David H. Freedman

The pharmaceutical industry is in a drug-discovery slump. How much can AI help?

From my article in the December 18, 2019, issue of Nature (“Innovations In” section)

….Because finding new, successful drugs has become so much harder, the average cost of bringing one to market nearly doubled between 2003 and 2013 to $2.6 billion, according to the Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development. These same challenges have increased the lab-to-market time line to 12 years, with 90 percent of drugs washing out in one of the phases of human trials. It’s no wonder, then, that the industry is enthusiastic about artificial-intelligence tools for drug development….Read more

With a combination of tech savvy, urban planning and public support, Colombia’s second-largest city rebounded from troubling times

From my cover story in the November 18, 2019, Newsweek

Think of a gondola suspended under a cable, floating high off the ground as it hauls a cabin full of passengers up a long, steep mountain slope. To most people, the image would suggest ski resorts and pricey vacations. To the people who live in the poor mountainside communities once known as favelas at the edges of Medellín, Colombia, the gondola system is a lifeline, and a powerful symbol of an extraordinary urban transformation led by technology and data….Read more

From paging a doctor to radioing one on the ground, airlines have ways of coping with illness. But none of them are ideal.

From my article in Elemental posted November 13, 2019

Cyrus Komer, MD, was flying on Delta Airlines from Boston to Vancouver, Canada, on a ski vacation, when a flight attendant asked a question over the PA system: “Is there a doctor onboard?” Komer, a physician specializing in internal medicine, who had never before been confronted with an in-flight medical situation, hesitated. “I had to think about it,” he says. “I worried about trying to help someone without any of the tools with me that I normally relied on”….Read more

The next gold rush in legalizing cannabis is public consumption. Entrepreneur J.J. Walker is already one step ahead.

From my article in Marker posted October 3, 2019

Several states and cities are already cautiously opening the door to the so-called social consumption of marijuana. These new laws would permit any adult who purchases cannabis in a specially licensed business to also consume the products right there. In other words, a legal future in which enjoying weed is as simple as walking into a bar or restaurant and enjoying a glass of chardonnay. Currently there are no credible projections of the size of the social-consumption market, but there’s enough relevant math to suggest it will likely be massive….Read more

Letters from readers about my July article, and my response, from the September, 2019, issue of The Atlantic

“I found this article to be a refreshing departure from most writing about health care. Of course culture matters. As a medical anthropologist, however, I thought David H. Freedman missed a key factor in health outcomes. Many people who have the worst compliance rates and outcomes (Freedman lists smokers, diabetics, and people with sedentary lifestyles as examples) also have the same socioeconomic status. In other words, they’re broke or too busy to do everything they’re supposed to….” Read more

Even specialists often struggle to make sense of the puzzling symptoms that come with these slow-moving disorders

From my article in Elemental posted September 30, 2019

Some 1.5 million Americans have been diagnosed with lupus erythematosus. And lupus is just one of more than 100 autoimmune diseases affecting nearly 25 million Americans, diseases that together present a challenging and often frustrating path to diagnosis for doctors and patients alike. “These patients often get sent on a long journey before they get an answer,” says Robert Lahita, M.D., the chairman of medicine at St. Joseph’s Healthcare in Wayne, N.J. “Some physicians will tell them it’s all in their head. It’s not, and they can be miserable for years until they get diagnosed.” Read more

Hacking the sensory-health connection can improve well-being in surprising ways

From my article in Elemental posted September 5, 2019

About a quarter of the human brain’s mass is devoted to processing information from the five senses. Given that the brain plays such a central role in health, it’s not surprising that the five senses are closely tied to well-being.

