Latest news with #Farber
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Health
- Yahoo
RFK Jr. Swaps Made-Up Studies in His Report for More Made-Up Studies
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s error-laden Make America Healthy Again report was updated Friday to remove citations to several non-existent studies—as well as some perfectly real ones—and replace them with citations that still make no sense, NOTUS reported. A NOTUS investigation published Thursday found that Kennedy's report taking aim at childhood vaccines, ultraprocessed foods, and pesticides listed studies that authors said were either misinterpreted or had never even occurred, leaving artificial intelligence researchers partially blaming AI for the errors. Several studies cited in the original report identified by NOTUS as nonexistent were all replaced Friday, as well as some studies with which NOTUS had not identified any issues. But in some cases, the replacements weren't much better. One study that the original report cited to support the claim that psychotherapy was a better treatment for children experiencing mental health issues than medication was replaced by another 'systemic overview' by Pim Cuijpers, a widely referenced psychologist in Amsterdam. But Cuijpers told NOTUS that his study covered the use of psychiatric medication in adults, not children. The two 'cannot be compared, and this reference is therefore not usable in adolescents,' Cuijpers wrote in an email to NOTUS. He also noted that there was no evidence to support the report's claim that psychotherapy was more effective than antidepressants for adolescents. This wasn't the only detail that undermined the report's arguments that American children were over-medicated. Cuijpers pointed out to NOTUS that the report's claim that 'antidepressant prescription rates in teens increased by 14-fold between 1987 and 2014' was a little less convincing considering that antidepressants were only developed in the late 1980s. 'So it can also be said that these drugs were simply used for the adolescents who could benefit from them,' Cuijpers told NOTUS. Another faulty citation attributing work to the incorrect authors was fixed, NOTUS reported, but the new study cited also failed to support the claim that 'since the 1970s, recess and physical education (PE) have steadily declined.' Yet another incorrect citation referred to pulmonologist Harold J. Farber, but didn't cite an actual paper he'd worked on to support the claim that 'an estimated 25-40% of mild cases' of asthma were overprescribed drugs. The new citation referred to Farber's actual study, which had been about a Medicaid-managed care program study in Texas, but Farber told NOTUS that the notion that those results applied to the general population required a 'tremendous leap of faith.' After the initial NOTUS report, so many changes were made to the documents to remove evidence of AI-chatbot handiwork that White House officials stopped denoting changes to the document, and deleted references to prior corrections, NOTUS reported.
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Health
- Yahoo
RFK Jr.'s ‘MAHA report' revealed to have cited studies that don't exist, and misinterpreted others
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. released his 73-page 'MAHA Report,' commissioned by the Trump administration, last week. Aiming to find the root causes of chronic disease in the U.S., it included sections on childhood illness, ultra-processed foods, chemicals, technology and children's mental health, and medication and vaccines for children. It cited 522 studies, with RFK calling the report a 'milestone' achievement for public health filled with 'gold standard' science. But now its veracity has now come under scrutiny, as the non-profit, non-partisan outlet NOTUS revealed that several of the studies were misinterpreted in the report—and that seven of them did not exist. Epidemiologist Katherine Keyes, who is cited in the report as the author of a study on anxiety in adolescents titled 'Changes in mental health and substance use among US adolescents during the COVID-19 pandemic,' told NOTUS that not only was she surprised to hear she was cited in the report, but that she did not write any such paper. 'The paper cited is not a real paper that I or my colleagues were involved with,' Keyes told NOTUS. 'We've certainly done research on this topic, but did not publish a paper in JAMA Pediatrics on this topic with that co-author group, or with that title.' The link for the alleged study is broken, and the journal issue that the report cites it to be in contains no papers on that topic. NOTUS also revealed that two papers included in the report's section on 'corporate capture of media' could not be found. Each allegedly illustrated the concept that direct-to-consumer advertising was driving medication use among children and adolescents. But one of the authors cited confirmed that he did not write the article cited in the report, while the other researcher didn't seem to exist. In another case, pediatric pulmonologist Dr. Harold J. Farber denied writing a cited study titled, 'American Children are on Too Much Medicine—A Recent and Emerging Crisis.' He said he never worked with the other listed authors, either. Farber told NOTUS that the MAHA report had egregiously overgeneralized research about the overprescribing of asthma medication to children. 