Dana Howard
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thedanahoward.bsky.social
Dana Howard
@thedanahoward.bsky.social

Assistant Professor | Bioethics and Philosophy. Views are my own and not that of my employer.

Professional website: https://sites.google.com/site/danasarahhoward/

Art 30%
Public Health 22%

On why we need an inclusive populism that celebrates difference: “right-wing populists see political equality as requiring homogeneity... elites aren’t like us and so they have no right to rule, while others who are different and inferior don’t deserve to have a voice at all.”
New post from me for @kettering.org's "From Many, We" blog on inclusive populism and how to oppose Trump's unconstitutional actions without defending our broken political institutions. Trying to be a more authentic populist won't work; we need a different vision of the people. Please read and share!
Inclusive Populism: How to Defend Democracy Without Defending Broken Institutions
If populism stands broadly for a politics that speaks for the people against elites, perhaps another kind of populism is needed to help the pro-democracy opposition contest Trump’s claim that he speak...
kettering.org

Reposted by Dana Howard

@rikiwilchins.bsky.social 2026 Feb 12 Advocate:
IN Bureau of Motor Vehicles quietly sneaks in ban on changing gender markers on state ID with new notice to website saying it no longer accepts court orders OR medical documentation recognizing trans people's genders.
Indiana quietly bans trans residents from changing gender markers on IDs
Indiana will no longer accept court orders or medical documentations recognizing transgender residents' gender changes.
www.advocate.com

Yes! “The U.S. government is knowingly releasing poison gas into the homes of its own citizens… The chemicals bind to walls, carpets, clothing, furniture and even children’s toys, they say, creating a toxic environment.” Public health lawsuit.

Reposted by Dana Howard

For Months, Tear Gas Has Entered Their Homes. Now They’re Suing ICE. www.nytimes.com/2026/02/11/c...
For Months, Tear Gas Has Entered Their Homes. Now They’re Suing ICE.
www.nytimes.com

This coming the same day the house (all Republicans + Henry Cueller) passed an election bill that would pose barriers for millions of American women and others who have changed their legal names because of marriage, assimilation or to better align with their gender identity.
Fuentes, yesterday: “Our #1 political enemy is women because women constrain everything, every conversation, every man, everything. They have to be imprisoned. They are the ones that are hurting the fertility rate. They're the ones making us sympathetic to poor people, which are also brown people.”
Nick Fuentes: “The number one political enemy in America is women. … They have to be imprisoned.”
www.mediamatters.org

Reposted by Dana Howard

New post from me for @kettering.org's "From Many, We" blog on inclusive populism and how to oppose Trump's unconstitutional actions without defending our broken political institutions. Trying to be a more authentic populist won't work; we need a different vision of the people. Please read and share!
Inclusive Populism: How to Defend Democracy Without Defending Broken Institutions
If populism stands broadly for a politics that speaks for the people against elites, perhaps another kind of populism is needed to help the pro-democracy opposition contest Trump’s claim that he speak...
kettering.org
Fuentes, yesterday: “Our #1 political enemy is women because women constrain everything, every conversation, every man, everything. They have to be imprisoned. They are the ones that are hurting the fertility rate. They're the ones making us sympathetic to poor people, which are also brown people.”
Nick Fuentes: “The number one political enemy in America is women. … They have to be imprisoned.”
www.mediamatters.org
More than 400 people, including hundreds of citizens, were “sorted” at gun point into racial and ethnic groups by 200 ICE agents who fired flash-bang grenades into cars with people inside, pointed guns at children & demanded their zip tied parents not comfort them. apple.news/Ausdx6kWtT0e...
Idaho families sue over immigration raid that swept up hundreds, including U.S. citizens — NBC News
About 400 people, including children and U.S. citizens, were detained for four hours while they were denied food and water in the raid, according to the lawsuit.
apple.news
Breaking: House passes new version of SAVE Act, worst voter suppression bill considered by Congress. Could disenfranchise:

-21 million Americans w/out access to citizenship papers
-69 mil married women who took partner’s name
-21 mil w/out valid drivers license

www.motherjones.com/politics/202...
The GOP’s “show us your papers” bill Is the latest effort to help Trump take over elections
“If the SAVE Act were to pass, it would be the worst voter suppression law that Congress has ever enacted"
www.motherjones.com
“…this assault — and the embarrassing actions around it — make it clear these centers aren’t really about encouraging civil discourse and intellectual diversity. @osuaaup.bsky.social is in favor of free speech for everyone on campus, not just for the ideas that politicians want to promote."
Ohio State professor on leave after tackling cameraman filming Gordon Gee
An Ohio State University professor was suspended after tackling a cameraman attempting to film former university president E. Gordon Gee.
www.dispatch.com
Another instance of a center director acting unilaterally to overrule other staff (which here also involved ignoring FDA's previous statements to the company).

As @reshmagar.bsky.social and I have argued, the bar should be much higher for such unilateral action:
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Reposted by Dana Howard

Government Shocks Nation With Good Decision
Ireland’s basic income for the arts scheme becomes permanent
When piloted, initiative that provided €325 a week to eligible artists recouped more than its net cost, study shows
www.theguardian.com
NEW: The F.D.A. refused to accept an application from Moderna for its mRNA flu vaccine.

