It's been a while.... Happy Fourth!

Like that song from the early aughts

"it's been a while
Since I could hold my head up high
And it's been a while
Since I first saw you"

(Staind) 

It's been on my mind since the inauguration of the 47th President and all the changes. I've missed the writing. Well, that's not entirely true. While I've missed the writing here, I have written things outside of here. However, I miss the discourse, the academic conversation, the idea that we did listen to experts and like science. 

As a trained infectious diseases PhD, who works in science and think that clinical trials and scientific discourse will save the lives of people and/or give better quality of life - the last couple of months have been ..... let's say disheartening.

During the weekend of the Fourth of July celebrations - The Birth of USA and the celebration of this (once) great nation - I found the wine that gave me some hope at the back of the bottle. (I'm a simple person, it doesn't take much.)

Let's see if I start posting in this ancient way more regularity. I think it would be helpful. For my peace of mind if nothing else.

the listening to what others think we should do, the academic conversation about the philosophical and moral quanderies that are about it in world. Or, very simply said - I miss the science conversation in the public. Before the lack ofvaccine 

Safe back to school? as a swede and microbiologist in USA

There's a few times more that others when I get more attention. I remember the last pandemic - swine flu 2008 - when a bunch of friends (and not so close friends) from high school and uni contacted me to ask "should we give our kids the new vaccine?". My answer, starting with a disclaimer asking what their pediatrician said and why/if they trusted the MD whom they went to consult about their children with, was that I am pro-vaccines in general - against virus especially - and that I would take the swine flu vaccine when it was offered since I deemed it safe.*

In general, that's what I do; I defer to the experts and then I offer my point of view and what I will do and what I recommend my family to do. All in the same idea as the saying when I was a child "do as I do, not only what I say".

So, last week was a flutter of emails, texts and phone calls from a number of coworkers and friends asking "what do you think about going back to school? Is it safe? In Sweden they had school all through spring!".

I think the answer requires a multipoint explanation. I had a twitter thread the other day where I worked through some of the key points. (That thread started with a reaction of how some data is presenting as comparison between days and that there is no thought on having consistency between groups when comparing them. I'll write a separate post of stats, need to be consistent and attention to detail.)

Anyway, the thread can be found here


The relevant tweets for my this blog post start with number 5. It has to do with statistics ( percentage, likelihood, distribution) and then actual numbers.
In short, a lot of epidemiology concerns population based research, trends and breaking down distribution in larger cohorts. It doesn't really say much about one singular case. It is about distribution and likelihood, percentages and other general numbers that for many people is hard to understand when drawn to a single case.

I mean some of this is almost like explaining the likelihood of winning the powerball... (1 in 292,201,338) which is quite ridiculous and people still play it since "there's a chance to win". Yet same people might have a hard time accepting they have a 1:2.5(41%) of getting cancer after age 60 and not worry too much about that. Let's not get into the likelihood of getting SARS-CoV-2 virus in community spread without any mitigation technique like mask or physical distancing (like sports practicing like normal, indoors in teams).

To get back to point. A lot of these questions last week were directed at me since I am a Swede. My family is in Sweden, a lot of my friends are there and I live in the USA so I have "knowledge from both worlds". In this pandemic there's been a lot of polarizing news (some true, some not) and one of them has been the constant comment about "Sweden's experiment" (let's not get caught up in the fact that the whole world are doing some kind of experiment here and there, or the "United States of America's experiment"). Two parts that have been reported pretty heavily were that Sweden didn't close their schools in the spring, and that the country didn't have a lock down.Let's start with facts:

• Sweden moved high school and universites to online only in March/April.

• Sweden kept elementary and middle schoold open the whole time before summer break.

• Sweden kept daycare open the whole time, and kept it during summer break.

• While Sweden didn't have a mandatory lock down - there is no provision in the law during peace time to do this from congress - a lot of people worked from home, didn't travel, kept children at home, didn't visit grand parents and so on. (side note; Swedes are pretty good at following so called "governmental recommendations" as well as having a relatively big amount of single households in the country -world leading)

However, it's part of this fact checking that Sweden didn't see vast community spread outside of specific suburbs of Stockholm. And that the majority of people who have died so far have been people over 70 who lived in nursing homes/elder cares. It's a tragedy in itself, and should have been prevented.

Why am I mentioning this? Well, simply because I would say that the evidence in April looking at the metrics on who was infected, hospitalized and in ICU pointed at that there was a large group of "people over 60, definitely over 70" who were mainly affected of the virus. Other groups were showing low incidences.

However, like all epidemiologists (and some microbiologists) know there is that thing of "incidence bias". In short terms; as you look, you shall find. (how you test will bias the results you look at)

How many young adults were tested in the spring? How many people were really infected? How many people who had no symptoms were tested? (I bring this up since that's another group that has been shifting in interest the longer the pandemic and data gathering have been going on.)

There is this thing with incidence and drawing conclusions. It's fairly safe to presume that if a large group ends up in hospital during an outbreak - it's a high likelihood that that group is more susceptible than the rest of the population. It is sometimes "simple things" as "the people who have eaten at one restaurant", sometimes "an overabundance of people who are older".

However, it doesn't mean that the groups that aren't found in the hospital are safe. It means that they are either safe OR the outbreak hasn't touched them in large enough numbers for them to get sick. Depending on the numbers, the distribution of sick people might change, and the numbers of sick will people will change.

These details, as well as knowing the difference between an isolated outbreak, an ongoing epidemic and a move to a raging pandemic.... that's why I listen to experts. It's complex to break down all these parameters into bite size morsels of information that people can and want to digest. It requires trust with diseases specialists who work with this everyday. And most of all, it requires an understanding that whatever the data shows in the beginning of an outbreak/pandemic will most likely change with time and amount of people getting infected and that it is crucial to stay nimble, gather more information and reanalyze the results.

Anyway, to make a long story short. Looking at the facts of infection rate and age groups in the USA today it's pretty clear that
a) there's ongoing community spread in a lot of counties (% positive of tested over 10% in a conservative view)
b) actual numbers of infected children, youth and younger age groups are going up
c) there's been fatalities in the groups "under 25", even in "under 17" - which wasn't the case in EU
d) the situation in USA today (in various counties/states or as a nation) is not comparative to the situation in Sweden in the spring
e) the situation in USA today (in various counties/states or as a nation) is not comparative to the situation in EU at the moment where countries are opening up and preparing for school

I don't feel that this complex conversation is taking place - at least not in a bigger context as "the situation in the USA right now is completely different from the EU situation". (I know, northeast are looking more like EU and keeping the numbers pretty good with their continuing partial lock down and limited openness.) I have had a lot of various emotions about this, especially since there are so many things that could be done to mitigate and stop the spread.

Alas, I ended up writing this blog post to put words to my frustration. 

The final point. There is still time to do things to stop this virus from spreading. To be inconvenienced for another time in order to mitigate the spread and give us less infected, less in hospital, less lingering effects from people who have been infected. 

Why is this so important? Because if there is something that drives me completely bonkers right now is the statement "the virus will go away someday [so we don't need to do anything extra]".

(I am sorry about the caps lock) 
THERE IS NOTHING STATING THAT THIS VIRUS WILL GO AWAY ANYMORE. 

The ONLY way we would've eradicated it would've been to quell it completely before it spread into an endemic virus. If it was a "truth" that viruses go away "after awhile" we wouldn't have as many diseases, rare and all, that pop up every so often. 

There's been documented two viruses that have "gone away"; SARS-1 and Small Pox. (First because of effective lock downs and controls, with a virus that was highly deadly. Second because of a world wide joint effort of mass vaccinations and travel bans without showing proof of vaccinations.)

