Where was the dog born? Plus mammogram changes once again

ANIMAL GENOME OF THE WEEK: CANIS LUPUS FAMILIARIS So is this a trend, the animal genome of the week? Last week pigs. This week, dogs. First things first: dog origins. A perennial hot topic, the

Again, water on Mars. Also abortion, Planned Parenthood, fetal tissue research

WATERY MARS AGAIN Emily Lakdawalla thinks everybody should calm down about NASA’s much-trumpeted latest discovery of liquid water on Mars. The discovery, which is probably not flowing water but rather something more like damp sand, doesn’t, she argues at the … Continue reading »

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Drug price hikes: revolt on the way? Also, the Pope, climate change, and a super eclipse

WILL DARAPRIM DISPUTE TOPPLE DRUG PRICES? Will the rage over Martin Shkreli’s extortionate overpricing of the old reliable toxoplasmosis drug Daraprim trigger a rebellion over the cost of our medicines? That’s what Dan Diamond argues at Vox. He hails Shkreli … Continue reading »

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All about the fossilized bones of (maybe) Homo naledi

SIX WOMEN UNEARTHED A NEW HUMAN SPECIES As you know, most fields of science, especially the ones best beloved by media, are dominated by white guys. Paleoanthropology, for example. Unless you are pretty familiar with human paleontology, Meave Leakey is … Continue reading »

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Jimmy Carter’s cancer, female sexual desire, and Donald Trump’s trumpery

IMMUNOTHERAPY FOR JIMMY CARTER’S  CANCER The immunotherapy Jimmy Carter is getting in addition to radiation for the metastisized melanoma that has invaded his brain and liver is startlingly effective in some patients and not at all in others. As yet, … Continue reading »

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Exciting new drugs for Alzheimer’s disease? Nah.

So, exciting new drugs for treating Alzheimer’s disease, right? Wrong. Or, rather, let’s allow for semi-miraculous outcomes and say instead that this recent news is unlikely to be right. Most of the news concerned research results on two monoclonal antibody … Continue reading »

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Obamacare lives and Kennewick Man is a Native American

WHEW! The Affordable Care Act (aka ACA, aka Obamacare) subsidies to help people buy health insurance got saved by the US Supreme Court after all, with the somewhat unexpected help (unexpected by me, anyway) of Chief Justice John Roberts. Here’s … Continue reading »

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Whither Obamacare? Philae phones home from comet! Approval for female libido drug?

  Whither Obamacare? The fateful US Supreme Court ruling on the legality of many subsidies for Obamacare health insurance premiums (the case known as King v. Burwell) is nearly upon us. Perhaps it will come as soon as Monday (June … Continue reading »

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Celebrating 10 years of Athena SWAN Charter advancing women in science

By Sara Carvalhal Gender inequality in science has been in the news lately, particularly around the fall-out of Sir Tim Hunt’s biased comments toward female scientists. Sir Hunt’s comments are not held in isolation, but rather indicate the need for … Continue reading »

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Dear Dr. Hunt: This female scientist has something to say. And it isn’t that she loves you.

By Linette Granen, MT(ASCP)DLM, director, Marketing & Membership, APHL

After reading the comments made by Tim Hunt, the biochemist who won the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 2001 for his work on cell division, I was appalled! His comments about his “trouble with girls” (his words) in laboratories made me look back over my many years in research, academia, public health and clinical laboratories and remember the prejudice and tactless comments I experienced firsthand.

Early in my career, there was my male lab supervisor who, upon seeing me bent over looking for something in a fridge, commented that my jumpsuit was “really attractive.” He clearly wasn’t looking at the jumpsuit!

Dear Dr. Hunt: This female scientist has something to say | www.APHLblog.orgLater, as my family and I were moving to a new city and I was considering several job offers, I asked a male pathologist for his input. He said, “You need to stay home and be a mommy!”

Then there was the time a male company rep tried to sell me a part for a piece of equipment and said, “Being a woman, you can’t understand how it works!” Needless to say, he didn’t get that sale and he never showed up to my university laboratory again. I didn’t stand for that type of treatment.

In my opinion, the most offensive discrimination is when girls are young, vulnerable and easily influenced by someone who should be encouraging them to pursue their interest in science. I’ve seen many girls experience discrimination, including my own daughter. She is both creative and analytical at the same time (both hemispheres of her brain fire all at once), and was in the gifted program in grade school. During a parent-teacher conference, her beloved and highly respected middle school math teacher (a man) told my husband and me, “Lauren doesn’t need to be in this gifted math class—she cannot keep up with the boys.” We were horrified, and even more so when we discovered that he told our daughter that directly. When she aced his final exam, his comment was, “You couldn’t have done that on your own.” Surprisingly (or not), he was removed from his gifted teaching job almost immediately after someone complained. (You know who that was, don’t you?)

Fortunately, my daughter knew her strengths and disregarded that teacher’s discriminatory comments. She went through high school, tested out of 22 course hours in college (including math), was a math tutor for the football team (all men, of course), received a degree in mathematics and ultimately a master’s in biostatistics. She is very successful in her science career, despite not being able to “keep up with the boys.”

So, Dr. Hunt, after all these years in science, I can truly say that no bouts of crying or lab love affairs (really?) have gotten in my way. I am still a scientist and so are both of my daughters. Despite the few people like you who think we can’t handle science because of our gender, we can and we have – and we hope to inspire the next generation to do the same.