The New York Times reports that two pro bloggers have died as a result of their extreme blogging.

… they profess a love of the nonstop action and perhaps the chance to create a global media outlet without a major up-front investment. At the same time, some are starting to wonder if something has gone very wrong. In the last few months, two among their ranks have died suddenly.

Two weeks ago in North Lauderdale, Fla., funeral services were held for Russell Shaw, a prolific blogger on technology subjects who died at 60 of a heart attack. In December, another tech blogger, Marc Orchant, died at 50 of a massive coronary. A third, Om Malik, 41, survived a heart attack in December.

Blogging is a health hazard, I’m sure some net nannies will say.  Maybe it should be banned when the government takes over health care?  Or, better yet, maybe tax it into submission and divert the funds into the general fund.

By the way, instead of staying up all night to post an article, it is easy to write up a bunch of articles during the early evening and have them automatically post at 1 a.m. or whenever you want.  You can look like you’re always posting — without having to physically stay up to publish the posts.  Don’t tell anyone, but some bloggers writing about “evergreen topics” have been known to write a bunch of posts on the weekend, then have them come out automatically during the week.

Technorati Tags: blogging, health

The New York Times is reporting that the Chinese maker of all RU-486 abortion pills distributed in the United States — Shanghai Hualian — is mired in a tainted leukemia drug scandal involving 200 injured cancer patients.

Chinese drug regulators have accused the manufacturer of the tainted drugs of a cover-up and have closed the factory that produced them. In December, China’s Food and Drug Administration said that the Shanghai police had begun a criminal investigation and that two officials, including the head of the plant, had been detained.

The drug maker, Shanghai Hualian, is the sole supplier to the United States of the abortion pill, mifepristone, known as RU-486. It is made at a factory different from the one that produced the tainted cancer drugs, about an hour’s drive away.

The United States Food and Drug Administration declined to answer questions about Shanghai Hualian, because of security concerns stemming from the sometimes violent opposition to abortion. But in a statement, the agency said the RU-486 plant had passed an F.D.A. inspection in May. “F.D.A. is not aware of any evidence to suggest the issue that occurred at the leukemia drug facility is linked in any way with the facility that manufactures the mifepristone,” the statement said.

Expect websites to pop up soon asking if people have been injured by RU-486 aka mifepristone when the trial attorneys get back from the American Association for Justice’s 2008 winter convention in sunny San Juan.

Technorati Tags: FDA, Food and Drug Administration, health, medicine, mifepristone, RU-486, Shanghai Hualian, tainted drugs

Scientists may have worked out a way to turn people autistic, then turn them back.

Reports i09:

Need to finish that work project, and wish you had the mental intensity to do it? Just take a synapse-regulating inhibitor, induce temporary autism, and you’ll want to ignore your friends and do nothing but number-crunching for days. Autism-inducers could become as popular as Provigil among the geek set by 2020. Last night, in fact, a group German researchers announced they’d perfected the method for inducing autism. (They can also cure it.)

Don’t let the bosses know about this or they’ll be putting this medication into our morning coffee!

Let’s hope that the research into autism creates a cure that will work.

Technorati Tags: autism, medicine, neuroscience, provigil

I hope you’re not suffering from a hangover after a fun-filled New Years Eve party.

If you are, the Wall Street Journal has an interesting post — Anatomy of a Hangover — that might help you to avoid suffering as much next year (or next time out).

One tip — try vodka instead of bourbon.

The old claim that dark-colored liquors such as whiskey are more likely to cause hangovers than clear liquors such as vodka does seem to be true. One study found that 33% of patients given bourbon had a severe hangover compared with 3% given a comparable amount of vodka.

Technorati Tags: hangover, health

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