Amy Maxmen, PhD

Susan Pedersen · Diary: Men explain Epstein to me You might think, given the subject, that the male hosts I think of as the podcast bros would have invited on a woman or...

Totally superb and fearless writing here from Susan Pedersen.

“…any man shocked by the Epstein story has been working over time at shutting his eyes”

www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

Israeli air and tank strikes kills six Palestinians in Gaza, medics say An Israeli airstrike and tank shelling killed ​six Palestinians, including two women and a girl, in separate attacks in Gaza City on Sunday, the deadliest incidents ‌in Gaza since the U.S.-Israeli ass...

Israel attacks a camp for displaced Palestinians in Gaza City, killing a paramedic & five others. www.reuters.com/world/middle...

WHO verifies 18 attacks on healthcare services in Iran & 25 in Lebanon - a violation of intnl law. WHO warns of deteriorating public health conditions, unsafe water, poor sanitation.

In Iran, fires & smoke from bombings are putting dangerous toxins into the air. www.emro.who.int/media/news/c...

It's as if a journalist did not interview this journalist.

WHO says at least 13 health facilities have been hit by US-Israel attacks on Iran. At least 1230 people killed in Iran & thousands more injured. Medics are among them.

“Under international humanitarian law, healthcare must be protected and not attacked," says @drtedros.who.int

At least 13 hospitals and health facilities hit during attacks on Iran, WHO says Global health body investigating reports that four medics are among the 1,230 people killed in Iran since start of war

WHO hub in the Middle East has frozen emergency assistance due to bombings. They've stalled shipments of medical supplies, eg $6m in medicines for Gaza & polio supplies to Afghanistan & Pakistan.

WHO says >100,000 people displaced from Tehran & >60K from Lebanon. www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

Ruben Ray Martinez: Footage shows US citizen shot by ICE agent in Texas traffic stop The Department of Homeland Security did not disclose Martinez was shot by one of its agents until almost a year later.

Newly released footage shows an ICE agent killing Rubin Ray Martinez, 23, in his car in Texas.

"He was shot at point-blank range through his side window by an ICE agent who was in no danger."
www.bbc.com/news/article...

States Move to Limit Access to H.I.V. Treatment

Tens of thousands of Americans are losing access to treatment for H.I.V. as nearly 20 states impose restrictions on assistance programs and several others weigh such changes.

www.nytimes.com/2026/03/02/h...

Growing measles outbreak in Florida, and yet somehow the Florida Dept of Health has managed to avoid mentioning vaccines.

Small print suggests consulting clinics for "pre-exposure options." 🫠

This is a very good article by @helenrumbelow.bsky.social on how the Epstein emails shed light on the way hatred of women permeates the thought-to-be private correspondences of powerful men.

www.thetimes.com/life-style/c...

Tennessee Wants to Let Schools Ban Immigrant Kids, Threatening to “End Public Education as We Know It” A Tennessee bill would take the right to education away from undocumented children. The Heritage Foundation is pushing it in other states.

Tennessee Wants to Let Schools Ban Immigrant Kids, Threatening to “End Public Education as We Know It” 
theintercept.com/2026/03/04/t...

5) Blame the growth of preventable diseases on government agencies (*the ones you now run*) saying they've lost people's trust.

Robert F Kennedy Jr: 1 year of failure In his first speech as Secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Robert F Kennedy Jr laid out a plan to restore trust. The COVID-19 pandemic saw public faith in Federal health...

"10 days after his speech about trust & openness,
HHS rescinded a 54yo policy of soliciting public
comments for new regulations, silencing
the voices the stakeholders he pledged
to serve..."

And MUCH more. Powerful rundown of RFK Jr damages @thelancet.com www.thelancet.com/journals/lan...

'UNIMAGINABLE CRUELTY': Judge Gary Brown, a Trump appointeee from NY, thrashes DHS' treatment of a man who came to the US at 9 as an abuse/neglect victim, has no criminal record and became a college grad.

"The laws of decency condemn such villainy." storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

One Detail About Trump’s Pick for Surgeon General Has Haunted Me for Years. Get Ready. A wellness influencer could soon be writing the warning labels on your vices.

@shanpalus.bsky.social reviews "Flackers" and nails the problem with Casey Means.

slate.com/technology/2...