We haven't even eradicated measles even though we have a vaccine since 1970 (and a better one since 1986), and it affects and kills children. Just asking a simple question; if we haven't been able to eradicate a disease that is that deadly and horrible to children - what makes you think that SARS-Cov-2 "will just go away"? There's got to be a solid plan (including distribution of a made efficacious vaccine - this is for another post)

I'll stop since this post is too long, too upset and touching on a lot of different things. Let me know in the comments if there is something I should elaborate or remove. Thanks for reading and being there. 




*there were a number of younger Swedes and Finns who got bad side effects from the swine flu vaccine. It was, over all in hindsight, impossible to have anticipated these side effects. It was about 200 children in Sweden and about 100 in Finland if I remember correctly. Out of a combined population of 13 million at the time. It's difficult to know how this part would've been discovered in the way "we" establish vaccines to be safe in this day and age. Most safety trials require relatively few, and then in the Phase III part of the trials - the more rare side effects are gathered as informational. Still though, it was a huge break in trust and it effected them in a life altering way.

PCR, serotesting, population level detection - what does this mean for me?! (covid19)

After more then three months of living in a pandemic, everyone is tired of it. It doesn't matter if it's living in a lockdown where people weren't allowed outside, or a country that sort of didn't mandated isolation for more than risks groups but every country has seen either extreme lockdown, massive death or lockdown and some death.

A few buzz words (describing mitigation techniques) have been floated during this time. I think that there are a fair amount of misunderstanding when using a lot of these words/techniques - compared to what they mean in a epidemiological setting. And since I have spent a fair amount of my time last three months discussing, explaining and listening to my friends and family telling me what limitations are involved with "testing", I would like to write a post about them (might have to be several).

First, a difference between tests. Two tests are mentioned a lot; PCR and serological (antibody). PCR test will indicate if there is RNA from the virus inside of a person.
Serological (antibody) will show if the person has developed antibodies against the virus (and therefore can not be sick again from the same virus). That is "the person has already 'seen' the virus".

Both tests have details attached to them that most people wouldn't know or care about. My primitive opinion is that people shouldn't really need know these details since FDA/EMA/country's each agency that approves test should know these details and only approve according to high standards. It might be obvious that I have an issue with how tests have been approved since I made this sentence in italics.

To evaluate biological tests for diagnostics there are three things to remember (there are a lot of others but these three are fundamental for how to view the test accuracy and validity - big words to say "does the test work well"):

• Sensitivity (how likely is a negative test to be really negative)
• Specificity (does the test detect the right thing that it's looking for)
• Limit of Detection (LOD) (related to sensitivity however slightly different and especially when talking about a whole chain of things together)

Before I go through these parameters, let's throw in another caveat with tests in general - especially since it goes hand in glove with these three fundaments. A test result should for all intent and purposes be seen as a probability and not a certainty. The golden and easy example for everyone to talk about is pregnancy tests. Those are, even if they are really really good, still a question of probability and certainty. The easy thing - the great thing - with pregnancy tests are that they measure one hormone (hCG) that only exists if the woman has a growing fetus inside. Then the test becomes only the question of "how low of a level of hCG can the test detect" (LOD). That's usually made into an equivalent of an average level of hCG at certain number of days after implantation, which is why tests have "early detecting, 5 days before period" (very low amounts of hormone can be detected) or "detection as early as first day of missed period" (a decent amount of hormone can be detected). If only all tests could be this clear cut.

With virus and PCR there is another issue that isn't much talked about outside the world of virus and microbiology. The fact that "just because RNA is detected doesn't mean that there is an infectious virus present". Dr Raciniello has described this on his blog a long time ago (here). The main take home message is "just because you find RNA, doesn't mean you find a virus particle that can infect." Further making it complicated, it will also depend where in the infection phase the person is, and what was investigated". It's been clear looking at published aggregated case studies from hospitals in regards to Sars-cov-2  virus is the likelihood of a positive test at different times in the infection within a person. The amount of virus, more specifically the amount of virus loose in the body available for detection and reinfection, varies a lot during the infection. There is a lot of virus day before symptoms show, there's evidence that 4 days after first symptoms there is more likelihood of testing positive. Combining the points (existing RNA but not active virion) seem to support the findings that 30 days after first symptoms, even if a positive PCR test, doesn't mean shedding (spreading) infectious virus. Brings back to the idea "it's a probablity, not a certainty". Also why hospitals where patients test negative on PCR but have distinctive 'glass lung' on CT are treated as covid19 positive.

(Side note for extra points; there is an assay that virologists use to evaluate virus load based on "plaque forming units" pfu which is dead cells that a virus have infected and killed, and that would give a "how many viruses who can infect exist in a sample" <- .="" p="" virions="">

All this is more than a 5 min simple read, and I apologize for even trying to cram a lot into a hopefully half-interesting blog post, I'm trying to explain why it's more complicated than "positive serotest" and "negative PCR and you're not sick" while not getting caught in the weeds.

So, back to the Sensitivity, Specificity and LOD.

When you take a PCR test - especially for an RNA virus - there is alway an overall chance/risk it will end up as a negative if you fail running the test itself. Why? Because the test is looking for a detection of something that will have to be going through at least 3 steps where the actual RNA might disappear before showing up in the test results. That's why there's always a control sample run together will all the real samples to make sure that all the steps worked out.

• Sensitivity is generally descried as how good the test is to find the true positives of what the test is looking for. That is to say, only the people who really have RNA from the virus should test positive when using the PCR test. Similar for the serotest (antibody), only people who have encountered Sars-cov-2 and developed those specific antibodies should test positive.

It also tells about the false negatives, which would the least good outcome. This since someone who tests with a PCR test, to see if they have virus and therefore might spread to other people, that comes back as negative might not keep safe distancing to people but move along closer so a false negative brings people safety when they really shouldn't have thought so.

• Specificity is generally described as how good the test is to show true negatives of what the test is saying it looks for. To simplify, if you test for sars-cov-2 RNA it's important that anyone with any old cold doesn't show up as positive (the common cold is part of the coronavirus family and share some parts of the RNA with sars-cov-2). If you don't have the virus, you are negative when testing.

There are repercussions of this part failing as well since looking at serotests (looking for presence of antibody in the blood) and if this shows antibody titers but it's the wrong type of antibody (say, from the common cold) then the test will have a low specificity.

• Limit of Detection (LOD) is the lowest concentration/level of test subject that can be detected in a sample. The reason for my addition to the list is that when it comes to certain tests, the LOD will depend on a number of different processes than "just the level in the blood/saliva" as is the case for a lot of samples. Again the pregnancy test as an example, pee on a stick. The hormone is in urine. The test is designed for levels that are found in urine (side note, the blood test is more sensitive and have a lower limit of detection). There is no part of the test that requires any manipulation/handling of the urine (or blood). However for a PCR test of an RNA virus - there are a lot of details involved. First of all, there is the base level of "amount of viral RNA present in the nose swab" that has to be present to be picked up on the swab. Then there are different ways to get the RNA (virus) off the swab, extracted into liquid and being able to even "run the PCR on" (PCR=polymerase chain reaction, a mix of stuff in a little tube to amplify what is in the tube from the start). And the limitations on how big of a volume was the RNA extracted into and how little was brought on into the PCR reaction etc..... 

I'm aware I didn't do a great job on the LOD discussion if nothing else I hope that I made it clear that it is complicated and also super important. Even if you don't know how to calculate this step - it should be super clear in the FDA approval process since the LOD will determine the limits of the usefulness of the test. 

