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Category Archives: Mind Building
Coronavirus: Public Health England ‘to be replaced’
Health Secretary Matt Hancock is to announce a new body this week, according to the Sunday Telegraph.
The medical school trying to become anti-racist
Students campaigned for changes to training so they are better prepared for patients from minority backgrounds.
Seeking the Final Straw
Here’s an interesting pattern: When people are heading towards a major transition, they often wait for a “final straw” incident before making a move.
In other words they wait until some arbitrary event happens that’s good enough to quality as the final reason that pushes them over the edge.
So an incident happens at work, and that becomes the reason for quitting. Or an event happens in a relationship, and that becomes the reason for breaking up. But of course those events are just catalysts for the transition, not the true reasons for moving on.
These inciting incidents serve as convenient triggers to finally take action to deal with a long-term misalignment. Such events may also be used for the purposes of explanation – to a boss, to a relationship partner, to coworkers, to friends and family members.
It’s hard to justify transitioning. You may feel you need a big enough reason to justify what looks like an extreme action. Otherwise you’ll seem unreasonable or crazy, like your announcement is coming out of the blue. Moreover, you need a reason not to feel guilty afterwards. You may feel better if you can point the finger at someone else for pushing you out and giving you no other option. Then the decision seems like it’s out of your hands – you had to act based on the inciting incident.
The incident can be big, but it doesn’t have to be. Sometimes people latch onto the most trivial of events to use for their final straw moments.
Some unwashed dishes left out could be the final straw that sparks a relationship breakup, but is that the real reason? Even the ensuing argument may not contain the real reasons for the breakup. The final straw event is just a convenience.
This is something to watch for within yourself. Is there any area of your life where you may be waiting for a final straw moment? Are you waiting for your boss, a friend, or a relationship partner to cross some arbitrary line, so you can finally cry foul and transition away from that connection? Is it possible that you’d even feel relieved if such an event occurred, like you finally had permission to move on without looking like the bad guy?
I’ve also seen this pattern come up when people are challenged working on some aspect of their lives. The struggle builds until they’re actively looking for a good enough reason to quit. They just need some kind of socially acceptable trigger moment to make it happen – an illness, a minor injury, a disagreement, a small failed project, an unexpected bill, etc. Then they can justify quitting, leaving, or transitioning.
What if people wait and wait, and a qualifying incident doesn’t come up? Then they’ll usually engineer one, often subconsciously. Have you ever seen someone go through a transition after an inciting incident, observing that they actually caused that incident and that it wasn’t something that anyone else actually did to them?
If you put a certain cause in motion, you’re basically baiting someone else to help you move closer to a transition.
I’d say the key lesson here is to be aware of this pattern and stay on the lookout for it, both in yourself and others. When you spot it in another person, encourage them to share their honest feelings and transition sooner without the need for an inciting incident. When you spot this pattern in yourself, question why you need an inciting incident to lean on and whether you can just be honest and change course.
The final straw event is a crutch. You don’t actually need it. When you realize that you’re waiting for a final straw event to occur, let that be your final straw right there – a clear enough signal that it’s time to make your move.
White Fragility
Earlier this week I read the book White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo, which is about how resistant white people can be when it comes to discussing and learning about systemic racism.
I thought the book had some interesting insights, although it was more academic and less emotional than I expected. I was expecting something punchier and more story-based whereas sometimes this book felt like a corporate training manual. I also thought it was a bit short relative to the weightiness of the topic. Overall I still found it worth reading, so I’d recommend it if you’re curious about it.
I took the main lesson to be the importance of considering other perspectives and being sensitive to them, especially when communicating. There isn’t necessarily a single clear and correct approach.
For example, suppose I tell a story on my blog that involves a black friend of mine (with his permission). Should I mention his race or not? Should I begin the story with “A friend and I…” or “A black friend and I…”?
My previous inclination would be not to mention his race unless I thought it was critical to the story. But am I attempting to be racially color blind then? Note that this isn’t the same as being racially aware.
Who am I to say that race isn’t a factor in the story? Am I trying to dodge some potential judgment by leaving out that detail, which may actually matter to some people and could change what the story means to them?
Many stories could be interpreted differently when considered against the backdrop of systemic racism, such as a story about academic or business success or failure. And as White Fragility points out, this backdrop is always present when people of different races interact.
So this book helped me understand that being racially color blind isn’t a good standard to adopt – it’s a pretty fake one actually, and it doesn’t help.
