat, 02 Jan 2016 12:05:18 +0000

This is precisely why every time someone pitches a business idea to me using a story I flag it as one that requires addition validation of facts. Not because I think all story tellers are charlatans (some definitely are)but because I want to make sure that I compensate for the activation of the non-rational parts of my brain.

New comment by 2skep in "Gene editing saves girl dying from leukaemia in world first"

2skep — Sat, 07 Nov 2015 19:50:59 +0000

There are other platforms that do that. Take a look at Kiadis which can identify activated T cells and kill them and then reinfuse rest of white cells back into the patient.