All three of these parameters will decide if the test is useful. It will further determine if the test is useful on an individual or population view. Why this difference? Because of statistics. If the test is only to be roughly an estimate on where the population - a higher lever of uncertainty (higher possible wrong results) are more acceptable since stats work that many tests together with a fairly high certainty turns into an ok stats.

The same test can have a detrimental effect on an individual basis. As previously stated, imagine going for a PCR test to determine you don't have the virus before going to visit your grandmother. You get a false negative (you think it is negative), and then go visit grand mother. That's a huge risk. Similar with testing if you have antibodies (the serotest) and it comes back positive (you have antibodies). You then might start doing relaxing and not wash your hands as much as before, and then you get sick.

All of these parameters are things that I (we) anticipate and expect that the FDA (EMA/country of your living) have evaluated and deemed acceptable. However, it's important to remember that in this case of the pandemic - there were a lot of changes in the acceptance criteria for a lot of tests. In order  to get an Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) the documentation from companies were relaxed a lot and most of all, not required to clearly state the limits on the test themselves.

You can argue that there isn't time to go through rigorous testing and documentation in a pandemic with an unknown virus - and I would agree whole hearted that time is of the essence. However, I would say that these details, the basis of the validity of the entire test, are extremely important to clearly state. If nothing else exactly to use when calculating the results on a population basis since the errors will compound/become very different based on these base numbers.

From an individual point of view - I wouldn't take a serotest without wanting to know the exact specifications since I wouldn't know what to do with a positive test unless I knew the cross-reactivity number. And that's not even mentioning the issue what kind of levels (or types) of antibodies that might be protective against sars-cov-2. 

"let's wish the virus away" and other comments - from a microbiologist

The last couple of weeks (months if you are picky) it's been very clear to me that a lot of people are stating opinions and thoughts in regards to covid-19 that are not based on fact, nor knowledge. As I've been working from home and reading news, tweets, facebook posts and listened to a number of news shows and podcast - I've come to grow increasingly frustrated with a few very obvious limitations in what people really know in regards to viruses and pandemics.

This post is in no way covering all things that I would like to point out. It's mainly a try to state some of the bigger points that have been confused/forgotten/ignored/whathaveyou - in my opinion and knowledge as a trained microbiologist with training in viruses, bacteria and having been an active researcher at the time of the last pandemic (H1N1) where I was part of conferences and guideline preparations on what countries, companies and people could do to prepare for a situation that no one wanted to happen.

1) it's very important to remember that comparing countries - both in regards to "reported cases", "reported fatalities" and "actions suggested and legislation enforced" - are very different and difficult to compare to each other.
Example; one country only reports deaths in hospitals where the person have had a positive test for virus, another counts all deaths in a hospital where a person have been previously tested positive for the virus and people who died in nursing homes having a few symptoms associated with the virus.

2) the actions taken by various countries depend, not only on the way the various government have ability to enforce regulations, but also on when in a pandemic they encounter the virus that is spreading across the globe. If early, complete eradication might be possible, if later in the time line - mitigation might be the only opportunity.

3) reporting "positive tests" as a number on its own is not helpful unless presented in context of "how is testing done" and with numbers of "how many tests have been administrated". This is the long way of saying - know which part of population is being tested, how often and with which test.
Example; one country tests only people going to the hospital with symptoms, another country tests people who go to school regardless of symptoms.

4) as long as there is no vaccine nor treatment that will make an infected person better, there is no other option to stay healthy but not becoming infected. Any infected person will have to beat the infection on their own. Some people benefit from helpful interventions like ventilators, a lot of people don't necessarily get better as much as we would like from these interventions.

5) saying "it will go away" doesn't solve anything. The virus "will go away" when it is no longer present in the population by not having any more susceptible people to infect (either by everyone being immune due to earlier infection or by vaccination) or when we have successful treatments. This also implies that a lot of people will have become infected and either survived (immune) or not survived the infection (died) or a treatment has been found.
Example; very few infectious diseases have "gone away". Even when we have vaccines. They have decreased and for a lot of them they might "flare up" in a smaller part of the population and then we can successfully protect more people so they don't get infected. This is also where viruses are different from bacteria since for many of the infectious bacteria we have found an antibiotic that can treat the cause of infection. For viruses, viral infections, the only known "treatment" is a vaccine which technically is viewed as a prevention, rather than treatment, since you need to be vaccinated before being exposed to the virus and therefore avoid infection.

6) most airborne and droplet spread infections will be hindered by hand washing (the virus will not be present on your hands and therefore not spread when you put your hands in your face), wiping down shared surfaces you touch (with your hands) or by limiting the number of people you meet and talk, cough, hug, kiss or hand off infected stuff to.
Example; someone coughs in a room and droplets end up on a keyboard, you later touch the key board with your hand and then touch your face.... the virus spreads. If the keyboard is wiped down between different users, the virus will be removed/inactivated and the other user will not catch the virus on their hands.

7) masks limit the amount of virus particles you spread and that others spread to you when breathing/coughing. Proper mask handling is key for this to work. Improper mask handling will create a sense of false safety and therefore might increase the spread.

8) regardless of your political affiliation - the virus doesn't care about that - everyone in a society is susceptible to viruses (and other infectious diseases). Virus aren't sentient and therefore per definition "not smart" or "intelligent" or any other wording that's being used.

9) Actually, per strict biological definition a virus isn't alive since it can't replicate on its own. A virus needs to infect a cell to be able to replicate. That's why researchers make a distinction of "being able to replicate" or "infectious doses" and "RNA titers". Of course, this is detail that for much of the current (social and political) discussion isn't really relevant if it's not for the point that a test showing there is RNA present in someone doesn't automatically correlate to that person having a viable virus that can infect and then replicate (it's more likely than not that the virus titer indicates that there is a presence of virus being able to replicate - especially for this covid19 bullet point list that I'm writing here). For the sake of 99% of the conversation about covid19 though, this point is not key relevant since it's the weeds and details that many researchers take into consideration (mainly super important for the discussion of tests and their sensitivity and false negatives and false positives - see point 10).

10) the general understanding of what constitutes a "validated and confirmed biological test used in hospital setting/for medical purposes" is low. There are a lot of details going into validating a test. Two of the most important factors are sensitivity and specificity. The test needs to be specific enough to only pick up specific factors from the virus (microbe) in question to be positive. The test also needs to be sensitive enough to pick up factors even when in small quantities. There are more factors that are important but in general, I'd say these two factors are key when discussing "false negatives and false positives".
Example: currently there are a lot of antibody tests being deployed all over the world to investigate and confirm how many people have really been infected by SARS-CoV-2 (the virus that causes covid19). The antibody test need to be specific enough to ONLY give positive to people who have been infected by SARS-CoV-2 and not any other virus around. It also needs to be clear how sensitive it is - as in "how many antibodies/what level of immune response" will the test detect. This latter part is complicated since it's not known what kind of threshold is needed to be protected for future exposure nor what kind of immune response various individuals have had if they've been symptomatic or asymptomatic. (see, I'm in the weeds now... lots of details on the background on validation of these tests.)

11) microbiology, epidemiology and public health are specific areas of expertise where there are a lot of facts and previously collected knowledge that are helpful when determining what to do, when and how. There is a difference between non trained people and trained people in regards of this knowledge.

12) no situation is being helped by panic. Many situations involving "unknowns" and "large amount of people potentially afflicted" create panic reactions and knee jerk responses at the time they happen. This is why it's important to have a plan before a bad situation happens since then there is less second guessing or panic reactions but rather "following a plan previously vetted and laid out". Most health care workers have been trained in planned responses, so that when "panic situations" arise, the trained people don't panic but rather adapt well to the planned response and go through the situations many of us untrained people wouldn't handle as well. Trust well trained workers.

