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Stop it you assholes
Jun. 2nd, 2010 03:13 pmIt's allergy season and very hot. I've been half blind all today and yesterday and I really want to sleep, not because I'm tired but because it's painful for my eyes to be open. I have switched the way I blink so I can maximize the time when my eyelid is down. Lortadine and allergy eye drops have helped, because otherwise I would be fully unable to stay upright, but that very description confirms they haven't, shall we say, fixed the problem.
I'm getting ready to discontinue birth control, and unwisely decided to perform due dilligence. Normally, research is good and I like it. In this area, research turns up a lot of alarmist crap that I then have to track sources on. Example: "OMG use an alternative method of birth control for at least three months!" Justification: there is no risk at all to you or the baby if you don't do this, and with modern birth control you should start ovulating immediately, but maybe you'd feel more confident if you had a few periods first?
Or: OMG Lortadine might not be safe! Real story: In 2001, the Swedish Medical Birth registry noticed a slightly higher rate for a minor and fixable birth defect in babies born to mothers who had taken lortadine in their first trimester. They weren't sure whether this was a stastical blip or not, since there wasn't a reason to think the two were connected other than that set of numbers, and there had never been a link found in animal testing or any other controlled studies of pregnant women taking lortadine. Since then, they've followed up the study every year, and there has not been a year since then when there has been a similar blip. In fact, since then, the babies of lortadine-taking moms have had a lower than average rate of the birth defect. They've now written it off as statistical noise. British researchers have sort of condemned everybody for flipping out about it in the first place, since nobody ever proposed any sort of causal link and it never made much sense. Everyone on the internet is, of course, still flipping out about it.
Can we please stop this idea that for pregnant or potentially pregnant women, we have to prove things safe rather than proving them dangerous? The idea that "no risk is low enough" is absurd. Everything has a risk. Some precautions are reasonable and some aren't. There is a chance, no matter what, that a fetus is going to have a birth defect. That does not mean that for nine months plus however long it takes to conceive I need to live in a cave (with no radiation) and not eat or drink anything. There could be lead in my tapwater and bisphenol in bottled. Raw vegetables might have bacteria on them. I shouldn't touch animals for the same reason. I shouldn't use any of my art supplies. I should stop using my fluoride toothpaste. I can't leave my sheets and clothes dirty because omg germs but I can't wash them because omg chemicals. I should avoid meat that isn't charred, meat that is charred, cheese, shellfish, soy, and anything that has ever touched plastic. And I shouldn't be stressed out, because that's bad too: I should sit near a stream (but not actually because what if I got bitten by a tick or something and got lyme disease) and think only beautiful thoughts, which will transform into a perfect god baby. Also, the cave I mentioned should have HEPA filters installed, and I should remove all the mold but not in a way that sends debris into the air or involves any cleaning products except maybe vinegar prayed over by monks.
It would be really nice if people would calm down so I could figure out if there's anything actually dangerous I need to worry about. As it stands, I plan to ignore all of it as hysteria.
I'm getting ready to discontinue birth control, and unwisely decided to perform due dilligence. Normally, research is good and I like it. In this area, research turns up a lot of alarmist crap that I then have to track sources on. Example: "OMG use an alternative method of birth control for at least three months!" Justification: there is no risk at all to you or the baby if you don't do this, and with modern birth control you should start ovulating immediately, but maybe you'd feel more confident if you had a few periods first?
Or: OMG Lortadine might not be safe! Real story: In 2001, the Swedish Medical Birth registry noticed a slightly higher rate for a minor and fixable birth defect in babies born to mothers who had taken lortadine in their first trimester. They weren't sure whether this was a stastical blip or not, since there wasn't a reason to think the two were connected other than that set of numbers, and there had never been a link found in animal testing or any other controlled studies of pregnant women taking lortadine. Since then, they've followed up the study every year, and there has not been a year since then when there has been a similar blip. In fact, since then, the babies of lortadine-taking moms have had a lower than average rate of the birth defect. They've now written it off as statistical noise. British researchers have sort of condemned everybody for flipping out about it in the first place, since nobody ever proposed any sort of causal link and it never made much sense. Everyone on the internet is, of course, still flipping out about it.
Can we please stop this idea that for pregnant or potentially pregnant women, we have to prove things safe rather than proving them dangerous? The idea that "no risk is low enough" is absurd. Everything has a risk. Some precautions are reasonable and some aren't. There is a chance, no matter what, that a fetus is going to have a birth defect. That does not mean that for nine months plus however long it takes to conceive I need to live in a cave (with no radiation) and not eat or drink anything. There could be lead in my tapwater and bisphenol in bottled. Raw vegetables might have bacteria on them. I shouldn't touch animals for the same reason. I shouldn't use any of my art supplies. I should stop using my fluoride toothpaste. I can't leave my sheets and clothes dirty because omg germs but I can't wash them because omg chemicals. I should avoid meat that isn't charred, meat that is charred, cheese, shellfish, soy, and anything that has ever touched plastic. And I shouldn't be stressed out, because that's bad too: I should sit near a stream (but not actually because what if I got bitten by a tick or something and got lyme disease) and think only beautiful thoughts, which will transform into a perfect god baby. Also, the cave I mentioned should have HEPA filters installed, and I should remove all the mold but not in a way that sends debris into the air or involves any cleaning products except maybe vinegar prayed over by monks.
It would be really nice if people would calm down so I could figure out if there's anything actually dangerous I need to worry about. As it stands, I plan to ignore all of it as hysteria.
