Researchers from the Yale School of Public Health published one of the dumbest papers we’ve ever seen.
They claim that some areas in which fracking takes place (Texas only) have more sexually transmitted diseases. Embarrassingly funny and, yes, “fracking” stupid.
It is difficult to describe how badly I wanted to include the terms “Fracking” and “F#####” in that title.
But I had a momentary lapse in poor taste, so I went with a tamer choice. Researchers at the Yale School of Public Health did not.
They risked ridicule by putting out one of the dumbest papers I’ve ever seen:
“A Multi-Region Analysis of Shale Drilling Activity and Rates of Sexually Transmitted Infections in the United States” N. Deziel, et. al., Sexually Transmitted Diseases, January 9, 2020, DOI: 10.1097/OLQ.0000000000001
And, ridicule they shall have. Not my fault. They practically begged for it.
A. The claim
Here’s the premise: The rates of two sexually transmitted infections, gonorrhea, and chlamydia, were found to be 10% and 15%, respectively, higher in Texas counties where fracking took place compared to other counties where fracking wasn’t being done.
Is there anything to this? Let’s take a look (Hint: Other than a good laugh, no).
The five most common sexually transmitted infections (STIs) in the US are:
- HPV (Human Papillomavirus)
- Chlamydia
- Gonorrhea
- Syphilis
- Herpes
But the paper links only #s 2 and 3 to fracking. What about 1,4, and 5? This discrepancy can be explained in one of two ways:
- Fracking protects people from HPV, syphilis, and herpes.
- The results are a bunch of nonsense.
I vote for #2.
B. What’s wrong here?
Plenty.
“In Texas, county-years with high drilling activity had 10% increased rates of chlamydia (RR=1.10; 95% CI=1.04-1.17) and 15% increased rates of gonorrhea (RR=1.15; 95% CI = 1.04-1.28), compared to county-years with no drilling.”
How did this ever get published? This paper is pure data dredging. And it’s not even good data dredging.
In retrospective studies, which are essentially useless on a good day, the minimum relative risk (RR) that is even worth paying any attention to is 2.0.
In other words, if the people in fracking areas had double (RR 2.0) the risk of those in non-fracking areas it might be worth paying some attention to the paper. When RRs are 1.1 and 1.15 the study is a joke.
“No statistically significant associations were reported for syphilis…”
There ya go. The authors at least admit but do not explain, that one of the other three STIs had nothing to do with whether people lived in fracking counties, non-fracking counties, or on Neptune.
This is another red flag – biological plausibility. There isn’t any. If there is really an increase in STIs in fracking areas it would be across the board – not just two infections.
By massaging the data the authors were able to come up with an imaginary correlation between fracking and some STDs but not others.
But even this supernaturally low bar was still too high to find a “statistically significant” association with syphilis (or anything else)…
C. It gets worse.
“No statistically significant associations were reported for… STIs in Colorado or North Dakota.”
As if this weren’t a big enough mess it would seem that we may have to consider another ICD-10 diagnosis code…
A56.8-BS – Sexually transmitted chlamydial infection in states with large numbers of electoral votes.
OK, so if I’ve got this right, there are 21 states that do fracking. The authors chose three of them and found a delusional “association” in one of these states, but for only two of the most common STDs and no association in the other two states. Sounds reasonable, no?
No.
D. This “study” is an anti-fracking screed. And nothing else.
“Associations between shale drilling and chlamydia and gonorrhea in Texas may reflect increased risk in areas with higher drilling activity and a greater number of major metropolitan areas. Inter-state differences highlight the need for local epidemiology to prioritize community health policies.”
Please.
Read more at ACSH
I guess that during the yukon gold rush there were increasing and unusual high levels of both drunkenness and STCs… close behind the hardware/mining supply stores came the saloons and brothels which may have been the root cause … are fracking areas (the methane goldrush) similar!!
And the tax payers are shelling out big bucks for this load of nonsense Stupidity all the way
Thank you for your preposterous contribution to medical science.
As a Yale alum, I just don’t have enough strength in my hands and arms to keep my head from exploding.
I believe they’ve been watching too many”Battlestar Galactica” reruns.
This Yale ‘study’ could send students of all genders rushing to the shale oil fields. Pay off their loans, get lucky and learn something.
We need to notice what this study really shows. It is the strong desire by those in research positions to support the climate change fraud. Their desire to do so is so strong that they were willing to publish junk science that significantly damages their professional status. The fact that such strong desire is so common shows that there is something seriously wrong with this country.
Carbonicus hit is right on. Oil rigs will draw a lot of single young men. Many have much stronger hormones than common sense. It is amazing that there isn’t a real correlation between all sexual diseases in areas with oil drilling.
Let me save research sponsors and Yale money and time.
Fracking doesn’t cause any increase in any of the 5 major STD’s.
Men who work in fracking cause an increase in STD’s. Not uncommon to work 3-6 weeks on, then get a couple weeks off. Many travel far from home. Pay is great compared to many other blue-collar jobs.
When they’re on, they may work 60 hours a week, 6 days. When they get 36 hours off, they want two things: alcohol and pu$$y. They don’t want dic#, they want pu$$y, because gay men don’t work on fracking rigs.
So, Yale. This ain’t complicated. And you just made yourselves look like fools. Again.
I’ve known a few oil field workers and they do tend to be a bit randy. Higher STD rates are not caused by fracking, though. Caused by another gerund spelled similarly.
Wow. The quality of Yale and Harvard have declined remarkably in the past few decades.
Just as stupid as the so called study that claimed link between drinking Milk and Colon Cancer as usial PETA and its fake Doctors group PCRM got involved and there was a stupid lawsuit to force Milk Cartons and jus to carry warning labels the study turned out to be false and the stupid lawsuit was thrown out by a judge with more commonsense and like the Saccarine test and cuasing cancer in lab rats but in the end it was found out you would have to drink 25 cans of diet soda a day.Yes this Study is Stupid very very Stupid
This ‘study’ reminds me of something that National Lampoon did years ago, how Holland was a threat to America. The tulip bulb pyramid scheme, Dutch Elm disease, etc. I think that they made a case for Dutch internment camps. It was obviously a joke, done well.
If Yale wants to be the joke, fine.
A new definition of insanity: people are sending their kids to this kind of “school” and paying these morons $43K a year.Added bonus: they will turn your kid to a full pledge communist/psychopath in the record time.
And what’s the bet that the paper ended with “… more research is needed in this area.” ie. send money.
This is perfect. The type of correlation that links STD’s to fracking is the same type of correlation that links CO2 to global warming.
Woo Hoo now talk about a totaly idiotic study who were the dumbells who came out with the load of Malarkey its so hard to beleive they would be this stupid to come up with such nonsense as this but as always the M.S. Media will take this as truth as they have with Climate Change and Evolution and Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez will use is to push their stupid ban on Fracking