The last page

Well that is it. Yesterday I was Jean Adams from The Times. On Monday I will be Jean Adams from Newcastle University again. No more struggles with incomprehensible geology research reports, no more flicking through the paper to see if my story made it.

The Times offered some temporary work next week. They were willing to pay £70 a day. I’m not sure how that compares to what I get paid by the university, but five weeks of paid leave is generous enough. I think I probably need to go back and build up a bit more good will before I try for another little adventure.

It has been frustrating (all those stories written and not printed), boring (remember the pictures?), exciting (my name in The Times), enlightening (press conferences with scientists who did and didn’t know how to sell their story to the papers), and entertaining (the prolonged discussion in the press room about whether the Pope thinks aliens could go to heaven). 

I will miss the pace of the work, the challenge of getting to grips with something new every day, the struggle to try harder and learn more in the hope that maybe this time my work will make the grade. In many ways it’s like academia – you read, you listen to people, you question, you try to think of a new angle, you write, you submit your work, sometimes you hit the jackpot, mostly you get rejected. But the cycle is so much quicker, the gratification so much faster, and the opportunity to brood over the rejection so much less that I feel it could be a good sidestep. Maybe just for a year or two until I got bored with it too. But I would be willing to give it a go.

If you see a job for a rookie reporter, let me know.

Off his brief

On Thursday The Right Honorable David Willetts MP, Minister of State for Universities and Science, came to speak to the British Science Festival. His main job was to speak at the dinner, but he also gave the press 30 minutes. Unfortunately I wasn’t there. But I heard what happened.

Apparently the minister was saying some things about how important it was to base policy and decisions on scientific evidence. So someone asked him why the NHS funds homeopathy when there’s little evidence supporting it. His response was that patients want homeopathy so the government pays for it. To which a journalist asked why people with cancer weren’t allowed expensive drugs, with evidence in favour of them, when they wanted them but NICE hadn’t approved them. The minister responded that NICE had an advisory role only and that GPs should be free to make decisions in the best interests of their patients.

This is how it was reported to me by some people who were there.

As it stands, NICE does not just have ‘an advisory role’. It does offer advice in some areas, but it also has a regulatory role. In particular, if NICE approves a drug for use then NHS organisations are obliged to pay for the drug should a patient and their doctor request it. If NICE hasn’t approved a drug, PCTs are left to make their own decisions: "The NHS is legally obliged to fund and resource medicines and treatments recommended by NICE's technology appraisals."

To say that NICE has only an advisory role is either a) wrong, or b) an indication of a change in policy. Given that Mr Willetts is a government minister, either possibility seems likely.

Apparently there was general hubbub after this incident. The science journalists thought it might be important, but they didn’t really know. Mr Willetts’ press officer came around to speak to each journalist in person to check whether they were going to write the story and pleading with them not to as the minister was speaking off his brief.

Most people didn’t write the story.

When I heard about this later, I was a bit aghast. I thought that either Mr Willetts being wrong about an important piece of government policy, or announcing a change in policy (perhaps prematurely) were both good stories. I couldn’t believe that they had let him off.

In the pub that evening, the man from the Irish Times suggested a number of things that might have happened. If the science journos just missed the real point, they might not have conveyed it properly to their news desks and so might have been told just to leave it. Or, because it was so late in the day (1630) the journos might just have felt a bit lazy, knowing that if they played up the story they would have been asked to follow it up with David Willets’ department as well as the Department of Health. All of which might have been a bit of a pain to do so near to home time.

And this is how news is made.

I wasn't going to tell you this.  It feels like a bit of gossip too far.  But it turns out that the only paper that did run the story was The Times.  Although, they too got it a bit wrong:

Full public responsibility

This little short was in yesterday's paper:

It is neither a particularly good representation of what the scientist said or what I wrote.  I think that what I wrote was a fairly accurate description of what Dr Rheumatoid Arthritis told us.  This piece is definitely not.  In particular, the headline has very little to do with what Dr RA said at all. 

I don't know at what point in the journey between my laptop and the printed paper these changes crept in, but I find the whole thing a little disconcerting.  In my normal life, having your name on something means that you take full public responsibility for it.  In this weird new life that I am experiencing, unidentified people can change anything you write and leave your name intact at the top.  Does that mean I still have to take full public responsibility for it?  If not, why bother putting my name on it? 

This makes me particularly uncomfortable because my normal life is hurtling towards me very quickly right now.  On Monday morning I am going to be Jean Adams from Newcastle University again, not Jean Adams from The Times.  What if someone asks me about that piece I wrote on rheumatoid arthritis?

The NIB*

Maybe you will have guessed from my tone that Tuesday was a slow news day at the British Science Festival. But we dutifully wrote and filed our copy. Two full pieces – one from science editor, one from science correspondent and media fellow combined. As we weren’t in the office on Wednesday morning with a big stack of papers to browse through, there was no opportunity to determine how successful we’d been.

“Have you seen the paper this morning?” asked science correspondent.

“There were a few things on the web” responded media fellow, optimistically.

“That doesn’t mean anything” said science editor, “I think your piece on alcohol got in as a NIB.”

“A NIB!” exclaim science correspondent and media fellow in unison, “we came all this way for a NIB?”

“Well, did you think there was anything worth more than a NIB yesterday?” asked science editor with sagacity and wisdom, “it’s not like there were any stories or anything.”

At least our piece got in as a NIB. Science editor’s piece didn’t even make it to the paper.

*News in brief. A hacking job done by someone who doesn’t get to work before noon that involves removing the majority of your words as well as your byline.

The big boys

In our press centre there’s a hard core of science journos from the dailies – The Times, Guardian, Inde, Telegraph, FT, Mail, Mirror and Irish Times. There’s also a man from the Press Association who is one of the gang and some other hangers on who, quite clearly, are not.

