UN Warns Brain Implants Must Not Violate Human Rights
The UN's ethical framework for neurotechnology includes warnings that tech should be regulated to ensure human rights lines aren't crossed. And as Elon Musk's Neuralink prepares for human trials, a regulator said it found no animal research violations at the company.
Politico:
UN: Brain Chips Must Respect Human Rights
As Elon Musk’s Neuralink gears up for the first clinical trial implanting chips into people’s brains to treat diseases, the United Nations is developing an ethical framework for neurotechnology’s use. On the plus side: The field, which encompasses electronic devices or methods to read or modify how neurons function in the nervous system, holds promise that was until recently seen as science fiction, said Gabriela Ramos, assistant director-general for social and human sciences at UNESCO. (Paun, Peng, Schumaker and Leonard, 7/19)
Reuters:
Regulator Says Found No Animal Welfare Breaches At Musk Firm Beyond 2019 Incident
The head of the U.S. agency responsible for animal welfare has told lawmakers that it did not find any violations of animal research rules at Elon Musk's Neuralink beyond a 2019 incident the brain implant company had already reported. Officials with the Department of Agriculture (USDA) conducted a "focused" inspection in response to a complaint about the company's handling of animal experiments, but identified no compliance breaches, the agency's secretary Thomas Vilsack wrote to Congressman Earl Blumenauer in a July 14 letter reviewed by Reuters. (Taylor, 7/19)
On the future of AI —
Politico:
EMA Outlines Position On AI In Medicines Development
The European Medicines Agency (EMA) has today published a draft reflection paper assessing the risks, benefits and opportunities that AI presents to the entire life cycle of medicines development and regulation, from the pre-clinical stage to marketing authorization. (Furlong, 7/19)
Stat:
How A Boston Hospital Is Priming Medical Residents To Use GPT-4
On a Friday morning in July, an internal medicine resident at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center stood up in front of a crowded room of fellow trainees and laid out a case for them to solve. A 39-year-old woman who had recently visited the hospital had felt pain in her left knee for several days, and had developed a fever. Zahir Kanjee, a hospitalist at Beth Israel, flashed the results of the patient’s labs on the screen, followed by an X-ray of her knee, which had fluid buildup around the joint. (Trang and Palmer, 7/20)
Fox News:
AI App Helps Aging Adults Manage Their Prescriptions With One Photo: ‘Your Personal Health Assistant’
As many as 55% of older adults fail to take their prescribed medications, according to data from the Department of Health and Human Services. Now a new artificial intelligence app aims to change that. "Together," a free iPhone app built on generative AI, is designed to help aging adults and their caregivers manage medications and other health care tasks. (Rudy, 7/20)
In other science news —
CIDRAP:
Study Shows Bivalent COVID-19 Booster Outperforms Monovalent Version
A new Italian study finds that estimated relative vaccine effectiveness (rVE) was 49.3% for the bivalent (two-strain) booster and 26.9% for the monovalent (single-strain) booster, with protection lasting at least 4 months for the bivalent booster and waning fast for the monovalent version. The study appears in The Lancet Infectious Diseases. (Soucheray, 7/19)
CIDRAP:
Studies In Kids Shed New Light On Long COVID, Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome
Today in JAMA Network Open, two studies detail long COVID and multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C), with Swedish researchers reporting that long COVID is rare in this group—but hospitalization or having a parent with long COVID dramatically increases the risk—and another finding that a significant proportion of US and Canadian youth who had MIS-C have persistent neurologic and psychological symptoms. (Van Beusekom, 7/19)
CIDRAP:
Preventive TB Treatment Could Avert Close To 1 Million Deaths, Study Finds
A modeling study estimates that scaling up preventive tuberculosis (TB) treatment for people with HIV/AIDS and household contacts of newly diagnosed TB patients could save nearly 850,000 lives by 2035, researchers reported yesterday in The Lancet Global Health. (Dall, 7/19)
