Health

Despite a global pandemic that caused the deaths of millions of people and drastically altered our way of life, we still haven’t mastered the art of recognizing grief when it shows up.Four years ago, life as we knew it slipped away. As news of the covid death tolls rose around the world, we watched footage on television of our front-line workers struggling with overcrowded hospitals, our children were sent home from school, weddings and graduations were canceled, jobs came to a halt, and toilet-paper flew off the shelves. Everywhere you turned someone was losing something or someone. But instead of grief rising to the surface, it was anxiety that was soaring.By November of 2020 research shows that in the United States reports of anxiety increased to 50% and depression to 44%—six times high...

Today marks four years since I said the global outbreak of COVID-19 could be characterized as a pandemic.My decision to use the “p-word” was not one I took lightly. Pandemic is a powerful word, evoking fear linked to plagues and pandemics throughout history that have claimed millions of lives and caused severe disruption to societies and economies—as COVID-19 did.Many of WHO’s critics have pointed to my use of “pandemic” on March 11, 2020 as evidence that WHO was “late” in taking the threat of COVID-19 seriously. By that stage, more than 118,000 cases had been reported in 114 countries, and more than 4,000 deaths. The horse had bolted.However, the far more significant date was January 30, 2020, six weeks earlier, when I declared a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC)—th...

When Karyn Bishof started experiencing Long COVID, there wasn’t a name yet for the symptoms that lingered after her infection in March 2020. “I had these continued, prolonged symptoms that I wasn't hearing about initially,” says Bishof, who founded a group called the COVID-19 Longhauler Advocacy Project to help advocate for those suffering with Long COVID. She experienced extreme fatigue, nausea, and insomnia, among other things, but doctors kept testing her for COVID-19, or telling her her symptoms were psychosomatic. March 11 marks four years since COVID-19 was declared a pandemic. But while much of society has moved on from masking, quarantining, and isolating, some still feel the effects of the pandemic every day. Bishof, 34, who continues to experience Long COVID, says that many patie...

“The soldier above all others prays for peace,” the former American military general Douglas MacArthur once said, “for it is the soldier who must suffer and bear the deepest wounds and scars of war.” But what about peace with oneself? More than 120,000 U.S. veterans have died by suicide since record keeping began in 2001, according to Veterans Affairs department data. Many more, in the U.S. and elsewhere, suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as conflicts spiral around the world. Ukraine’s health ministry estimates that 3 to 4 million people in the country live with PTSD. Amid this mental health catastrophe, authorities have begun turning to psychedelics for help—and for good reason.On Feb. 21, Ukraine’s special parliamentary commission responsible for the medical care of veter...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — West Virginia's GOP-controlled state Legislature voted Saturday to allow some students who don't attend traditional public schools to be exempt from state vaccination requirements that have long been held up as among the most strict in the country.The bill was approved despite the objections of Republican Senate Health and Human Resources Chair Mike Maroney, a trained doctor, who called the bill “an embarrassment” and said he believed lawmakers were harming the state.“I took an oath to do no harm. There's zero chance I can vote for this bill,” Maroney said before the bill passed the Senate 18-12. The House already approved a version of the bill in February and swiftly approved the Senate bill on Saturday, the last day of the state's 60-day legislative session.“It’s a ba...

Ground cinnamon sold by U.S. discount retailers is contaminated with high levels of lead and should be discarded, federal health officials said Wednesday.The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said cinnamon sold by stores including the Dollar Tree and Family Dollar contains lead at levels that could be unsafe for people, particularly children, with prolonged exposure to the spice. The agency urged suppliers to recall the products voluntarily.Cinnamon products included in the agency's safety alert include the La Fiesta brand sold by La Superior and SuperMercados; Marcum brand sold by Save A Lot stores; MK brands sold by SF Supermarket; Swad brand sold by Patel Brothers; El Chilar brand sold by La Joya Morelense; and Supreme Tradition brand sold by Dollar Tree and Family Dollar stores.“Removi...

Every day dozens of people come to Jennifer Witherspoon—a former dental office manager with zero medical training—for help managing nausea, headaches, and other side effects that can come with taking weight-loss shots. She even crafted a template response to help her quickly get through the messages. “People have offered to pay me, begged me to start a podcast, asked me to call their sisters-in-law, wanted me to call their doctor,” she said. “One lady even invited me to her wedding.” Even Oprah’s production company reached out to feature one of her videos in a prime time special. What makes Witherspoon’s advice so appealing? It’s filling a void. As a Mounjaro user herself, Witherspoon figured out ways to minimize her own side effects, absent guidance from the doctor who prescribed her the ...

The obesity drug Wegovy can now claim to lower the risk of heart attack, stroke, and other cardiovascular issues in people who are overweight or who have obesity, and also have cardiovascular disease. It's the first weight-loss drug to carry an indication for heart benefits. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the addition to the label on March 8 based on a study from Wegovy’s manufacturer, Novo Nordisk, showing that the drug lowered the risk of heart attack, stroke, or dying of heart-related issues in this population by 20% compared to people receiving placebo.When the results of the study were first released at the American Heart Association meeting last November, the findings were greeted with a round of applause from the heart experts in attendance. Obesity is a major ...

March 8, 2024 1:33 PM ESTMarch 8 is your last day to order free rapid COVID-19 tests, as the U.S. government prepares to suspend its at-home test program. Households in the U.S. can receive at least four rapid antigen tests, free of charge, simply by entering a name and address.The federal government has been shipping free tests since early 2022. The program was suspended for a few months in 2023, after the U.S. government stopped considering COVID-19 a public-health emergency, but was reinstated this past fall, as new variants began to spread and cause upticks in infections and hospitalizations. Now, the free testing initiative is again coming to an end.Today is the last day the U.S. Postal Service will accept orders, here. Households that have not ordered any tests since the program was ...

On Sunday, March 10 at 2 a.m., the U.S. and about a third of the world’s other countries will set their clocks forward by one hour, which will make the sun seem to rise later in the morning and hang in the sky longer in the evening. I am not alone in dreading it. Plenty of people want nothing to do with the whole hoary practice.It’s bad for health, bad for safety, bad for your mood, and just plain unpopular. But that doesn’t stop us from changing the clocks, pointlessly, twice a year.The ridiculous history of Daylight Saving TimeThe first push for changing the clocks took place in 1907, when British builder William Willett penned a pamphlet titled “A Waste of Daylight,” in which he proposed setting clocks forward one hour. “The sun shines upon the land for several hours each day while we a...