The people from The Times and the FT have media fellows who have taken on the persona. The man from The Guardian also has one, but she doesn’t seem to be quite so involved. We get to sit in there right amongst the big boys. Sometimes we even join in a bit of the jokes and banter. But basically it’s obvious that we’re the new girl/boy. Our one redeeming feature is that we both have medical degrees and so can reliably be called on to answer those “what’s the difference between a tendon and ligament?” questions (tendons join muscle to bone; ligaments join bone to bone).

So yesterday when Nature decided to call a press conference on C .difficile at 1230 when everybody already had enough material for three stories, guess what happened? FT man asked his media fellow to go just in case there was a good story there. Times woman looked at me hopefully. I knew what to do.

Oh the poor researchers. A paper in Nature is something you should be congratulated on, not have to defend to would-be journalists. Three media fellows amounted to 50% of the audience. All three of them doctors. All three of them working in public health. Two of them with a special interest in infectious diseases (yes, obviously me who doesn’t do infectious diseases). The other two quite skilfully identified that the research was of almost no relevance to the NHS, the Health Protection Agency, or patients.

We had are very own little huddle at the end. There was no story.

Press conferences

This is what happens. A bunch of journos sit in a big room with their laptops, their mobile phones and the all important data cables. Then a press officer shepherds them all into a lecture theatre where a scientist speaks to them for 5 minutes about their research, followed by 25 minutes for questions. Sometimes there is no real story, other times there is a great story but it doesn’t become clear until the last 5 minutes when the scientist lets slip about a teeny little thing they did last year but is actually a lot more interesting than any of the other things they have mentioned so far. Then the journos huddle up and swap notes on what was and wasn’t said and what the story might be. They grab coffee and return to the big room with the laptops. Then a press officer shepherds them all into a lecture theatre....


I took this photo through the blinds because I was too embarrassed to ask all those people for permission to take their photo.  I hope it give an impression, if not detail.

This happens five or six times a day. Well, actually only five or six times a morning. Because you can only catch a journo’s attention before about 2pm. After that they’re writing on a deadline and they are grumpy. Before that they are full of banter and gags and competitions re how many copies everybody’s latest book has sold and how many times they have each been slagged off by Ben Goldacre.

Then everybody files by about 6pm and they slouch off to the pub.

Really they’re a great bunch. Lively, curious, funny. Better at critical appraisal than most undergraduates and able to do it in a flash without ever having to actually read the research paper in question.

Through the afternoon the room is quiet, punctuated only by the guy from the Mirror asking if anyone can think of a single syllable word for protein.

Yesterday one of the press conferences was on something to do with turbulence. This is as much as I can tell you because, despite 30 minutes of intensive questions, I never got any further than it was something to do with turbulence. Eventually the lady from the Daily Mail asked if it would be possible for Dr Turbulence to just explain the key finding of his work. By the time he got to the stage of saying “Look at this jug of water, it wouldn’t be particularly interesting to observe for a prolonged period of time...” the soft giggles of the man from the Financial Times had deteriorated into loud guffaws. The room erupted. The journos stopped trying. There was no story.

Birmingham

Well it sure is nice to be back in student accommodation.

Actually it’s not that bad. Positively luxurious compared to the accommodation that I lived in when I was a real student. For instance, there is a shower and toilet in the room (obviously not just in the middle of the room...) and the toilet paper has an absorbency rating higher than tin foil.

Yesterday afternoon we had a little induction to the British Science Festival Press Centre from the people at the British Science Association. It is clearly fairly well kitted out with equipment, but not so well with windows. Right now it is all very unglamorous.

I haven’t been told very much about what I’m supposed to be doing over the next few days. But I’m getting the feeling that it involves going to press conferences 0845-1300, then writing something from them. I’m not sure how much writing or how many of them will be written on. In fact about all I have been told is “it’s very busy, you need to get there early”. I'm thinking that the fact that the science editor and science correspondent and me are all going says something about the level of coverage that might be expected. But it might not.

We were also given our press passes which, slightly disappointingly, don’t actually say PRESS on them. I’d really been looking forward to having a card I could stick in my hat band. I have no idea why it says ‘speaker’ on it. Whatever else I am doing, I am definitely not speaking at this conference.

Home

Yesterday I spent another inordinate amount of time trying to get out of London.  I had that awful heartsink moment when you arrive at King's Cross to see your train cancelled.  Somehow I managed to wangle myself onto one of the very few trains that went beyond Newark on the East Coast Mainline last night.  It certainly wasn't the train I was supposed to be on, but it's not like there were any staff on the train.  Would you believe someone stole some overhead cables in the Newark area?  Who would do that?  On a Friday afternoon of all times.  Who is it who has never been away from home and got to the station only to find their train cancelled?

But I'm here all in one piece with all my stuff and even a little bit of a refund from East Coast coming my way. 

Would you like to see some of the lovely things that confirm I am definitely home?

Hmmm.  Washing on the line, sheeps in the field, blue skies and green for as far as you can see.  Doesn't it all just make you glad to be alive?  We spent this afternoon picking brambles from the hedgerows in the lanes around and about our house.  Now there is a big pan of bramble and apple mush in the bottom oven that we will strain overnight and make into jelly tomorrow.  Oh how idyllic it all is.  How very different from smelly old London.

On Monday I leave for the British Science Festival in smelly old Birmingham.

p20, page lead

Oh my goodness.  I am clearly so totally blase (sorry, don't seem to be able to get an acute accent on that e and I know it will bother you pedants) about having articles in The Times that I totally forgot to tell you about this:

Page 20 of Thursday's paper. 

Apparently it caused a bit of hoo-ha.  I went to a press conference about the research on Wednesday morning.  When I came back and told the science correspondent about it she screwed up her face a bit and said: "Hmm, doesn't sound that interesting.  To be honest, looking at tomorrow's schedule, I'm pretty sure it wont get in the paper".  So I sat down and got on with something else.

