Cited

Cited is no more. We had a great run — over 100 episodes of one sort or another, major awards, and stories we are really proud of — but it’s time to move on. Still, Cited’s legacy lives on through the new projects our team makes, including Crackdown and Darts and Letters. Today, we celebrate Cited and play you a recent episode of Darts & Letters called Derailed: The Crisis in Forensic Expertise. Subscribe today. When it comes to complex social problems, us sensible well-educated book-learnin’ types turn to the experts; we ‘believe science’ — unlike those snorting, hooting, semi-literate dunces. But over the next two weeks, we have two stories that will make you think twice about putting blind faith in experts. What if they don’t actually know what they’re talking about? That happens to be the case with many forensic experts. You know, the folks who work on blood spatter, ballistics, hand-writing analysis, fingerprints, etc. They aren’t Gods, they aren’t magicians, they ain’t anything like what you see on CSI. In fact, they get things terribly wrong; and when they do, the consequences can be catastrophic. We’ll reveal the crisis in forensic expertise, and look for ways to fix it. First, Brandon Mayfield is an American lawyer who was accused of the Madrid train bombings in 2004. He was later released from prison, given an apology by the United States, and paid restitution. He takes us through his ordeal and the failures of forensic science in his case and beyond. Next, Judge Nancy Gertner was a United States District Judge in Massachusetts and is now Senior Lecturer on Law at Harvard Law School. She talks about forensic science and its limitations, the structural problems of expertise, and the biases that shape court proceedings. Then, Gary Edmond is a law professor in the School of Law at the University of New South Wales, where he directs the Program in Expertise, Evidence, and Law. He talks about forensic evidence and the tests such evidence is put through — or not. He says forensic science is essential for detecting and resolving crime, but that doesn’t mean experts and their methodologies shouldn’t be challenged, and improved. Finally, Kevin Flynn is the author of five true crime books and the co-host of the podcast Crime Writers On… He takes us into the changing world of true crime writing and podcasting, including the cultural expressions of — and fascination with — crime. ———-MORE FROM CITED———- If you’re feeling nostalgic to look back, here are some Cited’s best episodes: * The Heroin Clinic * The Battle of Buxton * Exiled in America —————————-CONTACT DARTS & LETTERS————————- To stay up to date, follow us on Twitter and Facebook. If you’d like to write to us, email dartsandletterspod@gmail.com or tweet Gordon directly. —————————-DARTS & LETTERS CREDITS—————————- Darts and Letters’ is hosted and edited by Gordon Katic. Our lead producer is

***This concludes our run of playing Darts and Letters on Cited. You will see the occasional episode cross-posted, but not each and every week. So now, if you’ve been listening to Darts and Letters here, it ends! You’ve got to subscribe to the new feed, otherwise you will miss out.*** What’s the matter with Catholics? They are strangely over-represented in the conservative intellectual ranks. From William F. Buckley to Steve Bannon and many others, Catholics have long been the brains of the modern American right. On this holiday episode, we look at the Catholic intelligentsia, and the battle between left and right Catholic voices. * First, in host Gordon Katic’s opening essay, he discusses his Catholic upbringing. The young atheistic Gordon waged a war of attrition against his parents, and eventually won. Now, he looks at his Catholic upbringing and the broader Catholic intelligentsia with a certain amount of pride, and a certain amount of shame. * Next (@), Kaya Oakes was raised Catholic, left the church, and then returned when she found Catholic leftists who did actually share her values. Today, Kaya is a writer, teacher, and essayist closely watching the contemporary battle for the soul of the church; battle between a well-funded Catholic right; and humble grassroots Catholic left. * Then (@), Patrick Allitt is an historian of the modern American conservative movement. He too has noticed Catholics dominate the intellectual ranks, and his first book was on this very subject. He discusses William F. Buckley and the anti-Communist conservative Catholics, and explains why Catholicism and conservatism has become a match made in heaven. * Finally, (@) Patrick O’Neill is a writer, journalist, and Catholic peace activist. On April 4th, 2018, he and 6 other Catholic activists broke into the Kings Bay Naval Submarine Base in Georgia to symbolically disarm the nuclear weapons there. He faces 14 months in prison, which will begin in January 2021. It wouldn’t be the first time. Patrick tells us the story of his midnight sleuthing, of being in prison, and the broader movements of left-wing Catholic peace activism. ——————-SUPPORT THE SHOW——————- We need your support. If you like what you hear, chip in. You can find us on patreon.com/dartsandletters. Patreon subscribers usually get the episode a day early, and sometimes will also receive bonus content. Don’t have the money to chip in this week? Not to fear, you can help in other ways. For one: subscribe, rate, and review our podcast. It helps other people find our work. —————————-CONTACT US————————- To stay up to date, follow us on Twitter and Facebook. If you’d like to write us, email dartsandletterspod@gmail.com or tweet Gordon directly. —————————-CREDITS—————————- This week, Darts and Letters was produced by Alex de Boer and Gordon Katic. The lead research assistant on this episode was Isabelle Lemelin, with consulting and support from David Moscrop and Andre Gagne.

