Архив рубрики: Здоровье Америка

The Senate confirmed Robert F. Kennedy Jr., one of America’s most notorious vaccine skeptics, to run the country’s leading health agency, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), on Thursday, sparking outrage among public health experts who worry that Kennedy will harm public health and further erode trust in science and medicine.

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“I think it’s a sad day for America’s children. I think it’s a sad day for public health when someone who is a science denialist, conspiracy theorist, and virulent anti-vaccine activist is [leading] the biggest public health agency in the United States,” says Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, who has served on vaccine advisory committees for the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). “I think every Senator who voted for his confirmation should be ashamed of themselves for their unwillingnes..

The first time you tell someone you love them, they might go weak in the knees. The millionth time? It’s probably still nice to hear—but also a bit, well, familiar. “Words do matter,” says Lauren Farina, a psychotherapist in Chicago. “If we’re only using the same words over and over again—as meaningful as the phrase ‘I love you’ can be—it does begin to feel overdone, and therefore loses some of its meaning.”

After a while, you might not even consciously think about what you’re saying. That three-word phrase—once so weighty—becomes a default expression of affection, the words rolling off your tongue automatically when you walk out the door or hang up the phone. Switching up what you say to someone you care about can indicate that you’re putting a heightened level of thought and intention into nurturing the relationship, Farina says.

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We asked experts to share their favorite alternate ways to let a romantic partner, friend, or family member know you car..

Dr. Frank Frizelle has operated on countless patients in his career as a colorectal surgeon. But there’s one case that stayed with him.

In 2014, he was treating a woman in her late 20s suffering from bowel cancer—already a rare situation, given her age. But it became even more unusual when her best friend visited her in the hospital and told Frizelle that she had many of the same symptoms as his patient. Subsequent testing revealed that his patient’s friend had a lesion that, had it not been caught early, likely would have become cancerous. “That really brought it home to me—how it’s much more common than you think,” says Frizelle, a professor of surgery at the University of Otago in New Zealand.

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Still, like any good scientist, Frizelle was skeptical. Was it simply a fluke that he kept treating strikingly young patients? Or was his practice one tiny data point in a larger trend?

He found his answer after sifting through national health data: color..

A generation has passed since the world saw the peak in AIDS-related deaths. Those deaths—agonizing, from diseases the body might otherwise fight off—sent loved ones into the streets, pressuring governments to act. The United States eventually did, creating PEPFAR, arguably the most successful foreign aid program in history. HIV, which causes AIDS, is now manageable, though there is still no cure.

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Now the Trump administration has put the brakes on foreign aid while alleging it’s wasteful, causing chaos in the system that for over 20 years has kept millions of people alive. Confusion over a temporary waiver for PEPFAR—and the difficulty of restarting its work, with U.S. workers, contractors and payments in upheaval—means the clock is ticking for many who are suddenly unable to obtain medications to keep AIDS at bay.

Read More: Inside the Chaos, Confusion, and Heartbreak of Trump’s Foreign-Aid Freeze

The U.S.-led global response to HIV has been so eff..

Since weight-loss drugs that target the hormone GLP-1 have surged in popularity, some additional health benefits have emerged. Beyond helping people shed pounds, they also lower the risk of heart disease and sleep apnea—and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has acknowledged these benefits by approving changes to the drugs’ labels.

Now, one type of weight-loss medication is proving helpful with another health issue. In a study published Feb. 12 in JAMA Psychiatry, researchers report that semaglutide, better known as Ozempic or Wegovy, helped people with alcohol addiction reduce their craving and drink less.

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The trial involved 48 people with alcohol-use disorder, which for men means consuming more than 14 drinks a week, with two or more heavy-drinking events during the week; for women, it means consuming more than seven drinks weekly with two or more of these drinking episodes. No one in the study was receiving treatment for their drinking, and mos..

If almost everyone you know seems to be sick right now, you’re not alone. “I think all of us know somebody who’s gotten the flu recently,” says Dr. Luis Ostrosky, chief of infectious disease at UTHealth Houston.

The numbers back that up. At least 24 million people in the U.S. have caught the flu so far this season, and that number only continues to climb, according to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

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Nearly 8% of U.S. outpatient medical visits recorded during the week ending Feb. 1 were related to respiratory illnesses including the flu, which is among the highest percentages documented by the CDC over the last two decades, according to the agency’s data. Forty-five states and territories are currently seeing “high” or “very high” flu activity, according to the CDC.

“This is at least as bad as anything we’ve seen” in recent memory, says Dr. Mark Rupp, a professor of infectious diseases at the University of Nebra..

President Donald Trump is known to drink many Diet Cokes, but one thing you’re not likely to ever see him using again is a paper straw.

“We’re going back to plastic straws,” Trump announced after signing an Executive Order on Feb. 10 that declared it U.S. policy to end the use of paper straws. “I’ve had [paper straws] many times, and on occasion, they break, they explode,” Trump said. “It’s a ridiculous situation.”

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Trump’s crusade against paper straws is nothing new. His 2020 presidential campaign branded them as “liberal” and sold nearly half a million dollars worth of Trump-branded plastic straws.

Here’s what to know about the history of—and controversy over—plastic and paper straws.

Why do we need straws at all?

Humans have historically needed assisting tubes to drink—the earliest indications of straw use were found in an ancient Sumerian tomb dating back to 3,000 B.C.

Straws also play a huge role for people with disabilities. The Center for..

The U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) is the largest funder of biomedical research in the world, and its grants create the foundation of basic science knowledge on which major health advances are built. On Feb. 7, the NIH announced that it would cut “indirect expenses” in the funding it provides to research grants by nearly half.

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“We were all just dumbstruck,” says Dr. Richard Huganir, professor and chairman of the department of neuroscience at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, who relies on NIH grants for his research into therapies for autism and intellectual disabilities. “I’m calling it the apocalypse of American science. This will basically change science as we know it in the U.S.”

“We’re going to see health research kneecapped,” says Dr. Otis Brawley, professor of oncology and epidemiology at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and the Bloomberg School of Public Health. Brawley has overseen grants at the National Cancer Inst..

KAMPALA, Uganda — Ebola cases in Uganda have risen to nine, while 265 other people were being monitored under quarantine, health authorities said Tuesday.

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The nine include the first victim, a male nurse who died the day before the outbreak was declared on Jan. 30. That man remains the only fatality.

Eight patients “are receiving medical care and are in stable condition,” a Health Ministry statement said. Seven of them were admitted to the main public hospital in Kampala, the Ugandan capital, in addition to one being treated in the eastern district of Mbale, the ministry said, adding that “the situation is under control” amid heightened surveillance.

The nurse who died had first sought treatment in Kampala and later traveled to Mbale, where he was admitted to a public hospital. Health authorities said that the man also sought the services of a traditional healer. His relatives are among those being treated for Ebola.

Kampala has a highly mobile popu..

The price of eggs is expected to skyrocket by another 20% this year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA).

Prices rose from $2.52 per-dozen for large, grade A eggs in January 2024 to $4.15 by that December, a nearly 65% change in just twelve months, per data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The shell-shocking price increase of eggs is due to the highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI), or bird flu, outbreak. Some 23.2 million birds had to be killed in December 2024 alone after contracting the virus, according to USDA, triggering a national egg shortage.

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The outbreak is having widespread repercussions across numerous industries. New York Governor Kathy Hochul announced on Feb. 7 that the state would shut down live bird markets after the virus was detected in seven markets in New York City.

American restaurant chain Waffle House announced they would be adding a 50-cent per egg surcharge to orders due to the egg shortage a..