Hi — new to BlueSky! I’m a journalist covering how health policy and systems impact people. Lately I’ve reported on federal cuts hitting a rural bioscience hub, a town recovering from meth, and a man who said he had to break Medicaid rules.

Based in Montana, I write for both 📰 and 📻

Relevant to today's conversation about AI's inherent sexism, here's an email from cognitive psychologist and early AI theorist Roger Schank, arguing to Epstein that women can't be truly intelligent, because they care too much about what other people think.

The last part abt how measles disrupts immunity vs other infections is, imo, underappreciated (& mechanism was recently clarified). It's part of why measles vaccination was seen to help beyond just reducing measles complications - not getting measles reduces severity of subsequent infections too.

Cambodian national dies in ICE custody in Indiana A detainee died in the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Indiana on Monday, with the cause of death under investigation, ICE said on Wednesday, marking at least the seventh death ...

A Cambodian man -- old enough to have survived Pol Pot genocide but too young to die -- is the 7th person to die in ICE custody this year.

A Cuban man died of asphyxia in Jan, with witnesses saying guards killed him. A Palestinian woman was shackled after a seizure.

www.reuters.com/world/us/cam...

Minneapolis is in a state of chaos. Racist immigration policies are to blame | Jamil Smith What is happening in Minnesota is proof that racist ideas lead to racist policies – and it produces bad, dangerous governance

Hatred cannot govern a country effectively. Prior to this morning's arrest of journalists for doing their jobs, I wrote about this government using fear as policy in the Twin Cities, and why racist governance is bad governance. My first column for @us.theguardian.com.

Immigrant Kids Detained in ‘Unsafe and Unsanitary’ Sites as Trump Team Seeks To End Protections - KFF Health News President Donald Trump’s Justice Department seeks to terminate the Flores Settlement Agreement, which since 1997 has required U.S. immigration officials to hold migrant children in facilities that are...

The Trump admin is pushing to terminate rules that mandate basic rights & sanitary conditions for detained children.

Already, CBP is detaining kids in tents, airports & prison-like settings, according to lawyers

By @sandywestreporter.bsky.social @kffhealthnews.org kffhealthnews.org/news/article...

Extensively drug-resistant Salmonella outbreak linked to moringa powder. MAHA and FOX News, among others, have promoted moringa as a "natural" medicine.

content.govdelivery.com/accounts/USF...

It's important to put this in context of one of the first things Taubenberger did when he took over as the director of NIAID - he canceled the premier pandemic preparedness network ("CREID" - which we were part of) because it was deemed "unsafe for Americans".

Cc. @maxkozlov.bsky.social.

Ack. 1.2 *million*

Exclusive: Key US infectious-diseases centre to drop pandemic preparation Staff members have been instructed to scrub this topic and ‘biodefense’ from the agency’s website.

After more than 1.2 Americans lost their lives to Covid, NIH director Jay Bhattacharya orders the agency to deprioritize pandemic preparedness & biodefense.

Make it make sense.

Scoop from @maxkozlov.bsky.social @nature.com www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Statement on the planned hepatitis B birth dose vaccine trial in Guinea-Bissau WHO is aware of the proposed randomized controlled trial (RCT) on the hepatitis B birth dose vaccine in Guinea-Bissau. Based on questions raised in publicly available information and consultation with...

"Exploiting scarcity is not ethical."

WHO director @drtedros.who.int puts out a statement explaining basic research ethics to RFK.

www.who.int/news/item/13...

Why are all the US media using words like "revoke" and repeal"? They mean nothing in this context. Why not "refuse to accept", "deny", or "lie about"?

I can't believe we're using Guantanamo for this shit

My dad was career US Public Health Service. He deployed after 9/11, after Katrina, helping to set up the basic infrastructure that saved lives. Its nauseating thinking about the position these folks are being put in.

HHS Has Been Using Anti-Trans Language From a Christian Right Think Tank The department refers to gender-affirming care as “sex-denying procedures,” a term coined by the Ethics and Public Policy Center.

SCOOP: The Department of Health and Human Services has been using the term “sex-rejecting procedures” to describe gender-affirming care for transgender and nonbinary individuals.

The term is not clinical or medical. It comes from a Christian Right group.

www.importantcontext.news/p/hhs-is-usi...