***We’re continuing to play the first few episodes of our new show, Darts and Letters. We’ll run this to the holidays. If you like Cited, you’ll like this. So subscribe today.*** I can point you to mountains of research about prisons. I can also recommend at least a dozen Netflix documentaries, and highlight a handful of radical activists and scholars. There’s a lot of intellectual work done about prison. But what about intellectual work done in prison? * First, in the opening essay, host Gordon Katic discusses the long history of radical intellectual though produced in prisons. From Thoreau to Gramsci, MLK, Oscar Wilde, Eugene Debs, Emma Goldman, and even Wittgenstein. * Next, Chandra Bozelko served 6 years, three months, and 11 days in a women’s prison in Connecticut. While inside, she started an award-winning newspaper column. She tells us what writing did for her, and what everyday prison intellectualism really looks like. * Then, Justin Piche edits one of the most amazing academic journals you will ever come across. It’s called the Journal of Prisoners on Prisons. It has been around for over thirty years. In each and every edition, you will see brilliant scholarly work—it just so happens that this work is written by prisoners themselves —————————-SUPPORT THE SHOW—————————- We need your support. If you like what you hear, chip in. You can find us on patreon.com/dartsandletters. Patreon subscribers get the episode a day early, and sometimes will also receive bonus content. Don’t have the money to chip in this week? Not to fear, you can help in other ways. For one: subscribe, rate, and review our podcast. It helps other people find our work. —————————-CONTACT US————————- To stay up to date, follow us on Twitter and Facebook. If you’d like to write us, email dartsandletterspod@gmail.com or tweet Gordon directly. —————————-CREDITS—————————- Darts and Letters’ lead producer is Jay Cockburn. Research and support from David Moscrop and Addye Susnick. Our theme song and music was created by Mike Barber, and our graphic design was created by Dakota Koop. This episode received support by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research, which provided us a research grant to look at the concept of “public intellectualism.” Professor Allen Sens at the University of British Columbia is the lead academic advisor. This show is produced by Cited Media, which makes other great shows like Cited Podcast and Crackdown. Darts and Letters is produced in Toronto, which is on the traditional land of Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishnabeg, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee and the Wendat Peoples. It is also produced in Vancouver, BC, which is on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh Nations.

