Devin Teichrow
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edgeofepi.bsky.social
Devin Teichrow
@edgeofepi.bsky.social
330 followers 1.8K following 110 posts
Epidemiologist, amateur historian, and science communicator • theedgeofepidemiology.substack.com
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edgeofepi.bsky.social
Devin Teichrow @edgeofepi.bsky.social · 15d
We’ve lived with microbes for millions of years. They built our immune systems, rewired our DNA, and killed billions along the way.
I tried to tally their bill: Humanity’s Deadliest Companions.
#EpiSky #MedSky #History #Anthropology #Archaeology #IDSky

open.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...
Humanity’s Deadliest Companions: Checking the Till on the Deadliest Microbes in History
I was reorganizing parts of my bookshelf the other day when I came across my copy of Deadly Companions by Dorothy Crawford.
open.substack.com
edgeofepi.bsky.social
Archaeologists once found a perfectly preserved Viking turd the size of an iPhone. It turned out to be one of the most informative fossils ever discovered. We learn a ton from fossilized feces, including things about diet, environment, and pathogen load.

open.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...
The Ghosts of Meals Past: What We’ve Learned from Fossilized Poop
When construction first broke ground for the Lloyds Bank building in York in 1972, within a moist layer of peat was something each of the crew would have seen countless times before, although never on...
open.substack.com
November 12, 2025 at 6:10 PM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
What’re the oldest diseases we know of?
Viral “fossils” >400M yrs old, cancer in a 240M-yr amphibian, worm eggs in Triassic dino poop, a 275M-yr infected jawbone.

Life’s first battles were microbes sabotaging each other.
#MedSky #EpiSky #History

open.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...
The Oldest Diseases We Know Of
What they tell us about life, survival, and our place in deep time.
open.substack.com
November 4, 2025 at 6:52 PM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
Somehow The Edge of Epidemiology just cracked Substack’s Top 50 in science. Huge thanks to everyone reading, sharing, and nerding out about the history of disease with me.

New post: Humanity’s Deadliest Companions

open.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...

#EpiSky #History #MedSky #IDSky
October 29, 2025 at 2:21 PM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
We’ve lived with microbes for millions of years. They built our immune systems, rewired our DNA, and killed billions along the way.
I tried to tally their bill: Humanity’s Deadliest Companions.
#EpiSky #MedSky #History #Anthropology #Archaeology #IDSky

open.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...
Humanity’s Deadliest Companions: Checking the Till on the Deadliest Microbes in History
I was reorganizing parts of my bookshelf the other day when I came across my copy of Deadly Companions by Dorothy Crawford.
open.substack.com
October 28, 2025 at 1:44 PM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
Leprosy survived the empires that once tried to quarantine it. In the early 1900s, colonial governments across the Pacific built “islands of isolation”, of which some ended up being half hospital, half prison. On Makogai, patients made a world of our own.

open.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...

#History
Islands of Affliction: Leprosy and Empire in the South Pacific
Leprosy is much older than any empire.
open.substack.com
October 22, 2025 at 2:53 PM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
In 1858, Staten Islanders burned down their own quarantine hospital in the name of “self defense”
A short story about fear, fire, and public health: open.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...

#EpiSky #PublicHealth #History
The Night Staten Island Burned Its Hospital: Fear, Fire, and the Forgotten Quarantine War of 1858
Staten Island, September 1858.
open.substack.com
October 14, 2025 at 1:42 AM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
GLP-1 drugs started as diabetes meds, became weight-loss blockbusters… and now might prevent migraines by lowering intracranial pressure and calming neuroinflammation.

When endocrinology and neurology collide, weird things happen.
#Migraine #EpiSky #MedSky #GLP1

open.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...
When Diabetes Drugs Start Treating Headaches: GLP-1 Agonists and the Migraine Connection
The story of GLP-1 drugs have had so many plot twists it would almost sound lazy in a medical fiction novel.
open.substack.com
October 7, 2025 at 1:12 AM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
America isn’t dying young because of food dyes or seed oils.
It’s fentanyl, drag-strip roads, and gunfire.