Then at about 4pm, I decided what the hell and wrote it anyway.  Miss Science Correspondent was actually rather impressed with my story and filed it and even flagged it specially to the news desk as something not on the schedule but maybe worth considering.

It turns out that the Daily Mail and the Independent ran it as front page news.  It was also fairly high up the Today programme running order on radio 4.  So if we (by which I mean, the organisation that I now totally identify with) hadn't run it there would have been uproar.  I hadn't quite realised that there is an expectation that if 'our readers' have heard about a credible story through any other outlet, they will expect it to be in The Times - or at least that's the way the head honchos think about it.  Which explains the exponential increase in media screeching that sometimes happens - if one outlet runs something and it's worth anything, everybody else feels it's their duty to cover the same thing.  They don't see it as whipping up a frenzy, they just see it as providing the service that their readers, listeners, viewers expect.

One of the editorial people even came over to congratulate me on the story.  Actually, I think he came over to give me a bit of a row for not flagging it up as an important story earlier in the day, but after he'd come over to our patch and said: "does anyone know who this Jean Adams is?", I think he realised that I was not a regular and not worth giving a row to and just said: "nice story" and turned around again and walked away.

Sainsbury's

We're gearing up for the British Science Festival now. This takes place next week in Birmingham and will be, I am reliably informed, a bit of a 'media frenzy'.

The press launch was on Thursday in the nice part of the RI. Lots of people were there, including Pallab Ghosh from the BBC. This is the second time I've been in a press conference and turned around to a voice I recognised before realising that I knew the speaker from radio 4, not real life. Vivienne Parry from Inside the Ethics Committee, was the other, in case you're interested. Neither look anything like expected, although as soon as I say that I start to wonder exactly what it was I was expecting them to look like.

The press launch was a very odd affair. Or at least I found it that way. Maybe these things happen all the time and are totally normal.

First off Lord Sainsbury, a science minister in the last government, gave a summary of his presidential address. He his president of the British Science Association, who run the festival. He will give a presidential address next week during the festival. He gave the press a summary of the address the week before. Does that sound weird to you?

His summary was full of "I will say this, then summarise that, then use the following examples to illustrate that....".

This clearly is how the Today programme can report that so and so will tell ministers today that... But I hadn't quite appreciated exactly how formal the whole thing was. What about if you're a super last minute person and don't have your speech ready until 2 minutes before delivery? What are you supposed to say at the press briefing then?

By the way, this is all strictly embargoed until 0001hrs on Tuesday 14th September.

Richmond House

In my normal life I probably get invited to at least one thing each and every week that I'd like to go to but can't because it's in London.  So, just for once, it's nice to have the chance to go to a meeting at the Department of Health in Richmond House.

Well not a 'meeting' as such.  More a demo. 

This is a bunch of postgraduate science students protesting against DH proposals to register acupuncturists, and practitioners of Chinese and other traditional medicine.  They argue that a registration scheme would give the impression that traditional medicine and it's practitioners are equivalent to western medicine and it's practitioners. 

I took a little test on old wives' medicine - what common spread should you put on a burn etc.  Then, because I got 100% in the test, I got a diploma.

I didn't tell them that I was there for The Times, or that I have a 'diploma' in western medicine.  Probably all very naughty.  But I did establish that none of them were doctors of medicine, and that they didn't have any evidence that a registration scheme for practitioners of traditional medicine would give any particular impression. 

When I got back to the office I further established that the 'proposals' they were arguing about came from a DH consultation document that described a number of possible registration schemes but didn't actually propose anything in particular.  The consultation was circulated last July with a deadline for comments of October 2009. 

The whole thing seemed a bit odd to me.  But it was fun to do get out and do a little bit of undercover reporting.  Maybe I will write something for the Eureka Blog on it.  I will certainly file my diploma with my other one.  It might come in handy.

So what is 'news'?

News is new, dumbo.  But it also seems to have to be interesting, or surprising, or intriguing.  And it has to speak to the reader ("our readers") as patient, parent, tax payer or perhaps voyeur.  Someone told me the other day that if the opposite of what you're about to write about is more surprising than your story, then you probably shouldn't write the story. 

Yesterday I was sent to another media briefing at the Science Media Centre.  The SMC is part of the Royal Institute.  The RI is dripping with Victorian grandeur.  The SMC is tucked away into two rather grotty rooms at the back of the RI and the hacks have a separate door.  Presumably so they don't mess up the glorious RI entrance hall.

The briefing was on new research on violence in people with bipolar disorder.  Data from Sweden shows that people with bipolar disorder are no more violent than people without bipolar disorder, but only if they don't abuse alcohol or illegal substances.  Those people with bipolar disorder who take drugs are six times more likely to be involved in violent crime than those who don't.  But people with bipolar disorder are also 20 times more likely to take drugs than people without. 

You can understand that the hacks were a bit confused.  So they aren't more violent.  Except when they're high.  And they're more likely to be high.  So they are more violent?  "Yes," said Prof. Forensic Psychiatrist, "but they're not more violent because they're mentally ill, it's because they take drugs."  But they take drugs because they're mentally ill?

Prof. Psychiatrist was patient.  He was calm and he tried to answer every question.  The reporter from the BMJ led the questioning.  He's pretty sharp.  You will be glad to know that everyone was very polite.  There was absolutely no "why exactly have we come here to be told that mentally ill people take drugs and commit violent crime?"

I wrote a story on 'post-natal' depression in fathers instead.

The opener

I flatter myself that I can write a news story.  What I definitely can not do is write an opener.  The most common comment I have received over the last few weeks is a variant on: "That's great, Jean.  Can we just have another look at the first two pars...."

This is a great opener.  Says it all in three sweet words.  Totally grammatically incorrect.  But it hooks you in and that's all it has to do.  Why would you go to any other shop - this one's open 24 hours.