But beyond merely proving those connections exist, researchers have recently started to explore ways to purposely manipulate them for people’s benefit. “Interventions based on what we see, feel, and even taste can have a seemingly dramatic effect on health,“ says Charles Spence, an Oxford University PhD researcher who runs a lab dedicated to studying the role that perception plays in behavior and health. “They can reduce pain, speed recovery from illness, and much more.” Read more

Pop culture says CBD cures everything—here’s what scientists say

From my cover story in the September 6, 2019, Newsweek

Hardly anyone had heard of CBD three years ago, but now two-thirds of Americans are familiar with it, according to a recent Gallup survey. One in seven Americans use it as an over-the-counter treatment for pain, anxiety and sleep problems. They have also turned to CBD for depression, muscle spasms, digestive issues and skin ailments. One in three pet owners give it to their dogs and cats, says a survey by market-research firm Packaged Facts. It’s also been touted as a treatment for cancer, Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease. One medical clinic reported that CBD relieved 90 percent of all symptoms in all its patients.

Trouble is, almost all of the claims are currently unsubstantiated. “Consumers are participating in one of the largest uncontrolled clinical trials in history, and no one really knows what it is they’re taking,” says Pal Pacher, an investigator at the National Institutes of Health and president of the International Cannabinoid Research Society. “It’s scary”….Read more

The standard tools that flag high-risk imbibing don’t always send the right people for help

From my article in Elemental posted August 8, 2019

There are two fairly reliable ways to discern whether you may have a biological disposition for alcohol trouble, says one psychiatrist at Massachusetts General Hospital who specializes in substance abuse. One is obvious: Look for alcohol trouble in your family history. The other is much less obvious: If you handle your alcohol better than most people around you, you’re at higher risk of a long-term problem….Read more

Many insist that toking on the job improves their performance. Scientists and other experts are lending some surprising support to the claim.

From my article in Elemental posted July 17, 2019

Besides their outsized reputations in the annals of literature, Victor Hugo, Alexandre Dumas, Charles Baudelaire, and Honoré de Balzac had something else in common: their interest in weed. They were all members of the Club des Hashischins — the “Hash Club” — formed in the 19th century as a way to provide opportunities for these towering figures and other celebrated creatives to explore the benefits of writing while high.

There’s reason to believe mixing pot and work may not be as problematic as once thought for others, too. Some scientists, physicians, and other experts are going as far as to suggest that for some people, pot can even be a tool for increasing productivity….Read more

Research explains why people have intense urges for specific foods — and reveals ways to train our brains to resist them

From my article in Elemental posted June 5, 2019

Serving as an experimental subject in the lab of Peter Hall means eating chocolate or potato chips — as much or as little of either as you want. And there’s no catch.

Well, maybe just a tiny one. While you’re scarfing down the goodies, you have to wear a device on your head that scrambles some of the signals in your brain with a blast of magnetic energy. It’s all in the service of advancing science. The science of food cravings, that is….Read more

A new theoretical model may help explain the shocking onset of superconductivity in stacked, twisted carbon sheets.

From my May 27, 2019, article in Quanta Magazine

The blockbuster discovery last year of superconductivity in a material called twisted bilayer graphene caught theorists off guard. None of them had even speculated about the sudden loss of all electrical resistance when two sheets of graphene — honeycomb lattices of carbon atoms — were stacked and twisted at a relative angle of 1.1 degrees. But one prominent proposal from Harvard University condensed matter theorists offers a detailed picture of what might be going on….Read more

Antibiotic-resistant bacteria will kill millions in the coming decades. Can we fix the broken economic and research models that could produce new treatments?

From my cover story in the May 31, 2019, Newsweek

In January, Columbia University revealed that four patients at its Irving Medical Center in New York had been sick with an unusual version of E. coli , a common gut bacterium. Although the news largely escaped attention in the media, it ricocheted through the world of infectious disease experts. The Columbia E. coli had a mutation in a gene, MCR-1, that confers a terrifying attribute: imperviousness to colistin, the final-line-of-defense antibiotic for the bug. “We’re looking to the shelf for the next antibiotic, and there’s nothing there,” says Erica Shenoy, associate chief of the infection control unit at Massachusetts General Hospital….Read more

Researchers are trying to untangle the surprisingly complex relationship between pot and appetite

From my article in Elemental on May 13, 2019

Convenience stores in about 2,000 of the United States’ 3,200 or so counties saw a jump in junk food sales between 2006 and 2016. The indulgent counties were all in or close to states that legalized recreational marijuana at some point during that 10-year time period, just before sales surged.