Those three explain much of the 4-year U.S. life expectancy gap vs peers.

Bad news: they kill a lot of people.
Good news: they’re fixable.

open.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...
The U.S. Life Expectancy Gap Sounds Worse Than It Is and (Hypothetically) Easier to Fix Than You Think
America isn’t cursed.
open.substack.com
September 26, 2025 at 2:44 PM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
Single-dose lysergide (MM120) beat placebo for GAD and the effect lasted to 12 weeks without trial-provided therapy.
Promising signal ≠ green light. We still need an active placebo, pragmatic eligibility (keep usual meds), and functional outcomes.
#MedSky #lsd

open.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...
Psychedelics for Anxiety: What the New LSD Trial Does and Doesn’t Change
In the Middle Ages, ergot was a curse with a Latin name.
open.substack.com
September 18, 2025 at 2:24 PM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
New post: The Doctors’ Riot (1788). When New Yorkers fought back against body-snatching medicine. Why cadavers were scarce, who got dug up, how “unclaimed” bodies became policy, and what that says about consent today.
#MedSky #EpiSky

theedgeofepidemiology.substack.com/p/body-snatc...
Body-Snatching, the Doctors’ Riot, and How Cadavers Built American Medicine
Why cadavers were scarce in the first place
theedgeofepidemiology.substack.com
September 11, 2025 at 2:35 PM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
New post: Finding Risk Where History Put It: how founder effects + endogamy make some “rare” diseases locally common, and why community-led screening works. SLSJ as model; South Asia + NYC for scale/equity. Corrections more than welcome.
#EpiSky
theedgeofepidemiology.substack.com/p/finding-ri...
Finding Risk Where History Put It: Founder Effects, Population Bottlenecks, Rare Diseases, and Screening Programs
Opening Disclaimer: I’m not a geneticist.
theedgeofepidemiology.substack.com
August 28, 2025 at 1:17 AM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
New post: how warmer weather and urban life are shifting mosquito, tick, and sandfly risk in 2025. maps, mechanisms, and what to do this week.
#EpiSky #MedSky #InfectiousDiseases
theedgeofepidemiology.substack.com/p/infectious...
Infectious Diseases on the Move (2025): How Warmer Weather and Urbanicity are Shifting Risks
Why ranges change
theedgeofepidemiology.substack.com
August 21, 2025 at 4:20 PM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
Cool little accomplishment! Thanks to everyone who has read, subscribed, and shared!
#EpiSky #MedSky

open.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...
August 17, 2025 at 5:18 PM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
Does lithium lower Alzheimer’s risk? I dug into RCTs, bipolar registries, Denmark’s water data, and a new Nature paper to see what is currently known. Its an interesting signal and definitely merits further study
#EpiSky #MedSky #NeuroSky

theedgeofepidemiology.substack.com/p/does-lithi...
Does Lithium Lower Alzheimer’s Risk? A Guide to the Evidence
Lithium used to be used in 7-Up as an upper.
theedgeofepidemiology.substack.com
August 15, 2025 at 3:44 AM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
New blog post: Paper Mills are Poisoning Science
Science is being spammed with ghost written junk articles sold in bulk. A new PNAS paper shows how far this has gotten.

pnas.org/doi/epdf/10.10…
Blog link belowopen.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...os
Paper Mills are Poisoning Science
You can now pay a few hundred bucks to publish your name on a scientific study.
open.substack.com
August 7, 2025 at 3:25 AM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
I reviewed @erictopol.bsky.social’s book Super Agers. It’s a thoughtful look at what you can do at home to improve healthspan paired with a compelling view of how tools like whole genome sequencing and nextgen medications are changing the future of aging + medicine