So why is it that I can't get the hang of the opener?  There seem to be some rules.  There's the who, what, where, when and why rule.  Which means that you need to answer all these questions in the first sentence, or two.  Which can be tricky, but not impossible.

Then there's the 'immediacy' rule.  You might think: "New research published today shows that doctors make rubbish journalists,"  is beautiful.  But have a look at a newspaper.  Almost invariably the first sentence of a report on research will take the much more clunky (in my opinion) form of: "Doctor's make rubbish journalists, shows new research published today."  I have learnt this rule and applied it almost religiously, despite thinking the results are invariably ugly.  I once tried bending the rule and moving the today bit back to nearer the start of the sentence.  I was reminded of the immediacy rule.

So I can apply these rules, but I still don't seem to be able to write a good opener.  Today my piece on bariatric surgery was returned four times before the opener was deemed acceptable by the health editor.  And you know it still wont get published.

Are you for the bridge?

Well I had a lovely weekend. Thanks for asking. The long wait at Gatwick resulted in a rather late arrival in the Belfast. But I got there eventually. My rather splendid M had sorted everything out including nice apartment, teeny hire car, maps for adventures and cheese sandwiches necessities.

Saturday began with a bit of a lazy loll in bed with this very belated birthday present. Oh my goodness, I can barely contain myself. What state of purgatory is this to have a new cake book and be away from home, baking cupboard and Aga for another two weeks? There's gonna be a cake fest when I get home.

Then Saturday afternoon was spent on a tour of some of the northern sights. The rope bridge at Carrick-a-Rede was originally used to access salmon grounds. Well, not this one, but a precursor. The National Trust have made it all rather safe. But the weather was a little wild and it was all quite atmospheric.

Next the Giant's Causeway. Which is a lot smaller than on the telly. This could have done with a lot more crashing waves, but we had some fun making up pseudo-scientific reasons for exactly how the rock got to be the way it is.

Sunday was reserved for an assault on the highest peak in N Ireland. This is a slightly ridiculous ploy of M's that involves climbing the highest peak in somewhere on or around his birthday. So far we have done Scotland, England, Wales and southern Ireland. You will see that this is going to turn into a progressively bigger undertaking as the years go on.

It felt like everyone on the whole island of Ireland was climbing Slieve Donard today. You can't blame them. There are fantastic views of the Mountains of Mourne and the Scottish islands from the top.

Evacuate

It's been a while, but I haven't missed long delays at the airport on Friday evenings.

A few years ago I did an MSc in London whilst still living in Northumberland.  I flew down on Thursday mornings and back on Friday evening.  And before you ask, this was the only way I could get to class on time without leaving before 0530.  For some reason the outward journey was generally fine, but I have spent many Friday evenings waiting the long wait at Gatwick or Heathrow.

A trip to Belfast this weekend, a fire alert airside at Gatwick, and here I am still waiting to go.  Should have stayed in London and gone to the Science Museum.

Science news

The Times have being giving a LOT of space to Stephen Hawking's new book recently which they managed to obtain exclusive advanced access to.  How exciting for one of the science correspondents to be on the front page on both Thursday and Friday this week.

Although absolutely nothing to do with me, it was great to see how much encouragement and congratulations the correspondent involved got.  Lots of people dropping by to say well done, lots of enthusiasm from the editorial people, lots of requests for follow up ideas. 

This particular science correspondent has a PhD in medical physics and was a BSA media fellow four years ago.  Hmmm.  Maybe that will be me in four years.  Maybe....  I still need to catch her to find out about exactly how she went from PhD at Cambridge to front page of The Times. 

So with everyone else busy thinking up new angles on the 'god unnecessary for universe' scoop, guess what yours truly got to do?  The other science lead.  Oh yes I did.  And a story on a Newcastle scientist to boot.

The press officer from Newcastle even contacted me to congratulate me on a piece well done - some of the better coverage of the work and great publicity for the Institute of Ageing & Health and for the University, apparently.  I'm trying to think that I am finally making progress.  But I think everyone else was just too busy.

Highs and lows

Yesterday I was asked to find and write up a 'case study' to accompany a story the science editor was writing on stem cell tourism.

A press briefing had been given by some UK stem cell scientists and the Parkinson's Society warning about the growing trend for British people to go abroad for unproven stem cell therapy. Generally it seems to be people with chronic, debilitating illnesses like multiple sclerosis, motor neurone disease and Parkinson's.

The general approach to the case study is to phone round the large relevant charities and support groups and ask if they know anyone with the appropriate history who would be willing to speak to the press. It is generally accepted as taking ages. Which is why people like me are asked to do it. I started phoning at 10.30am and finally decided I had done my best, phoned enough people and left enough messages two hours later.

Despite the thousands of people who are supposed to be going on stem cell holidays, I didn't get the impression that many were talking to their charities about it. We told the subs not to expect a case study.

But then at about 4pm someone from the MS society finally rang back with the contact details of a woman who had been to Holland for what she later came to believe was 'bogus' stem cell therapy. Bingo - I thought. Blog fodder - science editor thought.

But I rang the woman anyway. It seemed rude not to and I don't mind providing blog fodder. She was great. Open, thoughtful, even a bit inspiring. I wrote it up and filed it just in case.

O.M.G. They loved it. The news editor, or deputy, or someone important said it was "a great piece of reporting". The science editor said it really raised the profile of the story.

Reader, they printed my case study in the paper.

Today, I was told we were going to compile a 'Power 100' most influential people in UK science for the science supplement Eureka! Don't worry, I didn't have to work out the hundred people, they had that already. I had to write 50 word biographies of them all. By 4pm I thought I might die of boredom. By 6.30pm I had seventy done. Which leaves thirty still to go tomorrow. Snore.