The new data fits well with the experiences of hundreds of millions of people who use cannabis and with what science knows about pot. Or does it? In hundreds of studies of pot and appetite, the results are, well, disjointed. If there is any sort of consensus, it’s that longer-term use of pot is more closely associated with people maintaining what doctors classify as healthier weights than it is with people ending up glued to the couch, overeating….Read more

The U.S. Lags China in the next big technological advance in cellphone networks. But not where it counts.

From my article (part of the cover story) in the May 10, 2019, issue of Newsweek

“The race to 5G is on, and America must win,” said Trump in mid-April.

It’s no secret that he’s focused on China, led by giant telecommunications manufacturer Huawei. But which 5G race can the U.S. hope to win? There are really three: one to provide the equipment on which the new networks are built; one to roll out the services widely; and another to develop the whole package—the software, devices, services and business processes that take advantage of 5G’s blinding speed and near-instant responsiveness. The distinction is critical, because the U.S. has already lost the first race and may lose the second. But the U.S. could still win the third race—and reap the main economic benefits of 5G….Read more

Personalized health care and artificial intelligence could improve your life—at a cost to your privacy

From my cover story in the April 5, 2019, issue of Newsweek

Andres Rubiano first got the news that his blood pressure was too high in the 1990s, when he was in his late 30s. His doctor prescribed medication and encouraged him to get more exercise and cut down on salt, a regimen Rubiano wasn’t very diligent in following. Then, four years ago, his doctor convinced him to enroll in a pilot project. Once a day, Rubiano slipped on an automatic cuff that wirelessly relayed blood pressure readings to a team of clinicians. His Apple Watch sent off heart-rate and physical-activity readings. Soon, Rubiano was getting text messages and emails about his readings, and his doctor called every month to discuss them. His blood pressure dropped from 150 over 100 to a reasonable 130 over 78….Read more

The Japanese neatness consultant has inspired millions to declutter. But the mania also raises some interesting questions.

From my article in the January 19, 2019, issue of New Scientist

A CLUTTER-free kitchen, living room or office resonates with a clean, graceful aesthetic. Neatness implies organisation and discipline. Stress and inefficiency disappear with stray socks and the morning’s dishes. That’s the promise of Japanese neatness consultant Marie Kondo, as she espouses “the life-changing magic of tidying up” in her Netflix series. But why are so many of us obsessed—and defeated—by the demands of tidiness? Read more

Most cancer patients never get into lifesaving drug trials because of barriers at community hospitals

From my article in the January 2019 issue of Scientific American

The drugs available in clinical trials often represent the latest in research, and many turn out to be significantly more effective than standard treatments. But whereas about one third of cancer patients in the U.S. meet the criteria for a trial with a new drug, only about 4 percent end up in such tests, according to National Cancer Institute estimates. The main reason for the massive shortfall: in the nonacademic community hospitals where most cancer patients are treated, doctors do not feel they have the time, the incentives or the support to learn about available trials, to qualify and enroll patients, or to provide the extra follow-up care such trials often call for. Because nationally about 85 per-cent of cancer patients end up at community hospitals, most of the low participation in cancer trials is attributable to the failure of those hospitals to enroll their patients. Major academic hospitals enroll about 20 percent or so of cancer patients in trials, but community hospitals typically enroll less than one percent.

All of which makes it astonishing that a small community hospital in the middle of rural Nebraska manages to place some 35 percent of its cancer patients in trials. That achievement is due almost entirely to the sheer determination and dedication of a single doctor named Mehmet Copur…. Read more (may be paywalled)

Driverless cars are coming fast. That could be a big upgrade to life in America—or a complete nightmare, if we don’t quickly take control of the situation

From my cover story in the Dec. 14, 2018, issue of Newsweek.

At the dawn of the 20th century, the automobile was heralded as a way to free cities from the scourge of horse manure. Cars delivered on that promise, and they made us a far more mobile society. But they also stuck us with a slew of pervasive problems that haunt us today: urban blight, suburban sprawl, congestion, a rich-poor divide, a health-crushing lack of physical activity and enough pollution to upend the Earth’s climate.

