› added 6 years ago

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TIL that in the 90s, the US was first to develop an assay to test for HIV contaminated blood products. France refused to adopt the test because it wasn't French and delayed testing until their version came out, resulting in thousands of hemophiliacs being infected with HIV.

Read more nytimes.com

via reddit.com

QJNX9 Physicians and veterinarians agree: If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and is sick like a duck, it's best for it to be treated by someone trained to treat a duck. Faced with such a scenario, physicians would be armed only with what they know about human biology. And that doesn't go very far, says Rika Maeshiro, the director of Public Health and Prevention Projects for the Association of American Medical Colleges.
8emML TIL During courtship, the male Pigeon Mountain Salamander circles the female and bites her repeatedly to break the skin on her head. He then rubs a chin gland over the wounds, injecting pheromones directly into her bloodstream to subdue her enough for mating.
QJBQL TIL "footquakes" are created by thousands of stomping people and picked up by seismometers
WkJ98 TIL the Peruvian Navy still actively operates a ship that was built in England in 1862, disassembled into small pieces and shipped across the Atlantic, and carried by mules over 220 miles to Lake Titicaca to be reassembled. Its sister ship (sent the same way) also still works on the lake.
VMpEZ TIL peeling Scotch Tape in a vacuum releases enough X-rays to produce an image of finger bones on X-ray film