The Culture Shock Begins

Thanks to a computer error, I somehow got upgraded to Business class for my flight back to New York. I am now hanging out in the British Air Executive Lounge at Heathrow. The African immigrants are serving me watercress sandwiches and sparkling water with lime. My memories of roast goat and ugali are fading into the background. I'm going to go check out the shower-spa.

Superbugs

Jerome Groopman has an essay in the New Yorker about antibiotic resistant bacteria (sometimes called “superbugs”). These bugs will infect my life in 2009-2010, when I will be an infectious disease fellow in the Bronx. NYC tertiary medical centers must certainly be the epicenters of multiresistant bacteria. According to a doctor-friend who works at a hospital in NYC, if you leave your coffee unattended in the morning, there will be a layer of MRSA on the surface by lunch....

Goodbye Kenya

It's my last week in Kenya. I am saying my goodbyes (pic by Rebecca).

Crocs in Haiti

On the Partners in Health Website, a story about a donation of colored plastic clogs to prevent tungiasis. [Partners in Health is the Boston-based NGO founded by Paul Farmer and Jim Kim.] Tungiasis is a foot infection caused by a burrowing flea. I can't recall even a second devoted to this disease in medical school. Hopefully, I will learn about it at Liverpool.