But at least I wasn't one if the three people who today had to read TB's book, all 750+ pages of it, and have hourly meetings about the good bits. Appraisal from the guy sitting nearest us: surprisingly badly written and much more than we need to know about his toilet habits.

Mmmm

Skimmed milk, 0% fat frozen yoghurt, blueberries, raspberries and blackberries.  Enjoyed in a little green oasis between Oxford Street and Trafalgar Square.  Yum.

Research

I think I'm quite good at research.  I'm not always great at executing it perfectly, but I think I have a pretty good grasp of the basics of good study design and data analysis.  I try not to forget about simple things like specifying the population, intervention, comparator and outcome.

Yesterday the London correspondent (yes, really and would you believe she's from New Zealand) was running around the news room like a newly decapitated chicken looking for a 'researcher'.  Can I help?  Jean Adams, media fellow, here for a month. 

Yes, the deputy editor wants me to do a story on travel disruption around sporting events.  I need to know if there was any disruption on the tube lines serving the London football grounds during home matches.  Just do since January.  Just on the weekends.  Premiership matches only, don't bother about the FA cup or anything.  Just do Arsenal and Chelsea.

She seemed frantic, so I just did what I was told - found all the home, weekend, premiership fixtures for Arsenal and Chelsea since January.  Worked out what tube lines the stadiums were on.  Searched for disruption on the Transport for London website.  I knew it was stupid, (the population is neither complete nor a good sample - not all the clubs, not all the matches; there's no comparator; the specified 'outcome' doesn't seem necessarily relevant - station closure at the opposite end of the line from the stadium might not be important) but she seemed pretty clear that's what she wanted.  I rather forced at least a fuller sample on her by including Fulham and Spurs as well.

As soon as she saw the data, Ms London Correspondent worked out it was stupid too.  We shouldn't look at the whole of the lines serving the stadiums, just around the stadiums.

As soon as she saw that data, she worked out that was stupid too.  Jean, what do you mean by "around the stadium"?

As soon as she saw that data, she worked out that was stupid too, but I think by then time had run out and we were going with whatever we had.  At least she was kind enough to give me a credit on her article and there was another funky graphic.

You will notice that there is no mention of Arsenal at the Emirates here.  That's because there was no tube disruption around the Emirates during the study period.

Critical appraisal anyone?

Front page

No, obviously not THE front page.  But for a short time one of my pieces was featured on the on-line front page.

Just there in the beige bar on the right, fifth item down, it says "Blog: the science of bicycle lanes".  That's my blog post!  I'm sorry if you can't quite make it out - that's as big as I can make it.  Bet you wish you had an iPad now and could just stretch it and make it grow to your heart's content.

In other news, I did the research behind another graphic that I didn't get a print credit for.  This one's a bit more stupid, I thought.  The story was about the first full sequencing of a wheat genome.  This is big news because it opens up the potential for genetic modification to develop hardier types of wheat that can grow anywhere and solve all famine ever.  Or at least that's how the news editor wanted to spin it.  So we had to have a graphic showing that hungry countries rely on wheat.  But they don't, they generally rely on maize, rice and cassava. 

The graphic is all made up from real data. It's just a bit selective.

Copy

Well you might not think it's that interesting (I'm not sure I do), but given that my BPA copy didn't make it to print, I thought you might like to read it.  At least it proves that I've learnt to write like a journo.
----------------------------

Jean Adams

A chemical found in some babies’ bottles and food packaging has been linked to increased testosterone levels in men by new research.

The findings, from a team at Peninsula Medical School in Exeter, offer some support for laboratory studies that have shown an association between exposure to Bisphenol A (BPA) and changes in the sex hormones testosterone and oestrogen in animals.

Evidence on the link between BPA and sex hormones in humans has been more mixed and comes from very small studies. Two large studies have found a link between BPA and both heart disease and diabetes in the USA. Concerns have also been expressed about the influence of BPA on child development.

The new study of 715 Italian adults, which is published in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, appears to support such suggestions of an effect on testosterone.

Independent scientists, however, pointed out that the changes seen are much smaller than natural variations in testosterone levels, and said the study does not reveal any health risks.

Professor Richard Sharpe from the University of Edinburgh, said: "The change in testosterone levels due to BPA [seen in this study] is far less than occurs naturally in men. There is therefore no reason to suppose that the observed change presents a health risk to men."

BPA is thought to interfere with the natural breakdown of testosterone in the bloodstream. It may also trigger the body to produce more testosterone than normal.

Prof David Coggon Professor from the University of Southampton, said: "This is an interesting observation, but it needs to be independently replicated. If it is confirmed then further research will be required to understand the biochemical mechanisms underlying the relationship and its significance for health."

In the study, BPA in urine was monitored over 24 hours and levels of testosterone and oestrogen measured in blood. Higher BPA was associated with small increases in testosterone in the 332 men included. There was no association between BPA and testosterone in women, or between BPA and oestrogen in either men or women.

Professor David Melzer from Peninsula Medical School, who was involved in the research, said: "This is the first big study of BPA from a European country and shows that higher exposure to BPA is statistically associated with modest changes in levels of testosterone in men. This finding is consistent with the evidence from laboratory experiments."

As BPA is rapidly broken down by the body and excreted in the urine, BPA in urine is only a short-term measure of exposure to BPA. The long-term effects of BPA exposure are not known. Nor are the implications of today's findings for human health.

BPA is one of the world's highest production volume chemicals. It is found in some baby and water bottles, medical and dental devices, dental fillings, and as a coating on the inside of many food and beverage cans. Most human exposure to BPA is thought to occur when BPA leaks from food containers into the food we eat.

A number of countries have now banned the use of BPA from baby's bottles. The UK Food Standard's Agency current position on BPA states that "Current level of consumer exposure to BPA from food contact materials does not represent a food safety risk for consumers." BPA use has not been banned in the UK.

ends
----------------------------
 
Presumably there's no BPA in my metal water bottle.
 