'It is a tremendous leap of faith to generalize from a study in one Medicaid managed care program in Texas using 2011 to 2015 data to national care patterns in 2025,' Farber told NOTUS. That seemed to be a common theme in the rest of the report, NOTUS found. In one section about mental health medication—another point of contention for Kennedy—the report cites a paper as evidence that therapy alone is as or more effective than psychiatric medicine. But according to one of that paper's statisticians, that's not an accurate takeaway. Joanne McKenzie, a biostatistics professor at an Australian university, told NOTUS that their study didn't measure or compare therapy's effectiveness as a mental health treatment at all. 'We did not include psychotherapy in our review. We only compared the effectiveness of (new generation) antidepressants against each other, and against placebo,' she said in an email to NOTUS. NOTUS revealed further inaccurate representations in the report: Another cited study was reported to claim that 'antipsychotic prescriptions for children increased by 800% between 1993 and 2009,' but the years were actually 1995 to 2005. Another medical researcher revealed to NOTUS that the MAHA report mischaracterized her study on how screen time affects children's sleep—and further, RFK Jr.'s report named the wrong journal of publication for the study. 'The conclusions in the report are not accurate and the journal reference is incorrect. It was not published in Pediatrics. Also, the study was not done in children, but in college students,' Mariana G. Figueiro told NOTUS. In response to NOTUS' findings, press secretary Karoline Leavitt called the inaccuracies 'formatting issues,' and stated that the White House has 'complete confidence' in both RFK Jr. and his MAHA commission. 'I understand there were some formatting issues with the MAHA report that are being addressed, and the report will be updated,' she said at a press briefing on Thursday. 'But it does not negate the substance of the report, which, as you know, is one of the most transformative health reports that's ever been released by the federal government, and is backed on good science that has never been recognized by the federal government.' For more on RFK Jr.: Major food brands will stop using artificial dyes. Here's why RFK is sounding the alarm As RFK Jr. defends cuts to public health, experts warn of devastating effects that could haunt Americans for decades RFK Jr. blames these 5 environmental toxins for a spike in autism cases This story was originally featured on
Sky News
23-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Sky News
Harvey Weinstein is back in court - but what has happened to the #MeToo movement since 2017?
Seven years after allegations against him first emerged online, Harvey Weinstein is back in court. When the accusations surfaced in late 2017, the American actress Alyssa Milano tweeted: "If all the women who have been sexually harassed or assaulted wrote 'Me too' as a status, we might give people a sense of the magnitude of the problem." This gave birth to what we now know as the #MeToo movement and a flood of women - famous and not - sharing stories of gender-based violence and harassment. Weinstein, 73, was jailed in 2020 and has been held at New York's notorious Rikers Island prison complex ever since. On 15 April, jury selection for his retrial got off to a false start, with none of the 12 potential candidates or six alternatives being deemed suitable. One, an actor, described Weinstein as a "really bad guy" and claimed he could not remain impartial. A woman also bowed out after declaring she had been the victim of sexual assault. With jury selection now complete, the original charges of rape and sexual assault will be heard again, with opening statements and evidence due to start on 23 April. Here we look at why there's a retrial, why Weinstein will likely remain behind bars - and what has happened to #MeToo. Why is there a retrial? Weinstein is back in court because his first two convictions were overturned last April and are now being retried. In 2020, he was sentenced to 23 years in prison after being found guilty of sexually assaulting ex-production assistant Mimi Haley in 2006 and raping former actor Jessica Mann in 2013. But in April 2024, New York's highest court overturned both convictions due to concerns the judge had made improper rulings, including allowing a woman to testify who was not part of the case. At a preliminary hearing in January this year, the former Hollywood mogul, who has cancer and heart issues, asked for an earlier date on account of his poor health, but that was denied. When the retrial was decided upon last year, Judge Farber also ruled that a separate charge concerning a third woman should be added to the case. In September 2024, the unnamed woman filed allegations that Weinstein forced oral sex on her at a hotel in Manhattan in 2006. Defence lawyers tried to get the charge thrown out, claiming prosecutors were only trying to bolster their case, but Judge Farber decided to