What if I do the opposite and tell a story about “my black friend.” Now it introduces another issue, like I’m trying to prove to the world that I have black friends. Regardless of my actual intention, many people could interpret this as a really inauthentic effort to wrap myself in interracial friendliness. I can understand that perspective.
Note that even publicly acknowledging that I read White Fragility may induce different reactions in different people. Some may be happy (or even delighted) that I read it and that I’m blogging about it. Others may see it a statement like, “Hey, look at me. I care about social justice too!” Some may appreciate that I read it but dislike what I have to say about it.
If you want to know the actual truth, I wasn’t super enthusiastic to read this book. Some people nudged me to read it many weeks ago, but at the time I was much more interested in other topics. I only opted to read this one after finishing all the other books that were in my queue, partly because I saw that it had a strong effect on a friend. If not for curiosity about her reaction, I might not have read this book this year. One source of resistance is that I thought the title was a marketing trick to bait people, and after reading the book, I still feel that way about it. I found the title a turnoff much like I’m turned off by books that have “F*ck” in their titles. I think a more accurate title for this book would be: Lessons from Corporate Racial Sensitivity Training.
I think some white people who read this book may be frustrated by it, concluding that no matter what they do in certain situations, they can’t win – you’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t. I think that attitude misses the point though. I see the point as being more about listening, sensitivity, and consideration and then making decisions based on awareness. It’s not about following tight rules to be error-free with everyone, which would be an untenable goal anyway.
I’ve already learned from 16 years of blogging that if I write about sensitive topics, someone is likely to interpret what I say very differently than my intentions. So in one sense, it’s true that I can’t win per se. But I don’t need to win, which really means to offend no one. That’s a pretty ego-based way of looking at the situation and not particularly helpful. This isn’t about winning or losing as an individual.
I can still be sensitive to different potential interpretations when I write. And that awareness can help me write more clearly. Sometimes I’ll add extra clarifying words or statements to stave off potential misinterpretations. If I can anticipate a misunderstanding before it happens, I can put in a little more effort to prevent it. It still won’t be perfect, but it’s an improvement over being tone deaf and ignorant.
You will still make mistakes, and you’ll still be judged for them. But when you do stumble on some issue, can you discover why? Can you lean towards greater sensitivity and understanding? Can you turn it into a growth experience?
Most of the ideas in White Fragility weren’t new or surprising to me, but there were a few angles I picked up that did surprise me, so I like that the book educated me on these blind spots.
For instance, I didn’t know how problematic it could be for a white woman to cry during a racially mixed discussion or training on race, especially after someone of a different race shares a story about racial injustice. Now I have a better understanding of why that can be a really bad turn of events and why extra care ought to be taken to avoid tears in that context.
One perspective is that the white woman is genuinely moved and can’t help herself. But another perspective is that it can too easily lead right into a negative downward spiral that derails the discussion and could lead to a conflict where some people are offended by her tears while others feel a need to defend her. Such situations can even descend into violence. Moreover, there’s a huge negative history around white women’s tears leading to black people getting hurt. So when considering the other perspectives on this, I can see why stifling those tears or leaving the room might be a sensible option and why crying in such a context could be a really bad idea. I can also see how this situation can be so perilous due to different people assigning different meanings to those tears.
I don’t feel that this book gave me clear cut answers, but I do feel that it increased my awareness about how people may assign meaning differently when race is part of the context. I didn’t always agree with some of the book’s conclusions and recommendations, but I can understand why it recommends what it does.
Overall I found it easy to relate to the general idea of white fragility due to how closely it connects with a context I have a lot more experience with: the fragility of people who eat animal products. I see a lot of parallels between the avoidance of discussions on systemic violence and oppression in both contexts.
I can’t really know how it feels to a black person when a white person acts racially color blind, but I sure know how ridiculously lame it feels to a vegan when a meat-eater pretends to respect veganism, especially while eating a meal of animal flesh. I know these aren’t the same, but connecting these contexts helps me to better understand how pathetic such fragility looks and how utterly oblivious people are when demonstrating it. This realization also makes me want to push back more when I see people doing the fragility dance, regardless of the context.
I feel like I got the most value not directly from the book but from doing my own inner processing and journaling afterwards. What I most value isn’t what the book taught me but rather how it served as a catalyst for thinking about some deeper issues. I don’t want to detract from the book’s core focus on racial issues; however, I do feel I gained more from reading this book that extends well beyond the area of race. The issue of fragility is a powerful one that shows us in many other areas of life too.
