What I love about science

[plural]

is light of hope and optimism it brings the world.

Take this study for example:

You win the HIV!

Women using a microbicide to prevent transmission of the AIDS virus become infected more often than those in a control group.

How does someone get to be the lucky constestant in that freak show.
[Full Disclosure - I refuse to actually read the article]

I can just see the study planners now:

Group A will apply microbicide and get the HIV
Group B will not apply microbicide and get the HIV

Everybody wins!

Why brown people havent been this much fun since slavery.

Aint africa great?

Comments

[random-llama.livejournal.com]

What he said *points above*
There would have been some computerised randomisation procedure that assigned a patient to group A or group B. It would have been jigged to make sure the two groups were as similar as possible to reduce and the administrators/investigators would have had no idea what treatment a patient was going to get to reduce bias.

I should point out that they didn't actually infect the participants with HIV as part of the trial.
All participants received intensive HIV prevention counseling at each monthly visit and all women were given high-quality condoms free of charge. Participants received regular testing and treatment for sexually transmitted infections.
It looks like any HIV that was contracted was due to unsafe sex.

[plural.livejournal.com]

It looks like any HIV that was contracted was due to unsafe sex.

You know I love you
but seriously darling

that comment earns
a gold plated
captain obvious
award

*grin*

[random-llama.livejournal.com]

hahaha *mwah*

Yeah,yeah I know but I thought I'd put it in because your post seemed so righteously indignant about this evil drug company giving these poor african women HIV.

Still, I'm surprised that a drug now at phase III increased the risk of contracting HIV. You'd think that sort of thing would have been ruled out before it even hit phase I.

[plural.livejournal.com]

more than indignant I was having fun at the expense of a poorly phrase tagline (which is why I refused to read the article, cause then it would ruin my joke).

and one would think so.

I have to imagine however that the ethical decisions around how to establish such a study would have been quite difficult.

[random-llama.livejournal.com]

Maybe they were against animal testing and decided to do all the testing on african women instead.

[plural.livejournal.com]

I bet that was PETA's suggestion

[budhaboy.livejournal.com]

People for the
Ethical
Trafficing of
Africans

[budhaboy.livejournal.com]

[bevis-butthead-voice]heh... heheheheheh she said 'Jigged'...[/bevis-butthead-voice]

[plural.livejournal.com]

rofl

how did I miss that

I guess I fixated on the whole captain obvious