incorporate it into the current retrial. Weinstein denies all the allegations against him and claims any sexual contact was consensual. Speaking outside court on 15 April, his lawyer Arthur Aidala, said he was "cautiously optimistic that when all the evidence is out, the jury will find that all of his relationships were consensual and therefore reach a verdict of not guilty". Why won't he be released? Even if the retrial ends in not guilty verdicts on all three counts, Weinstein will remain behind bars at Rikers Island. This is because he was sentenced for a second time in February 2023 after being convicted of raping an actor in a Los Angeles hotel room in 2013. He was also found guilty of forcible oral copulation and sexual penetration by a foreign object in relation to the same woman, named only in court as Jane Doe 1. The judge ruled that the 16-year sentence should be served after the 23-year one imposed in New York. Weinstein's lawyers are appealing this sentence - but for now, the 16 years behind bars still stand. Has #MeToo made a difference - and what's changed? "MeToo was another way of women testifying about sexual violence and harassment," Dr Jane Meyrick, associate professor in health psychology at the University of West England (UWE), tells Sky News. "It exposed the frustration around reporting cases and showed the legal system was not built to give women justice - because they just gave up on it and started saying it online instead. "That was hugely symbolic - because most societies are built around the silencing of sexual violence and harassment." After #MeToo went viral in 2017, the statute of limitation on sexual assault cases was extended in several US states, giving victims more time to come forward, and there has been some reform of non-disclosure agreements (NDAs), which were regularly used by Weinstein. This has resulted in more women speaking out and an increased awareness of gender-based violence, particularly among women, who are less inclined to tolerate any form of harassment, according to Professor Alison Phipps, a sociologist specialising in gender at Newcastle University. "There's been an increase in capacity to handle reports in some organisations and institutions - and we've seen a lot of high-profile men brought down," she says. "But the #MeToo movement has focused on individual men and individual cases - rather than the culture that allows the behaviour to continue. "It's been about naming and shaming and 'getting rid' of these bad men - by firing them from their jobs or creating new crimes to be able to send more of them to prison - not dealing with the problem at its root." Dr Meyrick, who wrote the book #MeToo For Women And Men: Understanding Power Through Sexual Harassment, gives the example of the workplace and the stereotype of "bumping the perp", or perpetrator. "HR departments are still not designed to protect workers - they're built to suppress and make things go away." As a result, she says, men are often "quietly moved on" with "no real accountability". The same is true in schools, Prof Phipps adds, where she believes concerns around the popularity among young boys of self-proclaimed misogynist and influencer Andrew Tate are being dealt with too "punitively". "The message is 'we don't talk about Andrew Tate here' and 'you shouldn't be engaging with him'," she says. "But what we should be doing is asking boys and young men: 'why do you like him?', 'what's going on here?' - that deeper conversation is missing," she says. Have high-profile celebrity cases helped? Both experts agree they will have inevitably empowered some women to come forward. But they stress they are often "nothing like" most other cases of sexual violence or harassment, which makes drawing comparisons "dangerous". Referencing the Weinstein case in the US and Gisele Pelicot 's in France, Dr Meyrick says: "They took multiple people over a very long period of time to reach any conviction - a lot of people's experiences are nothing like that." Prof Phipps adds: "They can create an idea that it's only 'real' rape if it's committed by a serial sex offender - and not every person who perpetrates sexual harm is a serial offender." Part of her research has focused on "lad culture" in the UK and associated sexual violence at universities. She says: "A lot of that kind of violence happens in social spaces, where there are drugs and alcohol and young people thrown together who don't know where the boundaries are. "That doesn't absolve them of any responsibility - but comparing those 'lads' to Harvey Weinstein seems inappropriate." Dr Meyrick says most victims she has spoken to through her research "wouldn't go down the legal route" - and prosecution and conviction rates are still extremely low. "Most don't try for justice. They just want to be believed and heard - that's what's important and restorative," she says. But specialist services that can support victims in that way are underfunded - and not enough is being done to change attitudes through sex education and employment policy, she warns. "Until we liberate men from the masculine roles they're offered by society - where objectification of women is normalised as banter - they will remain healthy sons of the patriarchy.
