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June 28, 2011 01:14 pm PDT

What not to do in a public health slideshow presentation

I'm normally all for humor in science communication, but this has me a little bothered. Mother Jones has a story up about a neurological disorder that affected several line workers at a Hormel factory in Minnesota. That story's focus is on the connection between the waning power of unions, increasingly bad conditions for workers, and the way the people who developed this disorder have been treated by Hormel. And the disorder itself is pretty depressing, even without all of that. Known as PIN, Progressive Inflammatory Neuropathy, the disorder has been linked to slaughterhouse workers inhaling particles of pig brain material. When their bodies launch an immune system attack against that material, they end up attacking their own nerve cells as well as the pigs'. Victims end up experiencing everything from numbness and pain to temporary paralysis. PIN doesn't kill people. And in most cases, the symptoms improve over time, after the person stops being exposed to atomized pig brains. But, as the Mother Jones piece makes clear, this disorder has had a large, negative impact on the lives and livelihoods of the people who contracted it. Which is why I have a hard time understanding the logic behind the image above, which is the last slide from a Minnesota Department of Health presentation on PIN. Given the context, this odd attempt at levity looks pretty damned insensitive, at best....


Original Link: http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/M1cewjo2Ts0/what-not-to-do-in-a.html

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