***We’re continuing to play the first few episodes of our new show, Darts and Letters. We’ll run this to the holidays. If you like Cited, you’ll like this. So subscribe today.*** You know McKinsey and Co. They worked for a company that was fixing the price of bread in Canada.  They helped on Trump’s immigration policies, but their ideas were too extreme even for ICE. More recently, they proposed that Purdue Pharma “turbocharge” their sales of OxyContin by offering $14,810 rebates for ODs. Yeah, that’s McKinsey. We could go on and on. They have a long and sordid record as ‘capitalism’s willing executioners,’ to quote a Current Affairs article by an insider. Now, they’re coming onto our turf: higher education. So, we take a closer look. What is even is ‘management consulting,’ and is there anything to their methods? * First, in his opening essay, host Gordon Katic reminds listeners of the infamous case of General Motors and the side saddle gas tank defect of the 1970s and 80s. This story takes us to the world of cost-benefit analysis; a cold, hard logic that puts profits over people. * Next, (@8:20) Kate Jacobson is co-host of the podcast Alberta Advantage, a left-wing podcast in the heart of Canadian conservatism. She warns us that Premier Jason Kenney is using McKinsey as a pretext for his slash-and-burn approach to higher education. * Then, (@31:07) Matthew Stewart turned away from a potential career in academic philosophy to enter the world of management consulting. His tell-all book The Management Myth: Debunking the Modern Philosophy of Business takes us through his own time in consulting, and the broader intellectual history of management science—AKA the art of wringing every last ounce of labour from workers. * Finally (@53:44), Joel Westheimer is University Research Chair in Democracy and Education at the University of Ottawa. His work asks the basic, core question “what is education for?” He thinks McKinsey does not know how to measure what really counts about education—because ‘not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts.’ —————————-SUPPORT THE SHOW—————————- We need your support. If you like what you hear, chip in. You can find us on patreon.com/dartsandletters. Patreon subscribers get the episode a day early, and sometimes will also receive bonus content. Don’t have the money to chip in this week? Not to fear, you can help in other ways. For one: subscribe, rate, and review our podcast. It helps other people find our work. —————————-CONTACT US————————- To stay up to date, follow us on Twitter and Facebook. If you’d like to write us, email dartsandletterspod@gmail.com or tweet Gordon directly. —————————-CREDITS—————————- This week, Darts and Letters was produced by Jay Cockburn. The lead research assistant on this episode was Fran...

***We’re continuing to play the first few episodes of our new show, Darts and Letters. If you like Cited, you’ll like this. So subscribe today.*** You’ve seen hilarious videos of the evangelicals for Trump. You might be inclined to ignore them, mock their excesses, or dismiss their threat. But the evangelical right is a force to be reckoned with, even with Trump on his way out. So, who are these evangelicals? What do they believe? For years, evangelicals have been plotting a political course, a far-right “theology” that includes Christian nationalism and spiritual warfare. It’s paying off. And we need to understand why it works, and for whom. This is the first in a series of episodes we’ll be releasing that examine the political philosophies of radical right-wing movements. * First (@8:16), Andre Gagne is a former evangelical, once “saved,” who turned away from the light of the Church to become a professor. He talks about what he found in the church, the power of “narrative theology,” why he left the church, and why so much of the evangelical experience is powerful – and disconcerting. * Then (@37:24), Chrissy Stroop is an author, activist, and former Christian who has gone from Jesusland to Twitterland. She shares her journey with Gordon, including her creation of #emptythepews, a hashtag that marks the stories of people leaving the church. She warns of the power of fundamentalist enclaves, powerful ecosystems that exist on their own but also reach into the world to draw entrants into them. * Finally (@1:03:21), Bradley Onishi is a pastor turned professor turned podcaster who Ben Shapiro calls “that religion professor.” He takes on the so-called intellectuals of the far right through his academic research and the podcast he co-hosts with Dan Miller, Straight White American Jesus. Onishi doing his part to keep the discourse honest, a job that is as essential as it is Sisyphean. ——————-SUPPORT THE SHOW——————- We need your support. If you like what you hear, chip in. You can find us on patreon.com/dartsandletters. Patreon subscribers get the episode a day early, and sometimes will also receive bonus content. Don’t have the money to chip in this week? Not to fear, you can help in other ways. For one: subscribe, rate, and review our podcast. It helps other people find our work. —————————-CONTACT US————————- To stay up to date, follow us on Twitter and Facebook. If you’d like to write us, email dartsandletterspod@gmail.com or tweet Gordon directly. —————————-CREDITS—————————- This week, Darts and Letters was produced by Jay Cockburn and Gordon Katic. The lead research assistant on this episode was Isabelle Lemelin, with support from David Moscrop, and consulting from Andre Gagne. Our theme song and music was created by Mike Barber, and our graphic design was created by 