Graphics

After my rant the other day about sourcing images, I thought I should say something nice about graphics.  Today the science editor was working on a story on biosynthetic corneas.  As corneal surgery doesn't make for pretty pictures, he thought a graphic of the process would be better.  I got the job of researching and sketching out what the graphic should include, before sending the brief to the graphics man.

A couple of hours later, look what the nice graphics man brought round for me to check:

How cool is that?  How good would it be if we had a graphics man on site at the university who could whip up this sort of thing in a morning?  Ooooh.  I want one.  And I almost want my graphic to get to the paper more than I want my writing to.

Press conferences and responsible journalism

Well I went to my press briefing.  It turned out there really wasn't very much to it and I probably didn't need someone to show me what to do after all.  I"m not sure why there needed to be a press conference - it could have gone in a press release.  But if I hadn't gone, I wouldn't have got a pre-publication copy of the paper and the press pack.

The story was not quite as I had anticipated.  The new findings were not to do with cocaine, but to do with teachers rather than professional counsellors delivering an alcohol/drugs programme to school age children.  When I got back to the office I had to pitch the story to the health correspondent and get the go ahead to write it.

The research is about a form of screening and brief intervention for drug and alcohol use in children.  Year 9 kids are screened for personality traits associated with substance use.  Those who score more than one standard deviation above the mean on any of the four personality traits of interest are given two 90 minute sessions of counselling based on cognitive-behavioural therapy, motivational interviewing and positive psychology.  At two years follow up, the intervention is associated with a 40% decrease in binge drinking, and similarly large decreases in use of other substances.  The new work has shown that teachers can be trained to deliver the counselling as effectively as psychologists.

This is what I thought the lead was: "Teachers can reduce the likelihood that 13 year olds will become binge drinkers by 40% with just two sessions of counselling, new research has revealed." 

This is what the health correspondent told me the real lead was: "A simple class-room test can identify those teenagers likely to become binge drinkers, said psychologists today." 

The news editor was interested, but only if we could print the screening test.  So I wrote the story, found the test and added it in.  But then just as I was sending it through, I thought: "we can't do this; this is not a diagnostic test; this counselling will not be available to all and sundry; this is totally irresponsible."  When I voiced my concerns I was told that that's what we're paid to do.  In retrospect, I probably should just have said I couldn't find the test.  But I didn't think of that soon enough.

I worried about it overnight.  I hoped that no one whose opinion I respected would see my name on the story.  I shouldn't have worried.  Of course Sam Cam's baby bumped all other health news....  Once again my story didn't make it.

So just as I was coming to terms with "irresponsible" journalism, a curious thing happened.  The science editor asked me to do a story on BPA and testosterone.  BPA is a chemical used in food packaging and baby's bottles.  There has been some concern about the health and neuro-developmental effects of BPA, but existing non-animal evidence is limited.  "This is a story that will need some care" I was told.  "You need to make it interesting, but be careful not to sensationalise it.  Even if this doesn't get in the paper, it will be a really good learning experience for you to give this a go."

I gave it a go.  I tried to be measured, but highlight the new findings.  I got in all the good quotes about increases in testosterone don't necessarily mean detrimental to health.  I was pretty pleased and it was filed with minimal rearrangement.

So is the Times responsible or irresponsible?  Sober or sensationalist?  I had thought the former, but my experience with the screening test made me start to worry about the latter.  My conclusion is that different journalists really are different.  The science editor has enough clout that he can be a bit more measured.  The health correspondent is still trying to establish his own career.  Me?  Turns out I just do what I'm told and then worry about it later.

Bloggin'

There must be a hack-speak word for when your story doesn’t get printed. My piece on worldwide shortages of radio-isotopes for medical imaging didn’t make it to the paper or the web-site. But my blog post on placebos did make it to the blog.

There is something slightly strange about the this. There is more on the Times on-line site than in the paper. You have to pay to view the on-line site. But as a “journalist” it’s easier for me to get my stuff on-line than in the paper. Obviously there are space and lay-out constraints in the paper that don’t apply on-line. But you have to wonder if the paywall is a bit of a swizz, if all you’re getting access to is the detritus that didn’t make it to the paper. Probably if they employed me I would get sacked for saying that. It is totally inappropriate to describe all of their on-line content as “detritus”. I haven’t even looked at most of it.

Today I have to go to a “press briefing” at the Royal Institute. This is sort of exciting – morning out of the office. But also a little scary – I’m representing the Times. Everybody else is too busy. Which is probably a good indication of how important the Times feels the press briefing is. I have never been to a press briefing, press conference, press anything before. When I asked what I was supposed to do it went along the lines of “oh just go and take some notes”. And you thought “see one, do one, teach one” was rushing it. Maybe there genuinely isn’t much to it, and I’ll work it out when I get there.

The briefing is on reducing smoking, drinking and drug-use amongst school children, with a particular focus on some new research on preventing cocaine use. I have done my homework. In 2009, the one-year incidence of cocaine use in 11-15 year olds was 1.2%. I’m not sure this is a serious public health problem. Which is presumably why I’m going.

My oyster card and me

Today me and my oyster card went on an adventure in the big smoke. 

The first thing we did was go to this very, very cool yarn shop.  You don't get yarn shops in Newcastle.  Well.  There is a yarn selection at John Lewis and Fenwicks.  But they don't stock a very exciting range.  You couldn't really call them Yarn Shops.

This yarn shop extended over two floors of lovely natural fibreness.  Lambswool, alpaca, cashmere, organic cotton.  Ooooh.  It was all very soft and snuggly.  And in beautiful colours.  But it was also VERY expensive.  There was even some very lovely Cashmere for £32 a skein.  I costed some nice merino yarn for a crochet blanket at around £180.  And at that thought I was on my way out.  But then I decided that was a bit daft.  So I did buy just a few little skeins.  Nothing too extravagant.  It was a bargain really.

