Big fan of OWID!
I liked the example in the article you linked about depression diagnosis—the way that after receiving a diagnosis about major depressive disorder, some number of patients over time no longer have depression, even when they do not receive any treatment. This seems especially true in medicine in general, it was at least true for medieval times where sometimes the best chances someone had for life were if they had the least amount of medical interventions—that is still true to an extent today.
Plus there is an effect that if you for example have cancer and you have a consultation about what the best move forward is, whatever expertise area the doctor consulting you has is going to be the likeliest treatment you’ll choose to take, probably related to their highest confidence level in that method working since they know it the best. But there are no doctors that specialise in just doing nothing, or doing something equivalent to that. Some solid RCT work here could shift the balance a bit more and result in healthier people with less unnecessary interventions.
Maris Sala
Karma: 138
How much time does it take to get the paperwork in and apply for this for the 1st time by an org? You mention 1 week if it’s an experienced org for whom this ain’t their 1st rodeo—can you elaborate which parts take the time there?
Great to see initiatives that try to bridge the gap between what EAs are traditionally good at and what they’re less good at, like marketing. But also sounds very difficult to break through the barrier of getting further funding after seed grants—I wish you good luck in persisting!
(Commenting because I know Gergő for years and can vouch for his hard-working nature.)