I'll stop here since I don't want to overthink or write more at this time. It's my vent and my thoughts and feelings. And hopefully someone who reads this will find it helpful. It was helpful for me to write it down. And possibly I'll make a blog post regarding number 10 - Validation of biological tests - later since I've created test validations under FDA (21 CFR part 11) and EU equivalent from EMA (EU Annex 11) requirements.

"you're not a scientist, you don't have a PhD"

Ego getting in the way of making a good team. Ego ruining a good working team.

Everyone who has been in the science field for a certain time know when you meet new people in the field that there is a lot of questions about where everyone fit in and what roles everyone plays in these new teams and collaborations we do.

It's the newly hired person who thinks that "everyone in the labs who is involved with a paper gets on the authorship list". It's the newly minted PhD who know finally (?) feels secure that they have proved themselves explaining "I'm a real scientist now that I have the PhD title". It's the intern who spends three months in the lab washing dishes and cleaning up animal carcasses and studies for their MCAT since they are going into MedSchool and thinks that will give them power. It's the old technician who has seen numerous postdocs crash and burn with the thought that they are the special one who will change P&R while the technician has the ear of the PI.

And then there is that special person who takes it one step further and speaks up and tells people "you are not a real scientist since you don't have PhD" to their face.

And the kicker is that they don't seem to understand why it's offensive and making it impossible to work as a team. Never mind that they are wrong, oh so wrong they are. And that it is such a naive comment to make, and makes you look so small and misinformed. To disregard experience and the work that so many hand and heads in the lab contribute to. That science (STEM and biology is what I'm mainly talking about now since I'm mentioning lab work) is a team effort. That even if there is one PI seeing the bigger picture, writing grants, there is a lot of hands and thoughts and details getting in the way of the ego.... and that scientists come in different shapes, sizes, backgrounds, titles and knowledge areas.

It's similar to an old saying I had told to me in the scout movement and by military leaders in my leadership trainings;  "You're not a leader because you have a title. You're a leader because people follow you since they believe and trust you".

It's also called "if you have to call out in the room "I'm the boss/captain so you have to do what I say", your leadership is on the weakest ground/first step in the staircase of hierarchy and you don't have much in the long run. Authority is the position, that doesn't mean leadership which lies in the character of the person.

It's especially important if you are coming in new to a job, and your title is lab manager or lab supervisor - both titles that vary depending on where the job is, sometimes this requires a PhD, sometimes it doesn't. Whatever the requirements though, I would highly recommend a period of "look, see and gather information about the team" before making any big claims and statements. (Needless to say, I would never state anything as silly as "real scientist needs a PhD".) I would build confidence and trust with the new colleagues and lab members, as much or more as with the PI of the lab. Why?

It's a team sport this game we call science. The PI is the Captain/QB/Skipper/Coach depending on which sport we refer to and the rest of the lab take up various positions and depending on the time of the game, are of various importance at that specific time. An experienced lab technician who has been with the PI for a long time? Yep, crucial to the play. And, like a dishwasher (hello my old job) is key to get tables turned around fast in a restaurant to earn the money for the servers and seaters, someone to keep lab wear clean and sterile, changing animal cages, making regular solutions the same old reliable way are the backbone of repeatable, good and solid science.

And the absolute in the lab it trust. Trust that you know what you are doing at the bench. That you know when to ask for help. And that you realize that certain people in the lab know different things, and that the strength is in those differences and match ups. As long as you can make them all work together, towards a common goal, making al of them feel important and seen in their positions. That's a true leader, and something to strive for.

A silver lining

It's holiday time and it's not the easiest season for some of us. There's a lot of feeling in the air of "finishing up the year" and "how behind am I and I'm supposed to take off in the middle of it?". It's been too many long days and working late, and then the early morning wake up calls on wondering just a little on "why am I doing this?".

Well, every so often there comes that one moment when I realize why I do what I do. And why I feel that I try to make a difference. And that it is worth it. This week had one of those moments.

Part of my job is to handle a program where we share information and biological samples with academic researchers. If anyone wants something, they send me an email. This email address is spread around through PR campaigns and through websites. It also helps that my place of work is not unknown. One morning I saw an email from a parent, who has a child with a very rare serious disease. They were asking for help and wanted to get information on how to best treat their child. It's not the norm that non-researchers use the email. It's not for the public. However, it doesn't mean it's not answered. I reached out to the MDs and asked if they had any suggestions. Their response "we will take it from here, thank you!".

It may sound small. It may even sound like it didn't have much to do with me and my actions. But knowing that I was part of building this program, and running it everyday, being able to give a helping hand, to give some hope and connect people - that's a huge part of why I do what I do. Those moments, while they seem small, are what makes it worth it. Because while they might seem small, they are by no means insignificant. Rare diseases, and especially in children, are exactly that - rare. And if ever there was a time the saying "it takes a village" is appropriate - to me it is that time.

Being able to share information, treatments and unpublished results to help better and to make more understanding - that's something that is near and dear to my heart.

It was exactly the reminder that I needed at this time. When the world is going nuts with commercial shopping and unnecessary plastic gifts, the reality of what really matters is good to realize. That small moments of hope and action can make a huge difference in the course of a life.

"it only takes a minute" - does it really?

I hear it quite often, "it only takes a minute, just write them an email". But does it really?

In my job a lot of my time is spent with emails; reading them and writing them. I keep my inbox as a "task list" and mark the emails in a few different categories to keep track of what I need to do, follow up on and so on. In short, I read a lot of emails every day. I also write a lot of emails every day.

Here's the rub. I read a lot of emails that leaves me with "what does the person want [from me]?". When you get one of those emails it goes one of two ways; you read it and then go - I don't know what they mean, and reply back "I'm not sure what you mean, please elaborate", or you just leave it there and think "I'll read it again later and maybe it makes sense". The latter usually means that the email goes to die in the inbox until the person who wrote it follows up, or if that doesn't happen, it will get deleted and never seen again.

Brevity will always (with a few exceptions) be preferred. And then indicates "choosing your words and way of writing carefully". It's hard to do in a short time frame. You get better with practice. And practice takes time.

Before starting this job I was trained in writing proper letters, with salutations and paragraphs and proper endings. I have written memorandums for government and universities, for foreign communications and domestic law disputes. It's been an evolution in how I write emails, and to whom and why. I personally like to have a salutation in the beginning of an email, it probably dates me and it indicates that I view emails as "a letter rather than a text". This is not to say I don't write certain emails as texts
[empty row]
"sounds good."
[end email])

My default setting when writing an email though is
[start email]
"Dear Dr X," or "Hello Anna," or in certain cases when I am ambivalent on which level I should place myself "Hello, "
[keep going in the email].

The meat comes after the salutation (or not). And most times I would like to ask people "what's your purpose of writing the email"? It sounds simple, however when you unfold the idea it can turn quite tricky. Especially (?) in the times when constructing proper sentences and choosing correct words seem to more and more difficult. And this is not even getting into the "quick reply to show that you are on top of your emails" (please consider "what's the purpose of the email" when doing that as well. Quick response isn't always the best response).

If it is writing to someone you don't know, or who might not know exactly who you are but know either your organisation or your lab group, please start with a one lines introducing yourself in context to why you write to them. It shouldn't be too cumbersome or complicated "I work with Dr XX at Institute for awesomeness. I'm writing to you to ask for reagents described in you fab paper in journal of Fantasticness. We have worked on P for quite some time...."

