Caught in the headlights

This is ridiculous.

An abstract I submitted to a conference has been accepted. Great.

I recently submitted revisions to a manuscript on the same research to a journal. The decision is pending. Great. Odds are good, but maybe they'll ask for more revisions?

The association sponsoring the conference wants to publicize my research: press conference, press release, stock footage for media, etc. Great.(!)

BUT, the journal has a press embargo. If it's accepted it's embargoed until it appears in print. If accepted today it could be till next spring. In which case, at the meeting, which is this winter, I will not be able to discuss my results. Only my methods and background and who really cares about that?!

I have an interview tomorrow with a journalist who is putting the press release together.

I have taken the initiative of trying to figure this out, to show that I am trying to be responsible. Dealing with university press people, journal press people, association press people. But holycrap, it's a mess.

After a lot of back and forth here's what it looks like I'll do. Do interviews. Suddenly get article accepted. (Normally this is a good thing!) No longer present at conference. Piss off conference association. Try to retract what I have said from the press release, if possible and not yet released, and attempt to just talk about my methods in any revised press release.

Press embargoes are really ridiculous. Seriously people? It's still my ideas and my work. Well, I guess it's not once I sign a copyright agreement but I haven't yet! But the journal says it's theirs from the moment of acceptance.

I don't think I'll ever submit a manuscript so close to the time of a conference again. Clearly, manuscripts take precedence here but press would be nice. What a weird pickle I'm in!

The Public's Health

I have been following Sandy Szwarc's blog, Junkfood Science lately.

In a nutshell, Szwarc critically reviews recent medical and public health research and legislation, and media coverage of health, with a particular emphasis on anything relating to food, nutrition, physical activity, and obesity. As near as I can tell, she is pretty critical of any study or policies attempting to prevent, treat, or quantify the impact of fatness, or any health conditions relating to being fat. Sometimes she's critical in ways I agree with (for example, I think she's right when she repeatedly claims that a lot of public health policies are unsupported by solid evidence). Sometimes I disagree (for example, when she claims there is no credible evidence linking food intake to incidence of type II diabetes.)


She has a major axe to grind about "lifestyle medicine." I do too, actually. Just for very different reasons. Overall, I find her underlying theories (unspoken but obvious) to be too reactionary and well, atomistic. My philosophy about health centers on the social-ecological foundation of health, social determinants of health, and constrained choice...in a nutshell. And it drives me *NUTZ* to read Szwarc's reactionary rants that 1) claims the medical, media, and political industries are fabricating evidence; 2) all health outcomes are the direct result of genetics; 3) hails the randomized controlled trial as the final word regarding scientific evidence; and 4)fancies itself to be the end-all-be-all of renegade smoking-gun/myth-busting truth-busting information on health.

If I was motivated, which I am not, I think it would be a fun challenge to provide another perspective on her posts. Instead, I think I'll just rant about it in a non-productive way and leave you all with this!