Sky News
15-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Sky News
Everything you need to know about Harvey Weinstein's retrial – and why he still won't be released from prison
Seven years after allegations against him first emerged online, Harvey Weinstein is back in court. When the accusations surfaced in late 2017, the American actress Alyssa Milano tweeted: "If all the women who have been sexually harassed or assaulted wrote 'Me too' as a status, we might give people a sense of the magnitude of the problem." This gave birth to what we now know as the #MeToo movement and a flood of women - famous and not - sharing stories of gender-based violence and harassment. Weinstein was jailed in 2020 and has been held at New York's notorious Rikers Island prison complex ever since. Today, jury selection begins for the case against the 73-year-old, where the original charges of rape and sexual assault will be heard again. Here we look at why there's a retrial - and why he will likely remain behind bars - and what has happened to #MeToo. Why is there a retrial? Weinstein is back in court because his first two convictions were overturned last April and are now being retried. In 2020 he was sentenced to 23 years in prison after being found guilty of sexually assaulting ex-production assistant Mimi Haley in 2006 and raping former actor Jessica Mann in 2013. But in April 2024, New York's highest court overturned both convictions due to concerns the judge had made improper rulings, including allowing a woman to testify who was not part of the case. At a preliminary hearing in January this year, the former Hollywood mogul, who has cancer and heart issues, asked for an earlier date on account of his poor health, however, that was denied. When the retrial was decided upon last year, Judge Farber also ruled that a separate charge concerning a third woman should be added to the case. In September 2024, the unnamed woman filed allegations that Weinstein forced oral sex on her at a hotel in Manhattan in 2006. Defence lawyers tried to get the charge thrown out, claiming prosecutors were only trying to bolster their case, but Judge Farber decided to incorporate it into the current retrial. Weinstein denies all the allegations against him and claims any sexual contact was consensual. Why won't he be released? Even if the retrial ends in not guilty verdicts on all three counts, Weinstein will remain behind bars at Rikers Island. This is because he was sentenced for a second time in February 2023 after being convicted of raping an actor in a Los Angeles hotel room in 2013. He was also found guilty of forcible oral copulation and sexual penetration by a foreign object in relation to the same woman, named only in court as Jane Doe 1. The judge ruled that the 16-year sentence should be served after the 23-year one imposed in New York. Weinstein's lawyers are appealing this sentence - but for now, the 16 years behind bars still stand. Has #MeToo made a difference - and what's changed? "MeToo was another way of women testifying about sexual violence and harassment," Dr Jane Meyrick, associate professor in health psychology at the University of West England (UWE), tells Sky News. "It exposed the frustration around reporting cases and showed the legal system was not built to give women justice - because they just gave up on it and started saying it online instead. "That was hugely symbolic - because most societies are built around the silencing of sexual violence and harassment." After #MeToo went viral in 2017, the statute of limitation on sexual assault cases was extended in several US states, giving victims more time to come forward, and there has been some reform of non-disclosure agreements (NDAs), which were regularly used by Weinstein. This has resulted in more women speaking out and an increased awareness of gender-based violence, particularly among women, who are less inclined to tolerate any form of harassment, according to Professor Alison Phipps, a sociologist specialising in gender at Newcastle University. "There's been an increase in capacity to handle reports in some organisations and institutions - and we've seen a lot of high-profile men brought down," she says. "But the #MeToo movement has focused on individual men and individual cases - rather than the culture that allows the behaviour to continue. "It's been about naming and shaming and 'getting rid' of these bad men - by firing them from their jobs or creating new crimes to be able to send more of them to prison - not dealing with the problem at its root." Dr Meyrick, who wrote the book #MeToo For Women And Men: Understanding Power Through Sexual Harassment, gives the example of the workplace and the stereotype of "bumping the perp", or perpetrator. "HR departments are still not designed to protect workers - they're built to suppress and make things go away." As a result, she says, men are often "quietly moved on" with "no real accountability". The same is true in schools, Prof Phipps adds, where she believes concerns around the popularity among young boys of self-proclaimed misogynist and influencer Andrew Tate are being dealt with too "punitively". "The message is 'we don't talk about Andrew Tate here' and 'you shouldn't be engaging with him'," she says. "But what we should be doing is asking boys and young men: 'why do you like him?', 'what's going on here?' - that deeper conversation is missing," she says. Have high-profile celebrity cases helped? Both experts agree they will have inevitably empowered some women to come forward. But they stress they are often "nothing like" most other cases of sexual violence or harassment, which makes drawing comparisons "dangerous". Referencing the Weinstein case in the US and Gisele Pelicot 's in France, Dr Meyrick says: "They took multiple people over a very long period of time to reach any conviction - a lot of people's experiences are nothing like that." Prof Phipps adds: "They can create an idea that it's only 'real' rape if it's committed by a serial sex offender - and not every person who perpetrates sexual harm is a serial offender." Part of her research has focused on 'lad culture' in the UK and associated sexual violence at universities. She says: "A lot of that kind of violence happens in social spaces, where there are drugs and alcohol and young people thrown together who don't know where the boundaries are. "That doesn't absolve them of any responsibility - but comparing those 'lads' to Harvey Weinstein seems inappropriate." Dr Meyrick says most victims she has spoken to through her research "wouldn't go down the legal route" - and prosecution and conviction rates are still extremely low. "Most don't try for justice. They just want to be believed and heard - that's what's important and restorative," she says. But specialist services that can support victims in that way are underfunded - and not enough is being done to change attitudes through sex education and employment policy, she warns. "Until we liberate men from the masculine roles they're offered by society - where objectification of women is normalised as banter - they will remain healthy sons of the patriarchy.