A lot of people don't want to sound too demanding when asking for things, they start adding a couple of disclaimers in their emails. After a few of those, you're confused and it's hard to sort out what it is exactly that the person wants. In these cases I emphasize "be direct and clear without being rude". This is where finesse comes in. You have to know how to use please and thank you, and how to make at least one point about why the intended respondent is important/good/needed/positive word.

Also, adding some sort of time line when asking for something makes the email more likely to be responded to. A lot of things today fall in two categories, right now or later (never). It's the signs of us being so stressed and focused on the chores for today, also called being in a reactive mode. The chance of someone responding to your email, albeit later, increases a lot if you have a time limit in there. Why? Because if there isn't one and someone reads your email after a week, they might decided that "this was too long ago anyway so I am just going to ignore it".

Lastly, review the length of the email. For a lot of people email is not the best way to elaborate and make wordy tropes. If you end up with a long email (say six paragraphs and more than a page long) I would suggest you set up a meeting, type of the idea into bullet points, and then summarize in a memo that can be reviewed. If you have a four paragraph email, let's hope you made each paragraph 2-3 sentences.And whenever you have several things you want to address in one email.... either divvy them up between paragraphs or between emails if possible (too many things in one can lead to confusion), and consider making a bullet point/numbered list. When used properly, bullet points/numbers are efficient to make the text clearer and at the same time keeping short yet feeling spacious.

There are a lot of other things to consider when writing the perfect email, my main idea with this post was to point out that even a short "easy" email might take some time to craft. And that it is always a good idea to reread the email before sending it and ask yourself "is it clear, concise and easy to read?". If not, tweak and repeat.
TLDR: Many emails I read are too long and not precise enough. The chance of your email being received well and answered increases if it is short, precise and polite. This usually takes more than a minute. It will be worth the time to craft a good email.

There is Sunshine Outside the Ivory Tower (shameless selfpromoting...)

So I have been on a podcast..... Earlier this fall I got asked to be on a podcast talking about my career, how I left post-docing, and a little bit about what choices I made doing so. We had a good talk about "how it looks in hindsight", "are you happier professional now than before" and "it's about believing in yourself". It's up/out now if you want to take a listen?!

There is Sunshine Outside the Ivory Tower, episode 7

(and yes, it might be a little self-promoting but that's how the world works, isn't it? And the Podcast - without my episode - is very good and brings up very good points on "finding a new place after leaving academia". It's a tricky thing, those pesky feelings and ambitions.)

happy listening!

"Be able to ask someone else, not you, and go through the experiment with you to see if there’s something you can salvage. Get a pep talk and get someone else to evaluate things” – chall

a lab is like a NHL team?

I know, it's a little out there. And it might not be super accurate but the last week I've thought a little more about "what makes a good player/PI/postdoc" and "what makes a good team". It's mostly in the context of some moving a person with specific skills from one environment to another environment and hoping they will thrive in this new place. You know, like it happens all the time in science when a graduate student moves to a post-doc, or a player changes team and moves up to the NHL.

I'd admit, I started really thinking about this yesterday when I read this piece in ESPN and coupled it with what happened with Vegas Knights' player Sjipatjov/Shipachyov (depending on which transliteration you use, Swedish or English). Side note, if you are interested here is the official guide to "how to" from Russia to English from IIHF.

Anyway, back to the issue at hand. Just because someone is a shiny star in one place, doesn't mean that they are going to be shiny stars in a different environment. In certain things, this is obvious. In other situations, maybe not as obvious. And then there is that additional factor of "the majority of people want to feel comfortable" in order to do a stellar job performance.

The first time I encountered the discussion in a lab setting was as a graduate student with a predominantly homogeneous department. Let's say 90% was speaking fluent Swedish. It obviously meant that any visiting scholar was going to be either "changing the entire conversation into English" or "feel a little isolated when everyone was chatting away in their own language".

I've mentioned it before, it might not be an issue to keep all work presentations and seminars in English (common language) - however the small talk between people in the lab is usually feeling slightly contrived if it is in "not your native tongue when you are in majority in the group" (like being 9 native Swedish people and 1 foreigner). Yet, and I've given this spiel before - A LOT of communication and work productivity is lost if some members of the team doesn't pick up on the general chat that goes on. Of course, as I am not outside of the lab - I've missed that a lot of people nowadays wear headphones all the time so maybe this isn't as much of an issue that I had back in the days?

Moving to the United States, this became more diverse and complicated. The majority of the people at my institute were native English speakers. And we had a lot of international post-docs in the labs. A lot of people gathered and got to know each other, some more lucky (?) than others with having a peer group who spoke their native language and getting a taste of home. I still would argue though that if you are in a group of say 6-10 people, I think it is fairly rude to start chatting away in your own language if there is only one or two people who don't speak the language. (Yes, I've been there. As a person who has chosen to live with a person who doesn't speak my native language but hanging out with people who do.... I try and translate and keep him in the conversation since I find it extremely rude and excluding and these situations have decreased.)

It's different if you go off on your own with a small exclusive group, say three swedes go for dinner. There is no reason why we would speak English with each other but rather bond with our native tongue, exploring all the feelings that come from speaking your own language with all the nuances.

I digress from the point of the article. Most often when you talk about language issues and NHL there is a Russian somewhere in there. Why? Because other European countries have more English and do use the same alphabet as English. There have been a few examples of Russian players who come to the United States and start playing for NHL and not knowing any English at all. They have been great at playing hockey, stars of KHL but moving to NHL is a whole different game.

Some teams solve this a little different. There are stories about "host families" who speak Russian and English and take care of the 20-22 year old man who now is living in a completely different world. Others might have "another Russian" on the team and expecting them to guide the new guy into a more American style, interpret and then hopefully get the English going. The rumors around Shipachyov has been that he moved from Russia to Las Vegas as a 30year old who doesn't speak English, no host family or other Russian player on the team and that this didn't work out for him. There is probably a lot of other things, but a lot has been mentioned about this language/cultural barrier and that the owner and manager team might not have done as much as the could.

It's like when some new post-doc move to the new lab from another country and doesn't speak English that well or almost at all. They were good in their old environment, star in the lab, had good publications yet coming to the new lab entails learning where everything is, how things are done, where to go in the city for regular chores etc. Not always so easy and some institutions have a post-doc coordinator or an academic office to help with relocation issues. I know that I benefited enormously from the one that was there to welcome me. I don't know how I would've gotten a bank account, found a car, gotten a driver license and all those other stuff that I fixed the first two weeks of settling in the United States after getting off the plane with two suitcases.

All of this ranting is because I'm trying to avoid being rude. You see, I have a bad flaw when certain people start complaining about "they don't speak English all the time". It sometimes happens when people say similar things about Swedish, although it's easier making excuses for not knowing Swedish (small language, pretty difficult to pronounce), but I'm not as annoyed by it, my bad. My complaint is mainly these people say something to the point that they feel excluded in their own country and that "we need to put our foot down about this". (If you read the ESPN article linked in the beginning, look up Mr Seguin's comment. That's pretty much right on point where my irritation happens.) The unfair thing I want to ask them is "so how many languages do you speak?" Or sometimes, when I'm feel really self-important I'd say "come back when you've learned another language". Partly to point out that it isn't the easiest thing in the world to master a new language. Partly to bring to their attention that maybe, just maybe, they could pick up some new words themselves and make an effort to know something else that their native language?

I realize that it's a lot to ask from a hockey player to pick up Russian when playing in the NHL. And really, if they should pick up something it would be Swedish (109 players in NHL are Swedish, 66 Russian and 44 Czech) but hey - I'm just pointing out that there could be a humility about the fact that even if they are playing in the NHL, maybe that is because NHL is the best league in the world and people want to play there.