Most U.S. cities seem positioned to once again allow technology to overwhelm them. New York City, for example, currently has no testing program in place for driverless cars—General Motors was planning one for 2019 but canceled it when the City Council raised concerns about safety. Singapore, some European countries and China are taking steps to prepare for AVs, but not one major U.S. city has introduced new traffic or development laws intended to boost AVs or push drivers to use them. If cities don’t get their development acts together soon, driverless vehicles will likely make traffic far worse in the coming years….Read more

Americans whose treatments aren’t covered by insurance are saving thousands and getting good care by going outside the country

From my article in the November 2018 issue of Men’s Journal

Three years ago, Justin Bull was goofing around with friends, swinging on a tree rope, when he lost his grip. The 29-year-old multi-sport athlete and dirt biker plunged 35 feet, landing on his right shoulder and snapping a tendon. Worse yet, he was uninsured, which meant getting surgery in his hometown of Fort Worth, Texas, would cost $40,000, all out-of-pocket. “I was looking at going into serious debt,” he says.

Then Bull’s mother made a surprising suggestion: Go abroad to get it done. A few years before, she’d traveled to the Czech Republic for surgery on her ankle. The procedure had been top-notch, complication-free, and a huge cost-saver. Bull did some research and opted for the Hospitales Amerimed in Cancún, Mexico—an orthopedic-surgery destination for professional athletes worldwide. Bull says it couldn’t have gone better. Total cost of airfare, a week in a resort for two, and all medical costs: $7,400. He checked with two U.S. surgeons afterward who said the work on his shoulder passed muster….Read more

Obsolete, easily hacked voting machines in counties with close congressional elections–and no way to do a recount. How could Russia resist?

From my cover story in the October 26, 2018, issue of Newsweek

Security is tight at the Bucks County, Pennsylvania, Government Administration Building in Doylestown, a three-story brick structure with no windows. That’s where officials retreat on election night to tally the votes recorded on the county’s 900 or so voting machines. Unfortunately, Russian hackers won’t need to come calling there on Election Day. Cyberexperts warn that they could use more sophisticated means of changing the outcomes of close races or sowing confusion in an effort to throw the U.S. elections into disrepute….Read more

Facebook and others are turning your personal health information into a hot business commodity

From my article in the August 2018 issue of Men’s Journal

When the news broke that Facebook had allowed third-party apps to harvest troves of data from its users to influence U.S. elections, people (rightfully) freaked out. Now here’s something else to worry about: Facebook and others are turning your personal health information into a hot business commodity. Facebook and others have reportedly been looking into selling user information to hospitals and medical institutions eager to identify patients and build digital profiles that might include diagnoses, tests, prescriptions, and even sex-drive data.

This health data can be found in your posts, app downloads, fitness trackers, and phone activity, where it can be gathered and sold. And what Facebook has attempted to do is only a snippet of the kinds of health privacy violations hanging over the online world….Read more

Everyone is fixating on whether Tesla can succeed—and ignoring how that success could drive us closer to a future of jobless automation

From my cover story in the August 17, 2018, issue of Newsweek

….If you’re focusing on Musk’s bad manners, you’re missing the point. His plan to transform the car industry is picking up speed. Along the way, it could put tens of millions of people out of work, dismantling what has been a foundation of the nation’s social and economic life for a century. And it’s happening in the service of plying the wealthy with cooler cars…. Read more

The truth about concussions is more nuanced than most of what we’ve heard 

From my article in June 2018 in Men’s Journal

What the public has heard about research into chronic traumatic encephalopathy—the degenerative brain disease that seems to be caused by repeated blows to the head—suggests that suffering concussions as a kid is likely to cause depression, memory problems, and violent behavior years later. But what if this new conventional wisdom doesn’t get it quite right? Christopher Giza has been calling for a bit of calm and context. A pediatric neurologist who heads UCLA’s BrainSport program, Giza is one of the world’s leading experts on concussions in contact-heavy sports. Before you pull your youngsters from football—or sign them up for it—Giza has some advice. Read more