***We’re continuing to play the first few episodes of our new show, Darts and Letters. If you like Cited, you’ll like this. So subscribe today. We’re now up on all the places.*** We can breathe a sigh of relief with Biden’s victory, but it ain’t time to check out and go to brunch. Because Trumpism is not going anywhere. In a razor-thin election, Trump expanded his base—despite his bungling of COVID-19. In light of that, we have to accept this plain fact: Trump is more popular than we thought, and to more people. And again, the DNC, the pollsters, and elite media establishment clearly missed the mark. So, what is Trumpism actually, and how can we defeat it? * First, in host Gordon Katic’s opening essay, he sort of defends Trump. The media’s attacks on him were all wrong, because they often missed the true dangers of Trump. Now, Trumpism is only interrupted, and little has been done to blunt its underlining appeal. * Next (@9:08), Mark Blyth is the plain-talking political economist for everyone. He has the superpower of predicting terrible things, including: the 2016 election, Brexit, and he even said of this election “Trump has a lot left in the tank.” Mark tells us that Trumpism is a dangerous tribal anger; but there’s another more productive side of anger, righteous anger. We find ways out of Trumpism in his new book, Angrynomics, co-written with Eric Lonergan. * Then (@39:13), Professor Andrea Benjamin gives us the view from local politics; she takes us from city council to the DNC, asking: how do minority voters mobilize on the ground, and what do they actually want? She tells us, the Democratic establishment better start asking those very same questions. * Finally (@55:14), Luke Savage is one of the most exciting voices in the Jacobin-left, and he breaks down the election results and what they mean for the future of the party. We also talk about the emerging left intellectual commentariat, and why it is so exciting right now. —————————-SUPPORT THE SHOW—————————- We need your support. If you like what you hear, chip in. You can find us on patreon.com/dartsandletters. Patreon subscribers get the episode a day early, and sometimes will also receive bonus content. Don’t have the money to chip in this week? Not to fear, you can help in other ways. For one: subscribe, rate, and review our podcast. It helps other people find our work. —————————-CONTACT US————————- To stay up to date, follow us on Twitter and Facebook. If you’d like to write us, email dartsandletterspod@gmail.com or tweet Gordon directly. —————————-CREDITS—————————- This week, Darts and Letters was produced by Jay Cockbu...

Introducing Darts and Letters, a show about intellectuals and the work that they do. But it’s not just for the Ivy crowd, it’s for everyone. Even people who hack darts, and people who wouldn’t be caught dead with a New Yorker tote bag. If you like Cited, you’ll like this. We’ll play the first few on the Cited feed. But, subscribe today. In this first episode, we look at populism and anti-populism. It’s one of the most intense divides in contemporary politics. You can basically describe it like this: do we like people, or do we hate them? This crosses the ideological divide– there’s an emerging bi-partisan consensus that the people just suck. They are irredeemably stupid, racist, conspiratorial, reactionaries who can’t be saved. But we disagree. * First, host Gordon Katic asks: what is an intellectual? Hard to say, but to quote the Supreme Court justice who tried to define pornography, “I know it when I see it.” * Next (@10:48), we meet Daniel—the homeless bookseller of Bloor St, who might just be one of the most well-read people you’ve ever met. * Then (@21:26), journalist and historian Thomas Frank rights the distorted historical record and redefines “populism.” We discuss his most recent book “The People, No: A Brief History of Anti-Populism.” * Finally (@47:32), critical educational scholar and dissident Henry Giroux celebrates academics who are true ‘public intellectuals,’ and he attacks the neoliberal educational reforms that have made that kind of work so difficult. —————————-SUPPORT THE SHOW—————————- We need your support. If you like what you hear, chip in. You can find us on patreon.com/dartsandletters. Don’t have the money to chip in this week? Not to fear, you can help in other ways. For one: subscribe, rate, and review our podcast. It helps other people find our work. —————————-CONTACT US————————- To stay up to date, follow us on Twitter and Facebook. If you’d like to write us, email dartsandletterspod@gmail.com or tweet Gordon directly. —————————-CREDITS—————————- This week, Darts and Letters was produced by Jay Cockburn and Gordon Katic. Research and support from Addye Susnick. This episode received support by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research,  which provided us a research grant to look at the concept of “public intellectualism.” Professor Allen Sens at the University of British Columbia is the lead academic advisor. This show is produced by Cited Media, which makes other great shows like Cited Podcast and Crackdown. Darts and Letters is produced in Toronto, which is on the traditional land of Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishnabeg, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee and the Wendat Peoples. It is also produced in Vancouver, BC, which is on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh Nations.