It is a worsted weight organic cotton from Blue Sky Alpaca, in case you need details.  I will use it for some crochet cushion covers for my study, I think.  It wasn't a bargain at all.  It was REALLY expensive and I was glad for that "significant public salary".  It was a totally extravagant treat.

Oyster card didn't get any yarn.  He's a bit upset because his mum said that from now on she's only going to give him money for essential travel.  But he quite liked looking.

After nosying around the Islington outdoor antiques market for a while, we headed up here:

I was going to treat Oyster Card to a cake and a cup of tea and a little sit down.  But Ottolenghi Islington turns out to be pretty small.  Or at least the counter area is small.  It was absolutely heaving with people.  All cramped and noisy and busy.  So I just bought a cake and decided to take it to the park to eat in the fresh air.  They didn't want me to take pics inside, but I thought you might like to see the cake display from through the window.  The savoury display was just as gorgeous. 

A little flustered by the general busy-ness of the place, I found selecting a cake a bit difficult.  This was my choice:

Cherry chocolate cupcake with sour cream and pistachio.  Outrageously, it cost almost as much as a skein of yarn.  But it was a pretty good cake.  Very good quality chocolate, a good quantity of real cherries in the actual cake, and the sour cream provided a nice, sharp, clean contrast to the sweetness of the chocolate and cherry.  Frankly a significant improvement on the cherry chocolate cupcakes in one of Nigella's books.  I might try and see if I can work out how to replicate....

Reinvigorated, we pushed onto the main business of the day: The Foundling Museum.  Oyster Card made me walk.  He reckoned it wasn't "essential travel" and so he probably shouldn't spend money on transport.

The Foundling Hospital was established in the mid-eighteenth century.  Apparently it was one of the first places for abandoned children in the country.  It pre-dates Barnardo's by about 100 years.  It was set up by a guy called Capt. Coram with the help of, amongst others, Hogarth and Handel.  This little remnant of the original infirmary houses a small history of the Hospital, plus a Handel collection, and some other foundling related art. 

It was great.  Obviously some very sad little objects, letters and poems left by mothers with their babies.  But also some rather uplifting tales, paintings and photos.  The whole enterprise was dismantled between the wars and the Hospital building torn down.  But the community managed to save some of the land - now Coram's Field (after Capt. Coram).  This is the reason that all adults have to be accompanied by a child in order to go into Coram's Field.  It's the same Coram as book and play Coram Boy.

Although clearly very institutional and regimented, apparently the regime was rather enlightened for the time.  All children were inoculated against small pox (there's a Jenner Street around the corner).  They were also provided with a 'healthy' diet - although this didn't include any fruit or vegetables.  Children under 6 were placed with families.  No explanation was given for why they couldn't stay with those families.

In one place a display said "seventy-five per cent of children in London died before the age of five".  No details given about when or what was counted as London.  But this seems unbelievable to me.  Surely this can't be true?

Now home, Oyster Card and I are both a little exhausted by our adventure.  I don't think he'll be going out again for a while.

Sourcing images

Neither my piece on the Samoan earthquakes (filed with only minor changes), nor my one on breastfeeding stats (totally rewritten by health correspondent) made it to the paper.  They didn't even make it to the website.  What a big fat waste of time.  Frankly, it's inefficient.  We should get the Office of Budget Responsibility onto it.

Over the last few days I've been relegated to sourcing pictures from Google Image.  I'm trying hard not to think that this is direct a result of my total failure to get my last few pieces into print.  But it might be.

The Times publishes Eureka! - a science magazine - on the last Thursday of every month.  This month is the one year anniversary of Eureka!, and to celebrate they are releasing an iPad app on sports science.  I think this also has a lot to do with the Times charging for access to on-line content.  If they're going to charge, they'd better provide something good. 

My job has been to find images to accompany the text pieces that will go in the app.  For some reason they all have to be 'small' - as in microscopic, molecular, or just a good close-up.  I'm not sure what this has to do with sports science at all, but that's what I was asked to do.  I also have to provide 20-30 words on each image providing "an explanation, not just a description, of what we're seeing".

I have spent about 10 hours over the last two days doing this.  Searching Google Image, choosing pics, copy and pasting them into a word doc, writing 20-30 words.  For a while I was quietly amused that this is the sort of thing I would normally get someone else to do.  But what would happen if the Sun found out that I was being paid a significant salary from public money for this?  What about all my education and skills?  Don't anyone make the "all that education and no real-life skills" comment - I already know I'm doing this because I have nothing much else to offer.

You will understand that there are no images to accompany this post.

Cycling, part 2

I wonder if you know what this is?

It's a ghost bike.  A memorial for a cyclist, left near where they were killed on the road.  This one is on the southern approach to Tower Bridge on my way to work.  I noticed it the very first time I cycled past.  There was a bus in front of me with an advert about cycling safety on it.  I find it very poignant and especially like the little bundle of dried flowers.  But it also makes me a gulp.  How stupid is this cycling in the city lark?  "Lethal" according to my landlord.

Someone spotted me cycling the other day.  "You look like a real Londoner", they said.  I'm not sure if that's a complement or not.  I'm trying hard not to act like a real Londoner.  I have a real concern that if everybody just starts jumping red lights, the whole nature of society as we know it will collapse. 

In print

Can you see that?  The most important thing is that you can see a) my name, and b) that this is definitely a proper newspaper.  My technical adviser recommended a screen shot from the on-line version.  But I wanted you to see the real thing.  Page 6 of today's Times.  Aren't I clever?  Well actually not very.  The science editor was nice enough to say that what he did to my draft was just "tarting up".  I think it was a little more than that.

