The Undiversity of Clinical Trials and Anti-Islam Groups

Here’s what I’ve been covering in the world of data at FiveThirtyEight this week:

A Few People Lead Many Of The Anti-Muslim Groups In The U.S.

[T]he simple count of anti-Islam groups can be deceptive. Growth in anti-Muslim groups seems to be driven as much by a few key leaders founding multiple organizations as by new people forming independent groups.

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Geller and Spencer are, between the two of them, the leaders of 17 percent (four of 24) of all the anti-Muslim groups that the SPLC tracks. Mark Potok, a senior fellow at the SPLC, explained that his organization lists each group separately because the groups may engage in different patterns of activity.

Read more at FiveThirtyEight…

Racial And Ethnic Gaps Remain A Big Question in Medicine

[E]ven when Hispanics make it to the doctor’s office to seek treatment, they may run into another problem. The medicines that they need were rarely tested on people like them. Some medicines act differently or are appropriate at different doses for particular demographic groups, so being left out of trials can prevent these benefits and side effects from being noticed. As of 2011, Hispanics were 16 percent of the U.S. population but only comprised 1 percent of clinical trial participants. African-Americans are also underrepresented, comprising only 5 percent of the clinical trial participants even though they are 12 percent of the population.

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Under-representation in clinical trials doesn’t just cause patients to miss out on benefits, it sometimes produces direct harm.  The FDA had to revise its recommended Ambien dose in 2013, because the old dose worked fine for men, but was too much for most women because they metabolized it differently.  The FDA came up with a new women’s dose that was half the previous recommendation.

Read more at FiveThirtyEight…