Hanford is the most-polluted place in America. On our last episode, you heard about the nuclear plant’s largely-forgotten history–how it poisoned the people living downwind. On our season finale: a nuclear safety auditor tries to get it shut down, the downwinders struggle for justice, and we take you into the plant itself. The story of Hanford reveals that expertise is always a political battle, and never as straightforward as simply collecting facts–whether it’s executives putting profit over a safety auditor’s well-documented warnings, a community-based research pitted against government-backed studies, or turning a world-changing nuclear reactor into a dull scientific lecture. ———-MORE———- You can also find related articles on our website, citedpodcast.com. Including articles by our research assistant, Nicole Yakashiro, including: a detailed Hanford timeline, as well as the colonial history of the Hanford site. Plus, a transcript. ———-PROGRAMMING NOTE———- Sadly, this is the last episode of our season! We’ll be back in Spring 2021, but we’ll be launching a new show in the meantime. You’ll find the first few episodes in this feed, so stay subscribed. The best way to stay abreast of our plans for our new season is to follow us on Twitter and Facebook. You’ll hear about it there first. Plus, while you’re waiting, you might want to check out some of the other stuff that our team makes. Like Crackdown, a podcast about the drug war, covered by drug users as war correspondents. ———-FEEDBACK——— How did you like the season? Which was your favourite episode, which was your least favourite episode? What should we do next? Let us know! Email your feedback to info@citedmedia.ca–we might just read it on the show. ———-CREDITS——— This episode was produced Gordon Katic and Polly Leger. With editing support from Acey Rowe. Nicole Yakashiro was our research assistant, and Aurora Tejeida was our fact-checker. Our theme song and original music is by our composer, Mike Barber. Dakota Koop is our graphic designer. Our production manager is David Tobiasz, and executive producers are Gordon Katic and Sam Fenn. We’d like to thank historian Sarah Fox author of “Downwind: A People’s History of the Nuclear West,” as well as Kate Brown, author of “Plutopia: Nuclear Families, Atomic Cities, and the Great Soviet and American Plutonium Disasters.

Richland, Washington is a company town that sprang up almost overnight in the desert of South Eastern Washington. Its employer is the federal government, and its product is plutonium. The Hanford nuclear site was one of the Manhattan Project sites, and it made the plutonium for the bomb that devastated Nagasaki. Here, the official history is one of scientific achievement, comfortable houses, and good-paying jobs. But it doesn’t include the story of what happened after the bomb was dropped — neither in Japan, nor right there in Washington State. On part one of our two-part season finale, we tell the largely-forgotten story of the most toxic place in America. ———-MORE———- You can also find related articles on our website, citedpodcast.com. Including articles by our research assistant, Nicole Yakashiro, including: a detailed Hanford timeline, as well as the colonial history of the Hanford site. Plus, a transcript. ———-PROGRAMMING NOTE———- Yes, Cited has an album. Our brilliant composer Mike Barber put it together, and you can find it on his website and on Bandcamp. Check it out. Plus, we have branded mugs. And we’re doing a very simple giveaway. Write a review of Cited on Stitcher or Apple Podcasts, and then email me us a photo to info@citedmedia.ca. We’ll randomly pick three of the people who email, and send you a free mug. ———-FOLLOW CITED——— To keep up with Cited, Secondary Symptoms, and our upcoming show: follow us on Twitter and Facebook. Tweet at us, or email your feedback to info@citedmedia.ca–we might just read it on the show. ———-CREDITS———- This episode was produced Gordon Katic and Polly Leger. With editing support from Acey Rowe. Nicole Yakashiro was our research assistant, and Aurora Tejeida was our fact-checker. Our theme song and original music is by our composer, Mike Barber. Dakota Koop is our graphic designer. Our production manager is David Tobiasz, and executive producers are Gordon Katic and Sam Fenn. We’d like to thank historians Sarah Fox, author of “Downwind: A People’s History of the Nuclear West,” as well as Kate Brown, author of “Plutopia: Nuclear Families, Atomic Cities, and the Great Soviet and American Plutonium Disasters.” Check those out,