Its reason: The agency did not think Moderna compared the new vaccine to one of the best flu shots available. The company spent $750M+ on a 41,000 person study.

www.nytimes.com/2026/02/10/h...
F.D.A. Refuses to Review Moderna Flu Vaccine
www.nytimes.com

Reposted by Dana Howard

“Isn’t it very dangerous [to remove] the recommendations for certain infant vaccines… What, I wondered, are the consequences of under-vaccinating millions of babies in a country where working parents have no other choice but to put their literal newborns in a room full of other babies all day?”
The new childhood vaccine guidelines have a paid leave problem
Norway, Denmark, and other countries with fewer childhood vaccines have another thing in common: paid parental leave.
www.statnews.com
NEW: The AMA and a leading public health research group focused on vaccines are teaming up to create a parallel system to review vaccine safety and effectiveness. 
The CDC’s vaccine review process has “effectively collapsed” under RFKJr. My story.
www.washingtonpost.com/health/2026/...
AMA joins effort to launch vaccine science review amid CDC turmoil
The American Medical Association and a partner group are taking on a new role in reviewing vaccine safety and effectiveness as the CDC’s review process faces criticism.
www.washingtonpost.com

Reposted by Dana Howard

"Despite all the hype, AI just isn’t ready to take on the role of the physician. Patients need to be aware that asking a large language model about their symptoms can be dangerous, can give wrong diagnoses and can fail to recognize when urgent help is needed."
www.ctvnews.ca/health/artic...
AI chatbots give bad health advice, research finds
Despite now being able to ace most medical licensing exams, artificial intelligence chatbots do not give humans better health advice than they can find using more traditional methods, according to a s...
www.ctvnews.ca

So AI-enabled devices needn‘t be tested on patients to show improvements and the teams working at the FDA to test out new AI-enabled devices were decimated due to DOGE cuts.

The Reuters article is worth a read. It highlights how rules related to FDA approval for medical devices don’t require to be tested on patients (as they do for new drugs). Rather most AI-enabled devices satisfy FDA rules by citing previously authorized devices that had no AI-related capabilities.

“60 FDA-authorized medical devices using AI were linked to 182 product recalls… 43% of the recalls occurred less than a year after the devices were greenlighted. That’s about twice the recall rate of all devices authorized under similar FDA rules.”findings form: jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...

so excited for the panel happening today: “CARE Panel: Working with What’s Missing: Ethical Strategies for Incomplete Data” where we will tackle ethical approaches to missing and disappearing datasets. Join us! registration is open to the public: cehv.osu.edu/events/care-...
CARE Panel: Working with What’s Missing: Ethical Strategies for Incomplete Data
cehv.osu.edu
🌐I’m delighted to join @jocalynclark.bsky.social and the team @bmj.com as a guest editor of a new series on Global Health Geopolitics!

The call for papers is now published:
www.bmj.com/content/392/...

Please do submit Commentaries (800 words) or Analysis pieces (2,000 words)

1/n
Geopolitics of global health: a call for papers
External factors are forcing change to the global health architecture, demanding creative reform amid an uncertain future If 2025 marked the dismantling of the global health architecture, then 2026 m...
www.bmj.com

Fuck.
6/ “When I arrived every night I cried and now I don’t sleep well, I felt that being here was my fault and I only wanted to be on vacation like a normal family.”

9-year-old Maria Antonia Guerra Montoya, detained on her way to Disney World, spent 113+ days at Dilley.
6/ “When I arrived every night I cried and now I don’t sleep well, I felt that being here was my fault and I only wanted to be on vacation like a normal family.”

9-year-old Maria Antonia Guerra Montoya, detained on her way to Disney World, spent 113+ days at Dilley.
*Green card application in process and work permit, married to US citizen
*Lived in US for 20 years, no criminal record
*In detention for five months with no charge, despite judge approving release
*He disputes ICE claim that he signed forms agreeing to deportation
1/ ProPublica collected handwritten letters in mid-January from children held at the Dilley Immigration Processing Center, the same facility where 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos was taken.

Hundreds of kids are still detained.

We’ll let the children’s words speak for themselves. 🧵
And here is my story: ‘Absolute hell’: Irishman with valid US work permit held by Ice since September

www.irishtimes.com/world/us/202...
‘Absolute hell’: Irishman with valid US work permit held by Ice since September
Seamus Culleton has been in a detention facility in Texas for nearly five months despite having no criminal record
www.irishtimes.com

Reposted by Dana Howard

Beautiful:
Bad Bunny’s Sign Language Interpreter Will Make Super Bowl History, Too
Puerto Rican Sign Language is not the same as American Sign Language. Celimar Rivera Cosme will uniquely capture the rapper’s slang for the game’s deaf viewers.
www.nytimes.com/2026/02/08/a...
Bad Bunny’s Sign Language Interpreter Will Make Super Bowl History, Too
www.nytimes.com
NEW: A baby held in immigration detention became so sick, she had to be rushed to a hospital in severe respiratory distress.

“She was at the brink of dying,” a lawyer told me.

But the girl didn’t go home after her 10-day hospital stay; instead, ICE put her and her mother back in lock up at Dilley.
Toddler hospitalized with respiratory failure was returned to ICE detention without prescribed medication, lawsuit says
The 18-month-old was sent back to a South Texas facility after days in intensive care with severe respiratory distress, according to a federal lawsuit.
www.nbcnews.com

Reposted by Dana Howard

The NYTs comment section for our feature yesterday got so heated, they shut it down immediately. However, people want to donate to #IDSov. Here’s ours: www.bonfire.com/store/native... donorbox.org/help-to-empo... www.bonfire.com/store/native... Here’s the movement’s indigenousdata.org nativegov.org
Native BioData Consortium | Official Merchandise | Bonfire
Check out Native BioData Consortium on Bonfire and shop official merchandise today! Featuring limited edition custom apparel, printed with care in the USA just for you.
www.bonfire.com