Sean Murphy

What I’ve been busy with lately:

Speaking of Mount Isa and genetic mutations in response to pollution problems:

amp.abc.net.au/article/1029...

Although it still officially has nothing to do with what’s making the Indigenous population there sick (w/ Groote Eylandt Syndrome/MJD/SCA3), Purdey’s compelling Cawtian analysis notwithstanding, the excessive manganese exposure on Groote is now being recognized as detrimental to quoll health. Hmm…

‘A timebomb’: could a French mine full of waste poison the drinking water of millions? Scientists fear thousands of tonnes of chemicals dumped in mining tunnels in Alsace may seep into an aquifer with devastating consequences for people and wildlife

‘A timebomb’: could a French mine full of waste poison the drinking water of millions?
Then consider the implications for a #nuclear waste 'disposal' facility leaking over time ...
www.theguardian.com/environment/...

If you’re not familiar with the origin story of Chronic Wasting Disease, and how it supports my take on prion diseases more generally, here’s Mark Purdey breaking it down for you:

Although it wouldn’t surprise me if Shell used this same excuse, too, I might have been thinking of PDVSA, instead. My bad:

You follow?

Fishing population+oil pollution (from Shell, no less)=heavy metal (like mercury) exposure/poisoning, thus resulting in neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s in genetically susceptible individuals.

I’m sure it’s different at Lake Maracaibo, though, right? Pfft…

I just recently sent an email through ResearchGate asking for full access to this paper, but since I don’t like my odds, and am admittedly a bit impatient, is there anybody who has access to it and willing to share? I’d very much appreciate it. Thanks.

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8414025/

An interesting exchange I had a few years ago with one of my friends diagnosed with the Huntington’s Disease CAG expansion mutation.

Coincidence, or causation?

If you don’t have a problem with what BHP did (namely, threatened to sue researchers who implicated manganese as the cause of Groote Eylandt Syndrome), I’m not sure why’d you’d find this any more objectionable.

Neurotoxic Metropolis: Navigating Inflammatory Risks to Brain Health in Urban Environmental Planning | Journal of City Climate Policy and Economy Urban areas are epicentres of environmental stressors that pose significant risks to human health. Here, we highlight the manners in which these exposures—primarily air pollution, heat stress, and noi...

New paper with Ally Clonch highlights how urban environmental stressors like air pollution, heat, and chronic noise exposure are fueling Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and other neurodegenerative diseases by provoking inflammation in the brain. 🧵

utppublishing.com/doi/10.3138/...

ChatGPT fails the Turing Test because it sounds too clever.

Here’s what I put together for you on Groote Eylandt Syndrome/MJD/SCA3 @maaikeverbruggen.bsky.social. Not my best work, but I think it covers enough of what it needs to. Along with the timeline I’m reposting (which contains my sources), here’s pages 1-4 (of 12) of what I wrote:

Still think my intro (post linked to) is better, since I’m not ignoring the mercury pollution and pesticide exposure in Antioquia like everybody else who’d have you believe in genetic determinism, including Smith and Lopera. But what do I know?

bsky.app/profile/murp...

For whatever reason, Williams, like Kwakye, fails to mention that the clustering in Venezuela (which she does acknowledge) also impacts a fishing population. Considering that they both have to know as much (it’s no secret, after all), why would they omit it after the Minamata comparison? Anyone?

If you don’t have a problem with what BHP did (namely, threatened to sue researchers who implicated manganese as the cause of Groote Eylandt Syndrome), I’m not sure why’d you’d find this any more objectionable.

Remember when I contracted you a few years back (on LinkedIn) regarding BHP threatening to sue researchers who blamed Groote Eylandt Syndrome on manganese, before they funded the genetic research that entirely ignored their pollution? I’d still very much like to hear your take on this. Thanks.

Remember when I contracted you a few years back (on LinkedIn) regarding BHP threatening to sue researchers who blamed Groote Eylandt Syndrome on manganese, before they funded the genetic research that entirely ignored their pollution? I’d still very much like to hear your take on this. Thanks.

Trial Shows No Added Benefit From Antibiotics Before Appendectomy A major trial shows no significant difference in outcomes for patients with uncomplicated appendicitis who wait for surgery without antibiotics.

Trial Shows No Added Benefit From Antibiotics Before Appendectomy
www.emjreviews.com/gastroentero...

So I emailed one of the researchers (Dr. Andrew Hunter) involved and he was kind enough to respond and let me know that the research concluded, but has not yet been published. They hope to have it published by the end of the year. I’ll keep you updated.

Kwakye isn’t the only person who likens Huntington’s Disease to Minamata Disease while ignoring the documented mercury pollution in Lake Maracaibo. Dr. Blairanne Williams (also from Vanderbilt) makes the same comparison in her dissertation.

Since I see Quiroz was involved with this research, I’ll point out that when I asked for her thoughts about the potential causal relevance of the well documented mercury pollution problems in Antioquia (where Alzheimer’s is clustering) her research ignored, she blocked me on Twitter a few years ago.

So says the researchers (like Lopera) who ignore the causal relevance of environmental factors (like mercury and pesticides) to the disease, at any rate.

You know what would be great for my revisionist take on Huntington’s? Discordant monozygotic twin research which, in addition to supporting the HD mutation/pollution connection I stress, also supports that moving away from said pollution can prevent disease causation despite CAG expansion mutation.

Is a New Eugenics Afoot? is a historian of science in the Evolutionary and Population Biology Program of Washington University, St. Louis. His main research focus is the economic, social, and political context of the history ...

“If gene or drug therapy is substituted for improving our workplace or school environments, our diets and our exercise practices, how close is this to eugenics?”

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

And if it doesn’t concern you that 1) MJD research was funded by BHP, the mining company that’s polluting Groote Eylandt with manganese dust and threatened to sue in response to the earlier consensus on manganese, and 2) this research entirely ignored BHP’s pollution, could you please explain? #COI

The eugenicist responsible for diagnosing the Lake Maracaibo fishing population with Huntington’s Disease, Americo Negrette, noted that headaches were strongly linked to “el mal” (aka Huntington’s). But does research on HD support this connection? Not so far as I can tell.

Anybody else think it’s weird that there are at least two dissertations (one by Kwakye and the other by Williams) that liken the Huntington’s clustering at Lake Maracaibo to Minamata Disease, but absolutely no published research which makes this same (rather obvious) connection? (Prove me wrong)

Another question worth considering: why are Kwakye and Williams relying on Wexler as their source for Maracaibo being polluted, rather than research (there’s plenty of it, after all) which actually identifies what neurotoxic pollutants are contaminating it? Do they not want to be specific, or…?

For whatever reason, Williams, like Kwakye, fails to mention that the clustering in Venezuela (which she does acknowledge) also impacts a fishing population. Considering that they both have to know as much (it’s no secret, after all), why would they omit it after the Minamata comparison? Anyone?