The phrase “return to normalcy” has been thrown around a lot lately. It’s actually a phrase that was popularized in 1920, in the wake of the WW1 and the Spanish Flu. But, as with the Spanish Flu, “returning to normalcy” means forgetting the conditions that brought us COVID-19, and perhaps even forgetting COVID-19 itself. On this last episode of Secondary Symptoms, we focus on the politics of pandemic memory. We’re still in the thick of it, but many already seem like they want us to forget; yet, we will never forget. Gordon Katic talks to Andrew Stoeten (11:00), baseball writer at the Athletic and co-host of the Birds all Day podcast, about baseball’s dubious return plans. MLB’s commissioner claims the game will help us “return to normalcy,” but — with piped-in crowd noise and cardboard cut-out fans — there is nothing normal about these games. Next, historian Nancy Bristow (23:07) talks about her book, American Pandemic: The Lost Worlds of the 1918 Influence Epidemic. She explains why officials wanted the public to forget the epidemic, even while it was still happening. However, Nancy also argues that regular people simply couldn’t forget. In that spirit, we ask a number of folks one simple question: what will you remember about COVID-19? Finally, even though there are no memorials to the Spanish Flu, it is memorialized in one place: the blues. To close out the show, Mike Rugel (56:33) from the podcast Uncensored History of the Blues, plays us a few classic songs of pandemics and disease. ———-MORE———- UPDATE: Since speaking with Andrew Stoeten, MLB’s Miami Marlins have suffered a coronavirus outbreak. A number of games have been postponed, and many are wondering if the season may already be in jeopardy—less than one week after beginning. To read more about Harding’s “return to normalcy,” check out the article by historian William Deverell in the Smithsonian Magazine.   Also, check out our Spotify Playlist to hear the songs in full. They were: Jesus is Coming Soon, by Blind Willie Johnson; Memphis Flu, by Elder Curry; the 1919 Influenza Blues, by Essie Jenkins; Dyin’ Flu, by Albert Collins; and Don’t Let the Corona Get on Ya, by Deacon Otis Wicknine. ———-PROGRAMING NOTE———- This is the last episode of Secondary Symptoms. Don’t fear, though; we’ll be bringing it back as a new, standalone show. The new show will be here in a month or two, and you’ll see the first few episodes in this feed.   To keep up with Cited, Secondary Symptoms, and our upcoming show: follow us on Twitter and Facebook. Tweet at us, or email your feedback to info@citedmedia.ca–we might just read it on the show. ———-CREDITS———- This episode was produced by Jay Cockburn and

At Crosstown Clinic, doctors are turning addiction treatment on its head: they’re prescribing heroin-users the very drug they’re addicted to. This is the story of one clinic’s quest to remove the harms of addiction, without removing the addiction itself. ———-PROGRAMMING NOTE———- This is one of the best episodes in our archive. It was broadcast March 9th, 2017, and was honoured with a 2017 Jack Webster Foundation award for excellence in feature reporting in radio. The Jack Webster Awards are BC’s most prestigious journalism awards. Our next original documentary will be out next week. The Heroin Clinic was made in partnership with the Vancouver newspaper The Georgia Straight and the podcast Life of the Law. Check out the companion piece we produced with Travis here. ———-MORE———- If you want to hear more stories about the drug war, check out our other podcast Crackdown. Recently, Crackdown produced an episode commemorating longtime Vancouver drug user activist, Dave Murrary. Dave is pretty much the only reason this heroin clinic ever took off, and his story is chronicled in more detail on Crackdown. ———-FOLLOW CITED———- To keep up with Cited, follow us on Twitter and Facebook. Tweet at us, or email your feedback to info@citedmedia.ca–we might just read it on the show.  ———-CREDITS———- This radio documentary was produced by Gordon Katic, Sam Fenn, Alex Kim, and Travis Lupick. With editing from Nancy Mulane. We’d like to thank Life of the Law for their editorial support, Dan Reist for academic mentorship, Josh GD for editorial input, as well as Lauryn Rohde and Jenn Luu for research and marketing help. Dakota Koop is our graphic designer. Our production manager is David Tobiasz, and executive producers are Gordon Katic and Sam Fenn. Cited is produced out of the Centre of Ethics at the University of Toronto, which is on the traditional land of Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishnabeg, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee and the Wendat Peoples. Cited is also produced out of the Michael Smith Laboratories at the University of British Columbia — that’s on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh Nations.