But somehow I managed to learn something from yesterday.  Today I wrote a piece on a Nature paper on a Samoan earthquake.  This time I got "okay, I'm going to file this with just a few stylistic changes".  Woopee.  Result.  Maybe you can have another picture of a newspaper tomorrow.  Depends on the subs and senior subs and the copy tasters and a bunch of other people who don't come in until 3pm but might work all night.

Then this afternoon it all went bad again.  New DH statistics on breastfeeding show not much change from last year.  Have a look and see if you can find a story in there.  Phone the NCT and the Royal College of Midwives.  See if they've got anything to say.  There's probably nothing.  But then me prodding seems to lead to the Royal College of Midwives writing and circulating a press release to all and sundry.  So now everyone's going to have it and will be writing something so we have to too.

So I scrapped about and tried to draw my quotes together.  I write nice things about the organisations who had helpful press officers.  I somehow forget the 500 words limit.  I knew what I'd written wasn't any good.  But it was nearly 7pm and I wasn't quite sure how to make it better.  A lot more than "tarting up" happened to my breastfeeding story.  Serious surgery.

Today's lessons: focus on the so what, don't feel you have to be nice about the people who spoke to just because they were nice about you, don't ever write too much....

It's only day three.

First days

When I walked into the news room at The Times I almost blurted out how like The Wire it looked.  It must be the real thing - it looks like it does on the telly.  A massive room jam packed with desks, computers and people.  Overflowing with books and reports and general paper detritus.  Miles to the nearest window.  Men outweigh women by about 5:1. 

The Health Editor is on holiday so I have his desk for the next few weeks.  Lots of people seem to be on holiday, which means that the daily science team is currently made up of me, a health correspondent and the science editor.  The science editor reports to the news editor.  Upstairs there is, allegedly, another team working on the monthly science pull-out, Eureka.  But I haven't met them yet so can't confirm this.

So far, I've written a few posts for the science blog and written a story for the print edition on an evolutionary biology paper exploring the effect on brothers on female sexual maturation.  Well, I wrote a draft of a story on the paper.  Then the science editor showed me how he might revise it before filing it.  He was very complementary about my first try.  But really I think he wrote more of it than I did....  He said almost exactly the same thing as I say to so many students: the ideas are good, it's just not expressed very well.  Maybe it'll get into tomorrow's paper, maybe it wont. 

Today's learning points: short sentences; a new paragraph for each new idea; simple; cut to the chase.  I thought I knew all that.  Must keep practicing.

Cycling

According to google maps, where I live in Stockwell is 4.2 miles from where I work in Wapping.  Google suggested a walking route that I thought would be fine for cycling.  It was and is fine.  But guess what else I found?  What's blue, 1.5m wide and is almost as good as the information superhighway? 

It's the Cycle Superhighway.  Isn't it beautiful?  Isn't that a nice shade of blue?  On the bit across Southwark Bridge, it is even physically divided from the main carriageway.  Around Elephant & Castle it takes a slightly round about route through the back streets which is a bit of a pain.  But truly even I, with full bike swagger, am a little scared to cycle a folding bike around Elephant & Castle.

The Cycle Superhighway is sponsored by Barclays.  I think that might be why it's blue.  But maybe it was going to be blue all along and they had to find a sponsor who was happy with that.  I find it a bit odd that a bike route might be sponsored by anyone.  But why not?  If that's what it takes.  Cycling on the superhighway is a bit like a bike race.  People flying past, jostling of wheels at junctions.  My limited gear ratio means that I must maintain a stately plodding speed and not race anyone.  At the moment this is fine.  It gives me a chance to have a look at the world.  Maybe when it's raining and I'm late, it will become more frustrating.

But look what else there is.  Not just nice blue lines, also some nice blue bikes.

These are available to hire on an hourly, daily or yearly rate.  I think GBP45 per year.  What a bargain.  And yes I did see some people riding them, not dumping them in the river.  I saw 4 or 5 men in suits on blue bikes this evening, presumably riding home.

Is it sad that it makes me happy to be alive because there is a city in the world where there are big blue cycle lanes that drivers respect and nice bikes to hire to ride on them?

Preparation

I am an academic. Academic habit no. 1: When in doubt do a literature review. First thing I did on hearing I was going to be spending a month at the Times? Ordered some books on science writing from amazon.

The first book was pretty poor. I can't remember what it was called - probably just as well. It was a skinny little thing on writing magazine and newspaper features in general, not science in particular. It devoted a lot of space to grammar and making sure you tell the truth. Maybe it's skinniness was its key redeeming feature - it didn't take too long to read. I put it in a pile with a vague thought that it could be useful for a particularly illiterate future undergrad.

Book number 2 was more promising. Again fairly skinny but this time written by the editor of an American university's science magazine. I had never heard of such a thing. In fact, maybe the best thing I learnt from this book was that big American universities have in-house science review magazines. These are written by journalists and intended for alumni. They function both to keep people in touch with their unis, do a bit of PR for the unis, and also to inform. What great idea. We should have one. I might suggest it. Given that a key feature is that they are written by journalists, this is a good idea that giving voice to could never back fire in a "good idea Jean, why don't you lead on that"?

I have carried the third book with me on various trips and journeys over the last few months. Until this afternoon it remained unread. Now I've managed to read the first 50 pages or so. It's an edited volume of top tips. On the whole I'm not a big fan of edited volumes. I get sea sick from too frequent changes in style and voice. But actually I'm quite liking this. Each chapter is only about 2000-4000 words, so it's good for the distracting circumstances of a train journey. But each writer also seems to have been given a pretty clear brief and stuck to it. There is a feeling of progression, if not narrative. Is it only academics who can't keep to a brief and sling in contributions to edited volumes that barely hit somewhere 500yds from the mark? Maybe it's to do with a lack of experience of editorial control. Or maybe they're just not journalists.