open.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...
Eric Topol’s Super Agers: The Medical System We Ought to Build
I remember sitting in a gymnasium in Walnut Creek, California working with a group of elderly folk at an independent living facility measuring things like grip strength, up and down speed, and walking...
open.substack.com
July 31, 2025 at 2:58 AM
Reposted by Devin Teichrow
edgeofepi.bsky.social
🧠 Do you get migraines 3+ days/month? We’re running a remote UC Irvine study on migraine & memory. Ages 18–75, US only. Just 10 min/day for up to a month.
More info + sign up: faculty.sites.uci.edu/neuroinforma...
#MigraineChat #Migraine
Migraine Study – Neuroinformatics Lab
faculty.sites.uci.edu
July 28, 2025 at 4:38 PM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
🧠 Do you get migraines 3+ days/month? We’re running a remote UC Irvine study on migraine & memory. Ages 18–75, US only. Just 10 min/day for up to a month.
More info + sign up: faculty.sites.uci.edu/neuroinforma...
#MigraineChat #Migraine
Migraine Study – Neuroinformatics Lab
faculty.sites.uci.edu
July 28, 2025 at 4:38 PM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
Migraine can interfere with memory, attention, language, and processing speed, even between attacks.

I wrote about the cognitive effects across the migraine cycle and how meds can impact cognition:

theedgeofepidemiology.substack.com/p/migraine-and…#EpiSkyk#MedSkyk#NeuroSkyky
https://theedgeofepidemiology.substack.com/p/migraine-and…
July 23, 2025 at 3:28 PM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
I reread The Meme Machine recently and realized: memetics didn’t die, it just ended up subsumed by other fields.

After being trained in epidemiology, the metaphor isn’t even a metaphor anymore. Memes spread like pathogens.

“Memetics is Dead, Long Live Memetics”

open.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...
Memetics is dead, long live memetics
On stealth memetics, viral ideas, and why the term may have died while the logic behind it lived on.
open.substack.com
July 17, 2025 at 10:06 PM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
New meta-analysis of unblinded psychedelic clinical trials vs antidepressants: psychedelics work as well as open label antidepressants for depression. #EpiSky #MedSky

open.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...
Shrooms vs antidepressants: A meta-analysis calls it a tie
In the middle ages people feared ergot like a curse.
open.substack.com
July 10, 2025 at 3:07 PM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
In August of 1951, something toxic ripped through the town of Pont-Saint-Esprit in southern France. Hundreds were poisoned, dozens were committed to psychiatric hospitals, and at least seven died.

open.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...
The Poison Nobody Could Agree On: The Unsolved 1951 Outbreak of Pont-Saint-Esprit
In August of 1951, something toxic ripped through the town of Pont-Saint-Esprit in southern France.
open.substack.com
July 6, 2025 at 8:28 PM
edgeofepi.bsky.social
All over the world, kids are growing up faster, and not just emotionally or socially, but biologically. Puberty is showing up earlier and for years, scientists have been trying to figure out why.

open.substack.com/pub/theedgeo...
Calories, Chaos, and the Mystery of Early Puberty
Something strange is happening to childhood.
open.substack.com
July 3, 2025 at 7:24 PM
Reposted by Devin Teichrow
epiellie.bsky.social
How do we know that COVID boosters work? Using the test-negative design.

Curious what that is? Read more here:
open.substack.com/pub/epiellie...
How We Decide if COVID Boosters Work: The Test-Negative Design
If you watched, or read about, last week’s ACIP meeting, you might have heard CDC scientists talking about the “test-negative design” as a tool for evaluating COVID boosters.
open.substack.com
July 2, 2025 at 5:37 PM
Reposted by Devin Teichrow
edgeofepi.bsky.social
I’ve spent 5 months working in a migraine research lab. It’s more common than asthma or diabetes and nearly half go undiagnosed.
This post covers the epidemiology of migraine regarding who it hits hardest and when, and who gets missed.
theedgeofepidemiology.substack.com/p/migraine-w...
Migraine: What We Know and Who It Hits Hardest
Migraine is one of the most disabling conditions we know of. Here's what the data says about who gets it, who doesn't get help, and why we still don't quite understand it.
theedgeofepidemiology.substack.com
June 30, 2025 at 2:48 PM