Our whirlwind tour of the pharmaceutical industry ends this week. We’ve shown you the dysfunction, now we look for a better way. For some reason, the political vision is so curtailed here. Where is the manifesto for a new system? Even on the Bernie wing of the left, much of the focus is on negotiating better prices and importing pharmaceuticals from other countries. Today, we look at ways we can fundamentally change the industry, and medicine itself.  On this episode of Secondary Symptoms, Gordon Katic interviews economist Dean Baker on his simple idea for how to overhaul the dysfunctional pharmaceutical industry: change the patent system. Then, Jayasree K. Iyer of the Access to Medicine Foundation reminds us that other viral infections — HIV, tuberculosis, and malaria — will surge because of COVID-related disruptions. Finally, we end with Cambridge philosopher Jacob Stegenga. His polemical book Medical Nihilism speaks to the limits of medicine. Perhaps the simple but more overlooked interventions — access to good food, clean air, healthy neighbourhoods —  may offer more than the elusive ‘magic bullets’ of medicine.   ———-MORE———- This episode is meant to accompany a wider series that we are doing this season about COVID-19 and the pharmaceutical industry. If you are interested in this episode of Secondary Symptoms, you would certainly be interested in a recent Cited documentary: the Tamiflu Trials. You can find it in this feed.  You can also find related articles on our website, citedpodcast.com. Including articles by our research assistant, Franklynn Bartol, on topics like: industry funding of patient advocacy groups, the meaning (and limitations) of ‘evidence-based medicine,’ and the broader research literature on industry funding and why it’s a problem.  ———-FOLLOW CITED———- To keep up with Cited, follow us on Twitter and Facebook. Tweet at us, or email your feedback to info@citedmedia.ca–we might just read it on the show.  ———-CREDITS———- This episode was produced by Jay Cockburn and Gordon Katic. Franklynn Bartol was our research assistant. Our theme song and original music is by our composer, Mike Barber. Dakota Koop is our graphic designer. Our production manager is David Tobiasz, and executive producers are Gordon Katic and Sam Fenn

On a daily basis, we are exposed to thousands of toxic chemicals. This is no accident; it is by design. They are everywhere – coating our consumer products, in our food packaging, being dumped into our lakes and sewers, and in countless other places. However, for the most part, regulators say that we need not worry. That assessment is based on a simple 500-year-old adage, “the dose makes the poison.” The logic is simple: anything is poisonous, depending on how large a dose.  Dosing yourself with a minuscule amount of lead will cause no harm; while drinking an enormous amount of water will kill you. Regulators then try to find safe exposure levels for these chemicals—and they assume a simple, direct relationship (less is fine, more is worse). So, no matter how toxic the chemical, you only need to worry if it passes a certain exposure threshold. However, what if their approach is all wrong? A revolutionary group of scientists are challenging this 500-year-old paradigm. They argue that some chemicals behave in erratic and unpredictable ways, and they can mess with us even at minuscule doses. If they’re right, then the chemicals around us are causing irreparable harm, and everything must change. We sort out this battle of paradigms through the lens of one of their most-hated chemicals, BPA. ———-MORE———- You can also find related articles on our website, citedpodcast.com. Including articles by our research assistant, Franklynn Bartol, including: a detailed overview of the two paradigms, the low-down on CLARITY-BPA, and a description of how policies are changing in the EU. Plus, a transcript. ———-FOLLOW CITED———- To keep up with Cited, follow us on Twitter and Facebook. Plus, send us your feedback to info@citedmedia.ca. ———-CREDITS———- This episode was produced by Irina Zhorov. Editing from Acey Rowe and Gordon Katic. Franklynn Bartol was our research assistant, with fact checking from Polly Leger. Our theme song and original music is by our composer, Mike Barber. Dakota Koop is our graphic designer. Our production manager is David Tobiasz, and executive producers are Gordon Katic and Sam Fenn. Special thanks to the scientists who helped us understand this story, including: Laura Vandenberg, Daniel Dietrich, Rich Giovane and Savannah Johnson. This episode was funded in part by the Social Science and Humanities Research Council. It’s part of a larger project that examines the roles of values in science, lead by Professor Gunilla Oberg at the University of British Columbia. Professor Oberg also provided research guidance to the project, though this episode does not necessarily reflect the view of Professor Oberg or her project

