A Concerned Scientist @BE@qoto.org

There's a pretty good article today on Vox about this. I distinctly remember the author being on NPR shooting down immunity debt once, because she interrupted the host mid-introduction when she said "post-pandemic" to say "mid-pandemic" and I had so much hope. Then she said something wishy-washy about masks and suggested washing your hands better. But, that was at least a couple years ago and not a lot of people were actively shooting down immunity debt, so good for her.

Anyway, onto the article today. Overall it's good. It details some risks, what to do, recommends reverse osmosis as your best bet. There's a lot of good info here.

What do I hate? This:

"While their health risks are concerning — and scientists still have a lot to learn about them — it can be helpful to think of PFAS in the context of some other common toxins, says Ducatman. If you had “the choice between smoking a pack [of cigarettes] a day or being in one of those high-PFAS populations,” he says, “high-PFAS population is way safer.”"

I really don't know why anyone feels the need to compare every health threat to smoking a pack a day. Like, what is this? 1985?

Avoid PFAs wherever you can.

https://www.vox.com/even-better/24135052/pfas-forever-chemicals-health-testing-exposure

@henry @Infoseepage

Since you keep deleting things and reposting them, it's messing up the thread and I'm going to mute you for a day. I'm certain this will lead you to block me, and that's fine.

There is literally nothing I have said that would lead you to the conclusion that I am "upset" in earnest.

Your anger at the WHO is righteous. Place that anger in the right places and maybe consider directing it towards a better future.

@henry @Infoseepage

There is literally nothing I have said that would lead you to that conclusion in earnest.

Yesterday when I wrote this, I didn't know about this article:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-04-18/it-s-taken-scientists-two-years-to-rename-airborne-viruses-after-covid-mistakes

Now I understand why people are upset.

First and foremost, please read the document and not just hot takes about it.

https://iris.who.int/bitstream/handle/10665/376496/9789240089181-eng.pdf

I think the very first paragraph of the article is wrong:

"Airborne viruses will be called "pathogens that transmit through the air” under new terminology the World Health Organization hopes will end a scientific rift that hampered the early response to COVID-19."

The document's not even about "viruses" to begin with. It's about "pathogens" which are defined by The American Heritage Dictionary as:

"An agent that causes disease, especially a virus, bacterium, or fungus."

We're all here discussing the fact that language matters, and right off the bat we have imprecise language, minimizing the science, in this article. It's not JUST about viruses. This is important.

Further, they are not saying that airborne viruses will be called "pathogens that transmit through the air." In fact, they define airborne spread as...."airborne transmission" and you don't even have to go far. It's right there in the Executive Summary. They even put "airborne transmission" in bold.

I think what everyone is arguing about is "descriptor" vs "definition" in the end.

A descriptor is a term that can be used to describe or identify.

"The descriptor ‘through the air’ can be used in a general way to characterize an infectious disease where the main mode of transmission involves the pathogen travelling through or being suspended in the air."

No one has attempted to change the definition of airborne in this document as I've seen at least half a dozen people declare.

"Under the umbrella of the ‘through the air’, two descriptors can be used:

•‘Airborne transmission/inhalation’: Occurs when IRPs expelled into the air as described above and enter, through inhalation, the respiratory tract of another person and may potentially cause infection. This form of transmission can occur
when the IRPs have travelled either short or long distances from the infectious person. The portal of entry of an IRP with respiratory tract tissue during airborne transmission can theoretically occur at any point along the human respiratory tract, but preferred sites of entry may be pathogen specific. It should be noted that the dis-
tance travelled depends on multiple factors including particle size, mode of expul-
sion and environmental conditions (such as airflow, humidity, temperature, setting, ventilation).

•‘Direct deposition’: Occurs when IRPs expelled into the air following a short-range
semi-ballistic trajectory, then directly deposited on the exposed facial mucosal sur-
faces (mouth, nose or eyes) of another person, thus, enter the human respiratory tract
via these portals and potentially cause infection."

Airborne transmission is there. It's described. It's a term that you can use colloquially or technically going forward and say, confidently, that the WHO says so.

To get to the heart of the "puff" matter here, let's go all the way down to the end of the Bloomberg article.

"Still, Greenhalgh, professor of primary care health sciences at the University of Oxford, said Thursday that "airborne” best describes respiratory pathogens that are transmitted through the air.

"WHO wants to introduce terms like ‘puff cloud,’” she said in a post on X. "This is a retrograde step. I for one won’t be playing ball.”"

I fear she has not read the document, nor even the Executive Summary. Airborne DOES best describe it, and that's why they literally described it as airborne. The word "airborne" is used 65 times.

Rather than finding the WHO's declaration as a "retrograde step" you want to know what I found to be a retrograde step? Bloomberg quoting Professor Greenhalgh, who is not an aerosol scientist at all, and whose bio apparently won't use the term "mask" for how we should move forward.

"With colleagues at Oxford, I’ve helped set up a rapid review service for answering questions from the research literature. I’ve been digging out the evidence base on whether or not the public should be wearing face coverings as we move out of lockdown. I think they should."

https://www.research.ox.ac.uk/researchers/trish-greenhalgh