Similar to when people want to work in a world famous international lab. Regardless of the lab being in the USA or in France or in Holland, the people want to go there and work with the best of the best in that field. And maybe, just maybe, we have to accept that it means that it will be a little uncomfortable and that everyone, not just the people who move there, will have to make some changes and adapt to make everyone feel welcome and produce the best of their ability?

(Disclaimer; if you read this far - thanks. I personally think that learning the language of your new country is a must if you want to fit in. If my lab had been in France, I would have to speak more French, just as a lot of people moving to Sweden have to learn the language of 10 million people to make themselves more comfortable. What really pissed me off with Mr Seguin's comment was the fact that he lived in Switzerland for a year playing there. While he was there? He didn't speak any of the four languages given as an opportunity but kept on in his American English. So..... I would've hoped that he could've had just a little more understanding and humility than what he explains in the article as "putting down the foot and speak English since we are in the US". I just would've liked him to think that maybe his team mates in Switzerland would have liked to keep talking French/German on the ice rather than accommodating to him. Alas, I have prejudice and doubt he ever went there in his head. Mean me.)

Happy being "water divider" author of article in Nature

One of the things my late professor from graduate school taught me was to always be happy and grateful for every publication you get. Of course, you are more happy about your First author publications, BUT it's important to be happy about the publication that you are in the middle of the author list of too (and obviously if you end up on the TT, the ones where you are the LAST authors for).

When I wrote my thesis, it was a summary thesis of a number of published articles (as is customs for STEM in Sweden), every one on my committee made it clear to me that regardless of where I was on the author list of a paper I added to my thesis I was required and expected to be able to defend the WHOLE paper. It enforced the idea to me that if your name is on a paper, you are responsible for all of the paper. Similarly, they enforced that you should be happy and have pride in papers that you have your name on.

To me that was the start of being happy and celebrating every time I have had a paper accepted and published. (I actually celebrate both the acceptance "oh thank goodness no more resubmissions and revisions" and the actual publication "oh look, that's MY name, in print!".) I realized when I started my post-doc at the more prestigious institute(TM) that people pretty much scoffed at this idea and only celebrated the First Author papers in CNS journals. It seemed like they thought it was silly to care about these "smaller achievements", like celebrating finishing a race but you didn't get a medal. Or something like that.

After coming back to academia as a project coordinator, after my post-doc, I have been happy to continue my little mission "you should be happy with every publication" even when certain post-docs aren't as on board with the idea.

Maybe this is since I probably will never have a first author publication again? Maybe it's because I think it's important to show that a paper comes for a team effort? Maybe I just want to feel important and successful? Who knows. But I still think it's a thing to do. Celebrate the acceptance and then later the actual print coming out.

So, yesterday I had the happy times finding out that an article I am the water divider on (the one in the middle so when you go one from the front, one from the back you'll end up with my name in the middle) got accepted in Nature. Ha. There might have been a small dream of mine, back in the early days of my graduate days, to get my name as a first author on a Nature article - although to be honest, just getting my name on the author list was a pretty big dream as well. It's like saying you dream of receiving a Nobel prize, ending up receiving a national prize would still be pretty swell... And I'm not turning that down. And I am silly happy being part of an article in Nature and that my name will be there. Pretty nice feeling for sure.

As a kicker I decided to humble brag and posted my happy times on twitter. (I wondered if it sounded like it was my article or if it was clear "I'm one of many people on there" but I think it was pretty clear and shouldn't have to worry about it, right?!) Lots of people said congratulations and liked the tweet. And in the end I got my most viewed tweet as well. What a day. A little happy turning into more happy and a great start of the weekend!

THANK YOU for sharing my happy times! .... until printing time..... :)

a christian, a muslim, a jew and a Swede walk into...

...a lab. What's the point with science?
The christian says "all is forgiven, even a botched western blot". The muslim says "being oldest doesn't automatically make it right, there's always improvement to be made". The jew says "the oldest ideas have a tendency to rear their head even how much changes have happened". The Swede says "it's because we all have different viewpoints that we examine together".

(I'm paraphrasing a famous Swedish joke "A Norweigan, A Danish and Bellman..". I know, I'm not that funny.)

This Swede thinks the best with science have been the environment where I have met so many diverse people whom I never would've had the opportunity to meet, talk and get to know otherwise. I work every day in a place where there are diverse religions (or non-religion), nationalities, skin colour, gender preferences, ages and what have you. The stories they can tell about their lives and their families. The view points they have that makes me think once more about why I think the way I think. All that. I am grateful for it. It makes me a better scientist but most of all, it makes me a better person.

It reminds me on a regular daily basis that I can't presume that everyone agrees with my views and that sometimes allies come in the strangest shapes. The devout male muslim with a stay-at-home wife who can't shake hands with men have a daughter whom he is clear about will be a doctor and go out work in the world. The devout jew who brings homemade baklava for everyone to feast one and who bonds with said muslim over customs they did as children, albeit being from different countries and religion. The catholic who is vegetarian and gets recipes from the hindu with all these different flavours. The born-here-in-the-south-never-leaving baptist who put up solar panels on their house and recycles while working on getting their church to do the same. And of course, the Swede who still gets surprised that Christian holidays aren't "off from work"days*, even though it's so obvious at the lab work depend on all these diverse people being able to go to service, or not, at different times and nothing ever shuts down. (I'm kinda slow with some of these 'new' customs and traditions that are different from my home country even though I left more than a decade ago.)

I hope that we can provide a good foundation for the future and keep up the good work to become even more inclusive and bring the frontier in science forward. After all, I'm a firm believer we only have one Earth and we need to take care of it and the people on it.

Now, time to go do some of that science I keep waffling about.



*Sweden, with their old state church and pretty non-going-to-church-apart-from-5-times-in-your-life and school graduations, still keeps Christmas eve, Christmas Day, day after Christmas Day, Good Friday, Monday after Easter Day, Ascension Day as Bank Holidays. And Monday after Pentecost was a holiday up until less than a decade ago when it was traded for the National Flag Day as a day off work. (it's a complicated history that one, TLDR; national day was never off when I was a child. Not too many people cared about it, no big parades or anything like that.)

International Day of Women - links and practical things

If you read this blog (thank you if you do), you know that I have an opinion on equal rights, women in science and that the world is not a fair place at the moment. I've gone through my old posts and I wanted to write something new for today - being the 8th of March - and figured I could do some practical link love.

There is so much to do to work for equality still. (No, I don't think we are considered equal, us woman and men.) Every where you read research says that if women are given the opportunity to control their reproductive rights (read: not get pregnant too close together aka spacing children or postpone their first child to after 18 years of age) they will have a higher chance of finishing school, thus having a higher chance of supporting themselves and their families. It's one of the things that make me upset knowing that current politics of the USA is removing this opportunity since they are pulling the funds for all health aid IF they even mention abortion (they don't even have to provide it, just the mere fact of talking about it makes the money void).

Well, instead of making this a venting upset rant - I'll go right ahead with some links to things I find important this March 8th of 2017.

Site from United Nations on women and "changing the work today". Lots of facts and explanations on WHY it's important to work towards equality and what we could have in the future.

A Mighty girl; my "go-to-site" for inspiration and presents for my friends who are parents, and also to myself when I I need a pep talk and be inspired by all the great girls and woman all around us in the world.

