The robot was just demonstrating an abundance of caution. Bears are nature’s godless killing machines.
(credit: Stephen Colbert)
So now hundreds of people are going to receive packages soaked with bear spray?
“Alexa, kill the humans.”
Bear repellent sends 24 people to the hospital but only bearly (pun!) annoys actual bears.
In other news, no bears were seen anywhere near the fulfillment center.
Manufacturer declares victory.
Later, at eleven, Florida resident has a stone that repels polar bears. Says, “You all owe me!”
Ah yes. The Bear Stone Bear.
Gonna hammer on Dr. He a bit more because he conveniently forgot to mention all the potential negative effects the kids might suffer due to his treatment:
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-07713-2
Although the CCR5-Δ32 mutation disables the gene and makes carriers resistant to the dominant strain of HIV, over the past two decades dozens of studies have shown that CCR5 also helps to protect the lungs, liver and brain during some other serious infections and chronic diseases.
Influenza could also pose a greater risk to the twins . Work in mice has shown that the CCR5 protein helps to recruit key immune cells to fight the virus in the lungs3. Without the gene, this defence system fails. A study in Spain found that that people with the CCR5-Δ32 deletion are four times more likely than average to die from influenza4. And China is a hotspot for influenza outbreaks.
Did he communicate those risks to the parents? Of course not. Chances are he either didn’t care or didn’t know because he didn’t bother to research that part of gene. This is why we have protocols and rules. So the girl may not contract HIV, but could die much more easily from the flu or other diseases. Take all things in perspective and she is probably worse off with the manipulations that took place, not better.
Uh, not necessarily. Maybe she is worse off, and maybe better off. The only way to answer the question is through research.
Just to put things in perspective, if we had a good way to block CCR5 with a drug, then that drug would probably be in clinical trials right now despite all the risks you just listed. The problem isn’t blocking CCR5 per se, it’s the fact that gene editing is irreversible.
Sure more study is needed to verify and quantity. But I didn’t see anything wrong with the Spanish study outside of not having a sample size in the thousands.
The adult HIV prevalence in China is .037%. In 3 years more people die of the flu there than all the people who have HIV. I’m not sure I can concede that the risk of HIV in a somewhat repressed culture such as China is the same level threat as creating someone who now can’t handle the flu and other respiratory virus’s in a population center that is known for the transmission of flu worldwide and the epicenter of the SARS outbreak (Guangdong region, Hong Kong).
So at this point in time, all things being equal I still feel based on the evidence we have she is worse off now than if she hadn’t been edited. If she lived in Western, Central or Southern Africa I would say the opposite because her risk of HIV infection/death would outweigh her risk from respiratory mortality.
That’s just my take :)
That study found 3 deaths out of 17 people with the mutation, compared to 7 out of 141 people without.
It’s a significant difference, but just barely. Given the small sample size, the actual added risk may be very small, or extremely high. “Fourfold higher” is a split-the-difference estimate that raises more questions then it answers. I put very little faith in that figure, and therefore it is hard to make a confident answer as to whether the mutation helps or hurts.
Like I said, a drug that blocked CCR5 would certainly merit further testing. Even in places like China.
EDIT:
Lo and behold, a CCR5 inhibitor already exists! And not only that, it is already FDA approved and is sold by Pfizer under the brand name Selzentry.
Urban Axes, the newest recreational axe throwing location in the region will start its first local competitive league Jan. 15-16
“The newest”? There are more?
Yeah, I have seen multiple news stories and podcasts about the proliferation of axe throwing over the last year or two. Don’t know anybody who’s done it, though.
Apparently one opened here in 2017: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpIm9ly6ggQ
Edit: Ha! It’s byob, too!
An old D&D buddy of mine built a pretty nice axe throwing, uh…range? in his backyard a few years ago. As far as I know, it’s still the centerpiece of his house parties to this day, though we kinda drifted apart.
Split?
Ha
We’ve got an axe throwing place in Greenville:
It’s actually* pretty fun, but at $20/person/hour, something I’d just recommend trying once. Glad I did it, but not worth the money to do regularly.
They have pretty reasonable and thorough safety rules, though I’ve gotta say enforcement can be a problem. I’ve been a handful of times just as a non-paying, non-playing member of other groups, and on at least one occasion there was another group just being complete assholes**. Throwing two axes at once, throwing a second axe while there was already one stuck in the board, doing all sorts of stuff you’re specifically told not to do. They couldn’t stop trying to out-macho each other; they were just generally full of themselves, loud, and obnoxious. Not uncommon behavior out in the world (and especially in any kind of competitive atmosphere you could amp up with alcohol), but when it’s people throwing axes as hard as they can in the same room as me? Not ashamed to say I attempted to narc them out to the staff, which only resulted in a weak scolding.
So, legitimately fun event, overpriced in my area, but ultimately “What Could Possibly Go Wrong?” is still an open question and depends on how safely the establishment is run.
*axetually
**axeholes
Yikes.
He must have bad genes for the likelihood of his own survival to be so low.
Wow. That’s a whole new level of “career-ending move”.
Mugger picks MMA fighter as target…