Monday 14 October 2019

The Lancet explained

I've just come across this press release from earlier in the year which helps explain how so much unscientific, non-medical, political dross gets published in the alleged medical journal the Lancet.

'Activist Editor' Richard Horton of The Lancet receives $100,000 Roux Prize

.. "Richard has been an activist editor, relentlessly taking on issues beyond the traditional scope of 'public health,' including the accountability of the medical profession, as well as human rights," said IHME Director Dr. Christopher Murray. "He has demonstrated an uncompromising commitment to advance health internationally, and his vision for a healthier, safer, and more just world has made Richard one of the world's most sought-after population health speakers."

One of those issues beyond "traditional public health" has been "planetary health," a discipline Horton argues transcends incorporating public health and the environment, and examines "the unity of life and the forces that shape those lives," according to an editorial published last year.

"Planetary health was intended as an inquiry into our total world. Our political systems and the headwinds those systems face," he wrote. "The failure of technocratic liberalism, along with the populism, xenophobia, racism, and nationalism left in its wake. The intensification of market capitalism and the state's desire to sweep away all obstacles to those markets."

Okay.

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