For more practical "what can I do to help" - consider kiva.org where you can be a lender to micro loans to women (men and groups) all over the world with a small risk. The micro lending makes it possible for a lot of people to finish school, purchase that small extra that is needed to sustain their business and other things. You can choose places, people and projects that you feel are important. They have a special drive for March 8th, go take a look.

The book I would like every undergrad to have to balance the male dominance of all the science history and reports every day.

"We should all be feminists" by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie - there's a TED talk and a small book (based from the TED talk). It might interest you to know that the book was handed out to a lot of 8th graders in Sweden last year.

A list of the 100 most powerful women in 2016 from Forbes

Some self promoting (but at least I'm not rewriting the same things this year) - my old posts from March 8th:
Silly slut on Woman's day 2010
IWD this March 8th 2012 
being just enough woman, IWD edition 2016 

An old blog carnival: "IWD How To Do It All, one woman's perspective" lots of good posts

And finally, I found my blog post about the book Seducing boys club  that I never bought since I thought it was too "post-modern American" but now in a better mind frame to read and contemplate. Anyone read it? Any thoughts?

Now, let's go to work.

let's talk H1Bs for a second

I had planned to write my thoughts on FDA and the upcoming selection of the new Director and what policy decisions have been flagged for this week. A lot of them stemming from what I can only think is a naivety and non-understanding/misconceptions what FDA actually does and what is meant by saying "FDA approved drugs".

However, plans don't always go as you want. This morning a Huffington post article made the rounds in my twitter feed and since H1B was an issue that was floated around last week as well ("there's a draft that the president will soon sign"), I thought I'd tackle it instead.

Mainly because while the article seems to make some sense - especially to people who want to think "immigrants are taking the jobs from Americans" and the people who think "immigrants on H1Bs are getting vastly underpaid and this will help them" - while in essence it is talking about a very specific subset of jobs and people and dragging it to an "over all conclusion" that is non correct (or to the very least should acknowledge that this is not the whole story).

Also note that the article doesn't mention the idea of H1Bs being the visa for a lot of other workers in other sectors; non-profits (NGOs), post-docs in academia, pharma or other places. These places doesn't have the same salaries as Silicon Valley Tech and are not of the authors main priority as coming from the computer science field. It is worth noting that the far reaching suggestions in the article doesn't take these various places into account though.

First of all, anyone who reads this blog knows I'm an immigrant and I grew up in a place where there were unions, collective bargaining and student representatives present with voting rights when hiring professors at universities. This also means that I read any type of suggestions for "this is for the best of workers" with extra interest, simply because I grew up hearing that the USA didn't really care that much about workers but about the companies/employers.

I wouldn't mind having salaries public, so everyone in a company knows what everyone makes. Nor would I dislike having "similar salaries for similar jobs" and a suggestion from the legislature/union on what the job should pay. Neither of which is a reality in my state of the USA and everyone negotiates on their own. It's one of those "nice American opportunities where you as a skilled worker can argue your case and get lots of money if you are good". (Used a lot in the private sector, especially in finance/law/tech.) And one of the reasons companies who want to attract the best of the best have a lot of freedom to do so.

This article is a prime example of such a thing as posing as "this is thinking about the American worker and their salaries and the future of the country" while muddling the waters with all these odd ball comments that don't line up apart from "blame the immigrants"*. While in reality one should look at what the companies are doing when they are hiring "the cheapest labor" rather than "the skills needed for the job" and look further than to blame the lowest person on the scale.

Let's start with facts. H1B visas are for skilled workers. This means that there has to be a degree specification in the job advert and that the level needs to claim required - required to perform said job, not preferred or "if you have it, that's nice" but "you NEED this to do the job". (Anecdotal story; I applied and got hired for an industry job where the job ad stated "PhD preferred" [since they wanted to hire the best fit for the job and keeping it open to many applicants]. Thus not making it possible for me or anyone else to apply for an H1Bvisa since that wasn't eligible for that category. This "required" is an important point and piece of the puzzle, as you will see if you read the article since the author wants to use this to argue how immigrants take away from American workers.

Second, there is no obligation to pay _only_ the salary that is the limit for the H1B. If you want to hire someone who wants more money than the H1B floor because they negotiate well and you find them worth it - and that person turns out to be American - that's your choice (you might have to argue with HR and make sure that you didn't mislabel the level of work, but that's not the H1B issue). There is no "we have to hire the person with the lowest bidder for salary" for companies, especially not for "for profit Silicon Valley Tech companies". You think they ask their higher level candidates who wants the least? This is mixing two different things together as seen in passage below, which is directly arguing these two points. Maybe you can see what I mean that there are some difficulties getting both the arguments working with each other? Adding in the middle is the idea that "Americans are out competed by immigrants from their own universities to do doctorate degrees [that might not even be needed - in the second part - my emphasis] and these doctorate degrees are also on a visa status that should be curbed.

"The industry especially asserts a need to hire H-1Bs with a PhD, citing the fact that 50 percent of computer science doctorates in the U.S. are granted to foreign students. What they are hiding in that claim is that it simply doesn’t pay for an American student (i.e. U.S. citizen or permanent resident) to pursue doctoral study, as the salary premium for a doctorate is too small. That small wage premium is due to the flooding of the market by foreign applicants,[my emphasis] something correctly forecase with approbation by the National Science Foundation years ago. The industry claim is doubly deceptive, as they are not very keen to hire PhDs because this level of study just isn’t needed. We actually have a surplus of computer science PhDs; 11.3 percent of them are involuntarily working in a non-computer science field."

and further down in the article:

Employers claim that they hire H-1Bs for rare skill sets or outstanding talent ― traits that they would need to pay a premium for on the open market. Yet current law requires only that they pay the average wage.

A lot of the article then moves on to argue that the immigrant workers are inferior/weaker to the American workers who are out competed for these jobs (due to salary and not wanting to apply for these jobs) and therefore the salary requirements for H1Bs should be raised. How do they argue "weaker"?

But research performed at the University of Michigan and Rutgers University, as well as my own work for the Economic Policy Institute, shows that the former foreign students now in the U.S. workforce tend to be weaker than their American peers. On a per capita basis, the former foreign students in computer science file fewer patents, are less likely to work in research and development and have degrees from less selective U.S. universities.

At this point I wonder; does the author know what it takes to apply for a patent? And how it's decided who gets to be on a patent? I can tell you straight up, it takes money to file and the backing of your company and your boss. Never mind the last comment "less selective US universities" or the self citation. Is the author really annoyed that American graduates from "more selective US universities" can't get jobs in Silicon Valley? Or how to interpret this since there surely would be some American workers with degrees from "less selective US universities" who could get these jobs when the immigrants are gone? Or would they also take the jobs from those from "more selective US universities". Should we really make tiers to state "applicants from tier A gets hired, then graduates from tier B" even more than is currently happening with pedigrees and whatnot?

All of this writing and not once approaching the idea that employers - these massive tech companies and venture capital driven start ups in Silicon Valley - have any responsibilities of looking over their requirements or that maybe they are overstating what they need in order to do the work. I mean, IF the jobs are over stated just to attract and hire H1B people (which sounds plausible), when the jobs then are downgraded to not be eligible for H1B since the salary would be too high - the specific people the author is worried about wouldn't
a)get more money (downgraded the job requirements, remember -> less salary)
b)might not even apply since they are overqualified (thus would make them underpaid and overqualified if they get the job)

Maybe what is needed for this to be "fixed" would be more oversight on "how do you level/grade your job adverts to be eligable for the H1B visas" from the government and not leave it to the companies to make this up on their own? (Not that I think this would solve too much but it would solve a little. It sure as mud would place the responsibility where it should be, at the company and the government level. I'm sure you can't get an H1B level application on a janitor job advert for example so there has to be some oversight already.)

