Psychedelic medicine group investigating a board member accused of elder financial abuse

A leading psychedelics organization has launched an investigation into one of its board members after STAT reported allegations that she had taken financial advantage of an elderly Holocaust survivor and philanthropist who regularly used hallucinogenic drugs. The Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies said it is reviewing claims of financial elder abuse against board member Vicky Dulai, who was helping to care for George Sarlo, her longtime companion. The decision is an about-face for MAPS, which previously said it had not investigated because no credible claims had been made. MAPS’s compliance team will review the allegations, spokesperson Betty Aldworth wrote in an email to STAT. She did not explain what prompted the reversal. Dulai has denied the allegations and settled a lawsuit filed by a court-appointed temporary conservator for Sarlo’s estate. STAT’s Olivia Goldhill has more.

CDC watching U.K.'s unusual monkeypox outbreak

Seven monkeypox cases in the U.K. have sparked concern at the CDC that there could be some undetected transmission of the virus in that country in an outbreak that could possibly spread beyond its borders. “You have two clusters that have no link to travel or to other people who are known to be associated with a recognized outbreak. It suggests that there are unknown chains of transmission happening,” Jennifer McQuiston, a senior CDC official, told STAT’s Helen Branswell in an interview. “It just puts us on alert to be thinking: Could this be spreading outside the U.K.?” Seven confirmed and one probable case of monkeypox have been discovered in the U.K. since early May — an unusually large number given that human monkeypox cases are rare outside West and Central Africa. Read more.

FDA authorizes Covid boosters for 5- to 11-year-olds

Now it’s younger kids’ turn for boosters. Yesterday, the FDA cleared healthy 5- to 11-year olds to receive Covid-19 vaccine boosters as U.S. cases are climbing. The authorization comes before any formal recommendation for this age group from the CDC, whose scientific panel is scheduled to meet tomorrow. Pfizer and its partner BioNTech make the only Covid-19 vaccine available for children in the U.S. Kids ages 5 to 11, who will receive one-third of the dose given to everyone 12 and older, must wait at least five months after their last dose. So far only about 30% of them have gotten the initial two Pfizer doses. Meanwhile, parents of kids under 5 are still waiting. The FDA is expected to evaluate vaccine data on the littlest ones from Pfizer/BioNTech or Moderna or both sometime next month.

Closer look: A molecular ‘black box’ records how cells fly into tumor territory

Examining CT scans of cancerous tumors, right, and a clean scan, left, at the NIH. (SAUL LOEB/AFP/GETTY IMAGES)

We know cancer kills when aberrant cells grow and multiply and spread. How exactly they evolve into deadly tumors and then travel is the life’s work of oncology researchers peering into the black box of metastasis. New research published in Cell shows how scientists engineered a flight recorder inside cancer cells in mice to create a genetic family tree, tracing the ancestries of single tumor cells with an unprecedented level of detail. They used this lineage to learn how some shapeshifting tumor cells turn more aggressive and more likely to spread. “It’s like a molecular flight recorder, like the black box on a plane,” study author Jonathan Weissman told STAT’s Angus Chen. “You can reconstruct the history of how a tumor evolved and became aggressive, even try to understand the vulnerabilities that a tumor has at a very early stage."

An urgent call to recruit more diverse participants for clinical trials

To this day, says a new report calling for diversity in the clinical trials dictating which medical treatments we get, “research participants remain mostly white and male.” It’s hardly a new idea to include women and non-white people, but despite decades of evidence that homogenous studies hurt not just the people left out but the biomedical enterprise, the status quo has budged for women but not for non-white people. The report, issued yesterday by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, urges enforcement of diversity targets, cutting off funds to studies that don’t meet requirements, and rewarding those that do. “As the U.S. becomes more diverse every day, failing to reach these growing communities will only prove more harmful and costly over time,” the report’s chair, Kirsten Bibbins-Domingo, said in a statement. STAT’s Usha Lee McFarling has more.

Go out and play, kids (and child care staff)

Kids need to run around, right? It’s good for their motor development, cognitive growth, attention skills, and physical and mental health. A study out today in Pediatrics says children ages 1 to 5 aren’t getting enough chances to be physically active in child care settings, where 60% of U.S. kids spend an average of 30 hours a week. In the national study, the researchers found that fewer than half of child care centers and Head Start programs offered preschoolers both outside opportunities to be active (weather permitting) and the recommended 60 to 90 minutes of physical activity twice a day. The biggest barriers were weather and staffers not joining in outside play. Ensuring a time and place for physical activity, adhering to a schedule for it, and engaging staff in it could help, the authors say.

On this week's episode of the "First Opinion Podcast," First Opinion editor Patrick Skerrett talks with Alex Goldstein about @FacesOfCovid, which bears witness to people who have died of the disease. Listen here.

What to read around the web today

How a SIDS study became a media train wreck. The Atlantic
‘That’s just part of aging’: Long Covid symptoms are often overlooked in seniors. Kaiser Health News
Medication abortion is recognized as safe — even without a doctor — but do enough people know about it? The 19th
High blood pressure pills are costly — but also hard to find — in some lower-income countries. STAT+
Column: Mark Berman, pusher of unproven stem cell therapies, dies while awaiting verdict in FDA lawsuit. Los Angeles Times
Drugmakers use monopoly tactics to thwart lower-cost generic competition for inhalers, analysis finds. STAT+