Yahoo
09-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Harvey Weinstein Appears in Court Ahead of Jury Selection In Trial
Harvey Weinstein appeared in court Wednesday as his defense team and prosecutors battled over remaining motions ahead of his upcoming trial. Jury selection is currently scheduled to start April 15 for Weinstein, who faces a retrial on the charges of criminal sexual act in the first degree and rape in the third degree. In September, he was indicted on a new charge of criminal sexual act in the first degree. More from The Hollywood Reporter Kevin Smith's 'Dogma' Returning to Theaters in June Julia Stiles Says She Felt "So Slimy" During Harvey Weinstein-Led Reshoots for 'Down to You' Expect a Long Trial for Harvey Weinstein's Next Court Battle Weinstein and his team have often cited his poor health as a reason to get the trial started with urgency, and his health came into account again Wednesday, as the former mogul, seated in a wheelchair, asked his attorney to tell the judge that his treatment during Wednesday's lunch break was 'horrendous,' with his attorney, Arthur Aidala, citing his age, 73, and saying he 'needs some form of nourishment.' 'He cannot be in a diminished state during the course of this trial,' Aidala said. 'He's a 73-year-old man.' Weinstein waived his appearance Thursday due to his health issues, as the two parties work through remaining motions ahead of the trial, which is expected to last four to six weeks. Weinstein has been diagnosed with leukemia among a number of other medical conditions and has been brought to the hospital a few times in the last 12 months. Despite the focus on Weinstein's health during the pre-trial proceedings, Judge Curtis J. Farber ruled in an earlier hearing that his condition will not be allowed to be brought up in court, unless he testifies on the stand. During Wednesday's hearing, Farber also reversed his earlier decision and ruled that one of the three witnesses in the case, complaining witness #2, will be allowed to use the word 'force' or describe the use of force. Weinstein's defense team had sought to preclude the term after Weinstein had been acquitted of his prior rape charge that alleged he had used force. They argued that the witnesses use of the term would open the door to informing jurors that Weinstein had been acquitted of the rape charge. In an earlier proceeding, Farber had ruled that neither party can use evidence or arguments related to the reversal of Weinstein's 2020 conviction nor talk about the jury's decision to acquit Weinstein on certain charges at that time. On Wednesday, Farber told Weinstein's team they could cross examine the witness or he could add jury instructions if they were concerned about the prior conviction coming up in trial. However, Aidala told reporters during the lunch break Wednesday that this could be a potential issue for appeal. The majority of the day was spent on a motion by Weinstein's team to disqualify assistant district attorney Shannon Lucey from the case, as they said they would not be able to question her on the stand in regards to notes she took from one of the complaining witnesses. After heated arguments and several conversations in chambers, Weinstein's team agreed to withdraw the motion, so long as a stipulation was given to the jury about the notetaking. The two parties had yet to reach an agreement on the exact language for the stipulation, and planned to continue discussions overnight and into a hearing Thursday. Lucey took notes during an interview with one of the complaining witnesses in 2020. At the time, that witness was not part of Weinstein's criminal case. But the witness returned for grand jury testimony in 2024, at which time Lucey also took notes. Weinstein's team argued there are inconsistencies between the notes, while prosecutors argued that the notes were not verbatim and the early sessions were 'brief.' If the witness testified to use of force beyond what was included in the notes during the trial, Weinstein's team argued they would want to question the notetaker, Lucey, on the stand, but would be prohibited from doing so because she's part of the prosecution. If Lucey were to be disqualified, prosecutors had said they would need 60 days to replace her, delaying the start of the trial. Weinstein's attorneys argued that their client did not want to wait that long due to his health. Best of The Hollywood Reporter Most Anticipated Concert Tours of 2025: Beyoncé, Billie Eilish, Kendrick Lamar & SZA, Sabrina Carpenter and More Hollywood's Highest-Profile Harris Endorsements: Taylor Swift, George Clooney, Bruce Springsteen and More Most Anticipated Concert Tours of 2024: Taylor Swift, Bad Bunny, Olivia Rodrigo and More