But nothing really showed the true idea of the article until the last paragraphs, if anyone ever reads that far anymore?

This approach would give the visas to those who can truly make exceptional contributions to our economy and society. If there is real interest in draining the swamp, [my emphasis] this is a great place to start.

"draining the swamp" ... of all the immigrants? Or what? Really? And here I thought that the "swamp reference" was in regards to a comment made by President Trump while campaigning meaning "the upper echelon of politicians, law makers and lobbyists in Washington DC". But the author means it's the swamp of immigrants that needs draining. The swamp who are to blame for (quote directly from the article as seen above in my post) "small wage premium is due to flooding of the market by foreign applicants"**

Talk about missing the mark so completely, while stating where your political affiliations lie ever so clearly, author Dr Professor from UC Davis.



*I don't get why it's not even a whisper on how the companies, IF they want the best person and currently not getting that, could change how the look for talent. But I do understand it's easier to blame the immigrants for all of this. It's always easier to blame the little guy, especially is they're not even American.

**applicants - let's not get confused that they are even hired at this stage. They shouldn't even be allowed to apply to the position.

"you're here on a visa?" and Red Herrings....

I'm a little worried, more the last couple of days, that the energy spent on outrage is going to take a toll and once the initial energy is spent, there will be huge opportunities for other more recessive stuff to happen. Like what is going on in a lot of the states last week - banning demonstrations, making it harder for regular protests, adding fines to arrests etc. (This is affecting citizens of the United States so it is important to their Constitution and amendments.)

I'm worried that a lot of energy is spent on the most obvious thing, while the more insidious comments are being left behind and being slightly forgotten....while these comments and details might in fact be the real threat and issue.

Then again, I worry since there are so many things going on right now that there are not enough time and people to effectively go through them all so again - some things are missed. Of course, things are missed all the time, and that in itself are usually not an issue. You just need to focus on not missing "the important ones".

As a person who currently holds a visa to stay in the United States to work, the last couple of days have understandably made an impact on me. I have been caught between a few things though, and feeling slightly annoyed that certain things that people are outraged about aren't things that I think are the things to get outraged about. At least not right now. Why? Because they have always been like this. Some of these things are just the way visas work and countries adhere to (even if the general public might not know it).

One example of this is the outrage that "DHS will weigh your visa and application when you stand to enter the country". Maybe I'm naive, but my experience both here and when I was in Canada on a student visa, was that it is clearly written that even though you have your application to the visa and the visa - this will be on the discretion on Immigration at the point of entry to country. (I'm sure you can legally challenge if you get denied but this is another issue. Let's just say that the immigration person (CBP) has a lot of power and the whole system is based on them making the correct decision based on your paper work and their good will.) 

I have never been certain I'm allowed to enter with my new visa, just because the process is, imho, arbitrary and you have to be courteous and cute to the immigration officer to not get sent to a special room in the back for further questioning. (Yes, I have done been to a special room.) Then again, I wasn't really certain I was allowed to re-enter with my visa either. Like if you are a scientist and on a working visa and fill in "can you work with radioactivity/anthrax/other things regular people can't...." you end up in a special room, with special people.  (Yes, I have done that too.) Or, when you stand in front of the immigration person and they misread the paperwork, declare "this is not valid" and before you have a second they stamp everything with NO in red and ask you to turn away and you fight tears because you were only away for four days and the CBP person misread and the actual date they should look at is the top one and not the bottom one.... (Yes, that happened to me. Took a long time to resolve. Having a big NO on top of your visa in the passport is not helping future entries either.)

This doesn't of course include all the paper work you have to go through before even getting the temporary visa. Or the interview at the embassy or the paper work on your relatives etc ... Not to mention the things you go through when you apply for a green card. If you think the regular temporary visa has a lot of paper work, yeah it's got nothing on the green card. Plus the immigration physical, immunization records, clean bill of health (now here is something we could really talk about, what rights do you have as a non-healthy individual), tax records, criminal records (you shouldn't have any) and more and more. I'd call that vetting. It's already being done. Oh, and did I mention that you need to report where you live to DHS every time you move? There's already a tonne of data collected on green card holders so to issue an Executive Order to stop them from reentering on 12 hours notice is simply a malicious idea to show power.*

Anyhow, this has NOTHING to do with asylum seekers/refugees and their visas and entry to a safe country. Asylum seekers are someone who flees from persecution, death and is something generally accepted as a status in the world. There are treaties based on that we accept the notion that refugees has a right to apply for asylum and while their application is processed they have a right to be in the country awaiting the decision. If denied, they should leave the country. This process takes years for most countries. It's very unfortunately that there is a huge backlog, BUT this is not an excuse to forbid people to seek asylum when at the border to the country. Neither is the idea that you can turn away such asylum seekers, who have been granted visas in an insanely complicated process that USA is engaged in when it comes to agree to certain classes of asylum seekers to complete this process outside of USA**, and get granted asylum and then be allowed to get on the plane to come over. This process on average takes 18-24 months, during which time the asylum seeker is in a third country (who has agreed to let them be there while waiting for the USA vetting process). So they are vetted and the process is tedious and lengthy. Maybe even more than the average asylum seeker to say Europe - since there they are already in the country. And this is not mentioning the asylum seekers from Central America who are currently looking at a back log of more than 3 years, but they are in the country due to the opportunity of walking across land mass. This is also one of the issues that the wall won't solve since asylum seekers have an international right to seek asylum when touching the border (wall)...

Anyway, since this is turning too long and probably less interesting to read - I'll cut to the chase.

• It is a humanitarian right to seek asylum and turning people away at the border when they already have visas in order is breaking international treaties, brings chaos and decreases your credibility.
• To block Permanent Resident Card holders to re-enter with no warning after a short trip based on their country of origin and saying it's because of the safety of the American citizens is nothing short of faulty. It furthermore discredits the process by USA to monitor who gets the green card, if you don't trust the vetting that is already in place.
• Dual citizenship have always been an issue, and more so nowadays when a lot of countries are demanding visas for entries and making distinction between citizens and others, thus making more people dual. There are also countries who don't agree to give up your citizenship. This will not make things easier in the future.
• Real troubling is that people who have given up dual citizenship, gotten a new single one, are presumably targeted by this ban due to their "place of birth". (example a British parliament member who is born in Iraq but only UK citizen being told he is not allowed entry to the USA). This would be very telling of what is the back story... (imho)

And this is not even touching on the Muslim list for domestic use. I wish I could think that someone in congress would state "we don't make lists of citizens and their religion" - and I do hope that the SCOTUS would slam down on this. However, I am scared that immigrants and visa holders (both temporary and permanent residents) will be accepted to be on lists as such, "for the safety of the country" seem to work miracles and bring on short term memory.

I'm going to see what happens tomorrow at my work since we are a research facility, thus having a lot of immigrants working there. Personally I know people who are directly impacted by this and there will have to be some kind of reassurance or at least information from the higher ups what they will do to protect their scientists.

And yes, I'll try not to panic. But it is getting increasingly difficult.



*please note that it says in the information when you get the green card that if you leave the USA for a longer period of time (definetly 12 months and longer, but could be shorter depending on your travel schedule), you might not be allowed to reenter. This will be decided by the DHS/CBP person whom you encounter when you travel back. There's a lot of ifs and maybes, nothing is certain...

**you can read more about USA and refugees here: http://www.unrefugees.org/about-us/ or go to the governmental site https://www.state.gov/j/prm/ra/admissions/index.htm










And this all coming from a "safe country".