There’s another coronavirus. This one, causing horrific swelling in cats, even killing them. Gilead Pharmacueticals might have a drug that can cure this feline coronavirus.  Yet, they’re not sharing that drug, possibly because they’re scared it might harm their chances with another drug: Remdesivir. You may have heard of it; it’s the supposed ‘gold standard’ of care for COVID-19. The story of Remdesivir (and of the black market cat drug sibling) reveals how pharmaceutical companies do their research, and the lengths they go to protect their profits. On this episode of Secondary Symptoms, Gordon interviews Atlantic writer Sarah Zhang about her article on the strange story of feline coronavirus and its possible black market cure, GS-441524. Then, investigative journalist Sharon Lerner of the Intercept tells us about her reporting on GS-441524’s sibling, Remdesivir–no black market necessary. Also on the program, Shannon Brownlee of the Lown Institute, on how to make sense of drug research during the COVID-19 pandemic. Finally, Professor Sergio Sismondo talks about his book Ghost-Managed Medicine, which pulls back the curtain on medical ghostwriting and the other invisible ways that the industry shapes pharmaceutical knowledge. ———-MORE———- This episode is meant to accompany a wider series that we are doing this season about COVID-19 and the pharmaceutical industry. If you are interested in this episode of Secondary Symptoms, you would certainly be interested in a recent Cited documentary: the Tamiflu Trials. You can find it in this feed.  You can also find related articles on our website, citedpodcast.com. Including articles by our research assistant, Franklynn Bartol, on topics like: industry funding of patient advocacy groups, the meaning (and limitations) of ‘evidence-based medicine,’ and the broader research literature on industry funding and why it’s a problem.  ———-FOLLOW CITED———- To keep up with Cited, follow us on Twitter and Facebook. Tweet at us, or email your feedback to info@citedmedia.ca–we might just read it on the show. ———-CREDITS———- This episode was produced by Jay Cockburn and Gordon Katic. Franklynn Bartol was our research assistant. Our theme song and original music is by our composer, Mike Barber. Dakota Koop is our graphic designer. Our production manager is David Tobiasz, and executive producers are

Medical experts are rushing to see which drugs might help treat COVID-19. There are dozens of candidates: Remdesivir, Hydroxycloroquin, Actemra, Kevzara, Favipiravir, the list goes on. They better pick the right one; because billions of dollars of public money is at stake, not to mention 100s of thousands — if not millions — of lives.  We don’t know what will happen with COVID-19 drug research. But the story of past pandemics might give us a clue. To prepare for Swine Flu and Bird Flu, governments spent billions stockpiling a drug called Tamiflu. You’d think governments used the best evidence-based advice, but the story of Tamiflu raises questions about how money shaped the process.   On this episode, we open up the black box of pharmaceutical and public health expertise. We tell the story of a drug, from its days as middling flu treatment through its meteoric rise to international blockbuster.  How do experts decide what makes a good drug, and how do pharmaceutical companies make billions from pandemic panic? ———-MORE———- This episode has loads more information, citations, and resources. You can also find related articles on our website, citedpodcast.com. Including articles by our research assistant, Franklynn Bartol, on topics like: industry funding of patient advocacy groups, the meaning (and limitations) of ‘evidence-based medicine,’ and the broader research literature on industry funding and why it’s a problem.  ———-CORRECTION———- An earlier version of this podcast said that drug companies now must publish all their trial data before a drug goes to market. In fact, the FDA requires that the companies must register their trial data on a government website, ClinicalTrials.gov. This excludes non-randomized observational trials and a few other earlier, prospective studies. The script was changed to reflect that correction. ———-FOLLOW CITED———- To keep up with Cited, follow us on Twitter and Facebook. Plus, send us your feedback to info@citedmedia.ca–we might just read it on the show. We’re also doing a mug giveaway this episode. If you’d like one (for free), please do us a favour: tell one of your friends about Cited. Email or text them and send me a screengrab. We’ll randomly pick three of the people who email me, and you’ll get a free Cited mug. ———-CREDITS———- This episode was produced by Audrey Quinn and Gordon Katic. Editing from Acey Rowe and Gordon Katic. Franklynn Bartol was our research assistant, with fact checking from Aurora Tejeida and Polly Leger. Dr. Joel Lexchin and Professor Sergio Sismondo provided research guidance. Our theme song and original music is by our composer, Mike Barber. Dakota Koop is our graphic designer. Our production manager is David Tobiasz, and executive producers are