Most Significant Article You Haven't Read - Resistant Bacteria

I like reading the newspaper because the format allows browsing in a way that seems to alert me to interesting news in a way that browsing the internet never does. Friday's Wall Street Journal reprinted this article from Drugs.com:

Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria in India Could Spread, Experts Say

A gene that helps bacteria resist nearly all antibiotics is present in bacteria in public water supplies in New Delhi, India, researchers have found.

NDM-1 now appears to be widespread in the environment and that points to the critical need for action to limit the global spread of NDM-1-producing bacteria, said Timothy Walsh, of Cardiff University in the United Kingdom, and colleagues.

The spread of such bacteria could surely change the world in ways both predictable and not. For example, the widespread presence of resistant bacteria will impact major surgery, which is dependent upon the ability of antibiotics to prevent infection. Will this decrease medical tourism to India? The widespread use of analgesics to relieve aches and pains has the ancillary effect of making bleeding harder to stop. Will we limit their use to help prevent infections? (Is there a connection? Maybe just for bleeding ulcers.) Will we see more "nanny state" efforts to enforce hygiene, since we know that politicians like nothing better than crises to impose new controls on people.

I believe that we should think about these issues from the perspective of those who wish to preserve freedom, as I know the forces of statism will seize the opportunity to impose controls. A companion article also points to other failings.

The pipeline of new antibiotics is essentially empty, posing acute huge dangers to health care and efforts against infectious diseases.

Some experts warn health-care provision is in danger of reverting back to a pre-antibiotic era in which hip replacements, care of preterm babies and advanced cancer treatment are no longer possible.

And why are no new drugs in the pipeline? I suspect that our very own FDA, which is getting ever more restrictive in its approval processes under Obama is partly to blame. (Ronald Balley details the way that the FDA afflicts the drug industry here.)

And also, why is this news getting so little attention? Could it be that we have become inured to scientific disaster news, because there has been so much of it? Maybe we don't trust scientists whose horrible discovery will lead to more grant money if they can hype their findings. Maybe this isn't the horrible story I thought after all. This is the unfortunate result of politicians controlling the purse strings for science.

Saving Newspapers

Dean has been commenting about the demise of newspapers here and here. I must admit, I share Dean's fondness for them. It's easier to read them while eating breakfast (and less sloppy) than sitting in front of my computer or scrolling the Blackberry. Government cash is only going to kill the newspaper industry, so I thought I would present a different business model, so they can be saved.

Newspapers have some strengths they should play to. First, they have an unparalleled knowledge of the local community. Second, if they haven't squandered it, they have a reputation for even-handedness in reporting. Finally, and much overlooked, they have a low cost distribution network.

So what's to be done? First, to cut costs, they need to jettison the foreign bureaus and anything else where they can't be be number one or two. Second, they can't compete with the free ads offered by Craigslist and The Reader online, so don't try. Instead they should offer their ads for free on line.

I know what you're thinking, where does the money come from? First, if classified advertisers also want their ad in print, then they get charged, but it is going to be the same ad as offered on line to keep costs down. Second, their traditional source of print ads from businesses will remain, but probably continue to decline. But the key to further revenue streams is to emulate Google and Facebook.

I think that newspapers can successfully compete with Craigslist because Craigslist has failed to monetize their operation, so a monetized operation can probably deliver a better product. Craigslist only charges for a few categories of ads. Newspapers could offer targeted ads based on viewer searches and page views of other ads, advertising on top of advertising, but it already works. Just like Google delivers ads targeted based on user search so can the newspapers. They will probably even want to outsource the technology provisioning to Google, at least initially. Although I would be personally wary of Google's business practices, their failure to prevent click fraud being my chief concern.

Next, subscribers would get online accounts, to go with home delivery, that will allow them to receive coupons or other bargains they can't get anywhere else, to incentivize on line use. Developing a knowledge of consumer preferences from the subscriber base will allow the newspapers to deliver targeted free samples or coupons to their readership. This is intended to emulate the way Facebook delivers ads based on your interests and seems to make good money doing so. This is also something no else can do as cheaply as newspapers and plays to one of their strengths, in distribution. To my knowledge, the only targeted physical advertising today goes through the mail system. Seems like competing with post office shouldn't be too tough, especially with more in depth customer knowledge.

This plan is just a broad outline, and as simple as it appears, I doubt that most newspapers will do anything about it. For some reason, practitioners in dying industries tend to stop innovating and circle the wagons. I hope for a better outcome, so that's my two cents.