What White Fragility doesn’t provide are long-term solutions to systemic racism itself. It doesn’t share how to overturn and replace the old systems. It’s more about confronting and acknowledging that we all have a relationship with this system, even if that relationship has been hidden. It invites consideration of other perspectives and how our actions may be interpreted differently that we’d expect. It invites us to become less fragile (i.e. avoidant) and more honest and aware.
Health24.com | Obesity ups odds for severe Covid-19, but age matters
- The more obese you are, the higher your risk of dying or requiring ventilation
- This, however, only applies to people younger than 65 years old
- Researchers noted several reasons why obesity may increase Covid-19 symptoms
If you’re younger than 65 years old and obese, Covid-19 poses a special danger to you.
A new study reports that the more obese you are, the more likely you are to either die from infection with the new coronavirus or require lifesaving mechanical ventilation to survive.
Morbidly obese Covid-19 patients are 60% more likely to die or require intubation, compared with people of normal weight, researchers found.
Patients who were mildly obese were 10% more likely to die or need a breathing machine, while those who were moderately obese were 30% more likely, according to the study.
Bigger risk for younger people
“Increasing obesity was associated with an increased risk of lung failure or death in Covid-19,” said lead researcher Dr Michaela Anderson, a pulmonologist at Columbia University Irving Medical Center in New York City.
But obesity only posed a risk for people under 65, researchers added.
Anderson said that’s probably because older people are sicker, more frail, and more likely to develop respiratory failure with Covid-19 due to health problems unrelated to their weight.
She and her colleagues reviewed medical records for nearly 2 500 patients hospitalised for Covid-19 in March and April at Columbia University Irving Medical Center. They looked at body mass index (BMI), which is based on height and weight. Obesity begins at a BMI of 30; morbid obesity is 40 or over.
“At the beginning of the pandemic in New York, we noticed there were a lot of young and obese people who required breathing tubes to help them breathe,” Anderson said. “We were hoping to figure out if weight or body mass index or obesity were associated with the likelihood of developing lung failure if you got infected with Covid.”
About 25% of the patients died and 22% required mechanical ventilation. On average, they were hospitalised for one week, researchers found.
Simple body mechanics
Looking at BMI, researchers found that excess pounds did increase patients’ risk of severe Covid-19 – but only if they were young or middle-aged.
Anderson said there are several reasons why obesity might worsen Covid-19 symptoms, starting with simple body mechanics.
“If you have a big, obese belly, does that push up on your lungs and make it harder for you to expand your lungs?” she said.
Fat tissue also produces biochemicals known to promote inflammation and blood clotting – two factors linked to more severe Covid-19 infection, Anderson added.
“Fat tissue doesn’t just sit there and store fat,” she said. “It also does lots of other things that can influence your health.”
It also might be that other illnesses associated with obesity, such as diabetes or high blood pressure, contribute to Covid-19’s impact on the body, said Dr Aaron Glatt, chief of infectious diseases at Mount Sinai South Nassau in Hewlett, New York.
Prolonged physical distancing
He said this study basically confirms what experts have suspected. “Clearly every study has shown obesity potentially contributes to more severe illness, more intubations and even death,” said Glatt, who wasn’t part of the new research.
Based on the evidence, people who are obese might want to hew even more closely to physical distancing and other methods of protecting themselves against infection, Anderson said.
“It’s important for doctors and patients to really think about how long they should prolong physical distancing, whether they should continue to try to avoid contact until the pandemic is under better control,” she said. “People who are obese and young may want to consider prolonged physical distancing and minimising risks for a little longer than people who are not obese.”
Glatt agreed.
“Every person should attempt to minimise their exposure to Covid, regardless if they are obese or not, regardless if they have risk factors or not,” Glatt said. “The more risk factors you have, the more risk-averse you should be.”
The findings were published on 29 July in the Annals of Internal Medicine.
Image credit: iStock
Health24.com | Study shows coronavirus conspiracy theories and fake news can have severe consequences
- As Covid-19 spreads, so do misinformation and rumours
- Not only can these types of news cause mental health and anxiety, but also bodily harm
- In some cases, false medical information has had fatal consequences
During the coronavirus pandemic, an underlying danger continues to be the spread of fake news, misinformation and conspiracy theories.
A new paper, published in The American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, investigates the phenomenon that experts now refer to as an “infodemic” – where an overload of misinformation, fake news, rumours and conspiracy theories is causing significant harm and affecting more than mental health. Misinformation on so-called “treatments” and preventative measures can cause physical harm and even death.
