Jennifer Beattie's Blog Post #7: June 27th, 2024 | 2024 Lehigh-in-Milan with Professor Gupta

This week I was able to share one of my Wall Street Journal discussions about Eli Lilly, the large pharmaceutical company that is one of the largest manufacturers and sellers of diabetes and weight-loss drugs. I did my Wall Street Journal topic about this because I looked into the effects that producing these drugs has on the environment. The process of synthesizing the peptides that go into creating these drugs is nonsustainable for mass production and creates a lot of waste. I originally did not know that and I discussed the topic of is it worth it to create these drugs and distribute them for “weight loss” when there are other more environmentally friendly ways to lose weight. I think it is important for doctors and distributors of these drugs to have them as a last resort option, not be the first thing that is prescribed. Often obesity issues arise in one’s diet and habits and a quick-fix weight loss drug is not going to work in the long-term.

This week, our boss was not here Monday-Wednesday he was on a work trip so we were able to do work from home. Our main responsibility was to keep going through the database we had and gathering information on people from their emails. For example, we have a list of a bunch of emails, but we do not have the first and last names of the people that go with the email. So Victoria and I are working on going through that large list and extracting the first and last names if they are included in the email and writing it down separately. If they do not have a first and last name in their email then we just skip it. We have paused working on our SIGEP assignment for the week but will get back to working on that on Thursday when we go back into the office.

This weekend, my friends and I traveled to Nice, France, and on our way back we stopped in Monte Carlo, Monaco. I have been to France already, but only Paris and I have been wanting to go to Nice for a very long time. It was honestly one of the best places I have been. One thing I would note before going is that the beaches are straight rocks and you should probably bring flip-flops or some sort of water shoe if you go there and wear them into the ocean when you go in. I did not know that and only brought sandals that were not waterproof and ended up getting cuts on my feet and knees from the rocks and it hurt walking in and out of the water. But that did not stop me from going in and out of the water multiple times because it was so beautiful. It was so blue and fun to swim in and the waves were not too bad but they also did exist which was perfect. Leaving Nice, a few of us decided to stop in Monaco. It took some convincing because I wanted to go as I recently got into Formula 1 racing, but a few people decided to come with me. It wasn’t the nicest day, but we walked around the Yacht club, the Monte Carlo Casino, and the Famous race hairpin turn, before getting lunch at Nikki Beach. It was fun to walk around and see all the cars and people living in Monaco and all the luxury shops they had there. It was an awesome weekend.