Danger fuelled by harmful reports
In this new research, a team of infectious disease experts examined social media platforms and news websites to monitor misinformation on Covid-19.
They found over 2 300 reports containing potentially harmful Covid-19 related statements, rumours, conspiracy theories and misinformation.
In the paper, the study authors cited a popular myth that consuming concentrated alcohol will “kill off” the virus.
Earlier in the pandemic, Health24 reported on several snippets of misinformation, often in the form of voice notes, that circulated around South Africa. In other parts of the world, similar pieces of misinformation ended up causing actual injury and death.
“Following this misinformation, approximately 800 people have died, while 5 876 have been hospitalised and 60 developed complete blindness after drinking methanol as a ‘cure’ for coronavirus,” the researchers reported. This occurred in Iran, but similar incidents took place in Turkey and India.
Not all misinformation is as deadly, but it’s still worrying, as it’s freely available on several platforms – which is the key problem, the researchers stated.
Why do people feel a need to spread conspiracy theories?
Many studies have been done examining the psyches of those who believe in conspiracy theories. A previous Health24 article addressed the psychology behind these theories.
Research has found that the need to believe in conspiracy theories and alternative viewpoints all stem from a need to take control in an uncertain environment; distrust in governments and authority; and even narcissism.
And even though conspiracy theories don’t always cause physical harm, they can have a detrimental effect on mental health.
What can be done about fake news?
According to the researchers, the study had certain limitations – for example, they didn’t follow up on the misinformation or establish the exact number of people who believed in a specific conspiracy theory or fake report.
However, they state that there is concrete evidence that misinformation can have severe consequences and should be tracked in real-time by health authorities and governing bodies to be debunked as soon as possible.
READ | Coronavirus conspiracies abound, and they could cause real harm
READ | FAKE NEWS on WhatsApp: Coronavirus, doctors from Vienna and “killer” Ibuprofen
READ | Increasing your Covid-19 knowledge may lessen pandemic-related stress
Image credit: Pexels
Coronavirus: Test, trace and the curse of the 0300 phone number
England’s test and trace system changed tack this week, as national teams struggle to find cases.
Parents urged to stay up-to-date with children’s vaccinations
Vaccinations are continuing as normal while jabs given in school are being rescheduled.
Mathematical tool helps calculate properties of quantum materials more quickly
Many quantum materials have been nearly impossible to simulate mathematically because the computing time required is too long. Now engineers have demonstrated a way to considerably reduce the computing time. This could accelerate the development of materials for energy-efficient IT technologies of the future.
Supercomputers around the world work around the clock on research problems. In principle, even novel materials can be simulated in computers in order to calculate their magnetic and thermal properties as well as their phase transitions. The gold standard for this kind of modelling is known as the quantum Monte Carlo method.
Wave-Particle Dualism
However, this method has an intrinsic problem: due to the physical wave-particle dualism of quantum systems, each particle in a solid-state compound not only possesses particle-like properties such as mass and momentum, but also wave-like properties such as phase. Interference causes the “waves” to be superposed on each other, so that they either amplify (add) or cancel (subtract) each other locally. This makes the calculations extremely complex. It is referred to the sign problem of the quantum Monte Carlo method.
Minimisation of the problem
“The calculation of quantum material characteristics costs about one million hours of CPU on mainframe computers every day,” says Prof. Jens Eisert, who heads the joint research group at Freie Universität Berlin and the HZB. “This is a very considerable proportion of the total available computing time.” Together with his team, the theoretical physicist has now developed a mathematical procedure by which the computational cost of the sign problem can be greatly reduced. “We show that solid-state systems can be viewed from very different perspectives. The sign problem plays a different role in these different perspectives. It is then a matter of dealing with the solid-state system in such a way that the sign problem is minimised,” explains Dominik Hangleiter, first author of the study that has now been published in Science Advances.
From simple spin systems to more complex ones
For simple solid-state systems with spins, which form what are known as Heisenberg ladders, this approach has enabled the team to considerably reduce the computational time for the sign problem. However, the mathematical tool can also be applied to more complex spin systems and promises faster calculation of their properties.
“This provides us with a new method for accelerated development of materials with special spin properties,” says Eisert. These types of materials could find application in future IT technologies for which data must be processed and stored with considerably less expenditure of energy.
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Materials provided by Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin für Materialien und Energie. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.
