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2 dead, 58 sick amid Legionnaires' disease outbreak in New York City

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

NEW YORK — A second person has died and 58 others have fallen ill amid an outbreak of Legionnaires’ disease wreaking havoc in the Harlem area, New York City health officials announced.

It marks an increase from previous figures released by the New York City Health Department on Thursday, when there was a total of 22 reported cases and a ...Read more

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Historically redlined communities have slower EMS response times

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

Residents of historically redlined communities experience slower response times from emergency medical services, according to a study published Tuesday in JAMA Network Open.

Redlining refers to the discriminatory practice under which the federal government and banks systematically denied mortgages to Black and Hispanic residents. The practice ...Read more

Barry Williams/New York Daily News/TNS

Stigma still keeps police from seeking mental health care, study finds

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

Police officers may face hundreds of traumatic incidents over the course of their careers, but many still hesitate to seek mental health support when they need it.

Despite growing investments in wellness programs by law enforcement agencies across the country, a recent study of just over 100 surveyed officers from the Fargo Police Department in...Read more

E. Jason Wambsgans/Chicago Tribune/TNS

Commentary: Erosion of democracy threatens our health

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

Even before the Trump administration’s headline-grabbing assaults on public institutions, our democracy was showing alarming signs of distress. A 2023 Brookings Institution report found that the United States “is experiencing two major forms of democratic erosion in its governing institutions: election manipulation and executive overreach.�...Read more

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California man in dire need of a kidney transplant finds 1-in-100,000 match: His wife

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

LOS ANGELES — For much of his adult life, Jim Irish was a self-proclaimed bachelor — moving cities every few years, too busy as a business executive and entrepreneur to devote much time to romantic endeavors.

By the time he was in his mid-50s, he had pretty much given up on the idea of finding a life partner.

But fate had other plans.

...Read more

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'Relentlessly debilitating': The chronic symptoms of Lyme disease

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

LOS ANGELES — Grammy award-winning pop star Justin Timberlake, 44, recently took to Instagram to share his diagnosis of Lyme disease, a bacterial infection that he said was "relentlessly debilitating, both mentally and physically." His statement comes on the heels of criticism from fans who felt he was under-performing during his recent world ...Read more

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Ask the Pediatrician: Everyday ways to talk about mental health: Tips for families

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

Mental health is health. We keep track of our child's physical growth and milestones such as learning to walk or talk. But we also need to check in on their mental health and how they are feeling.

Talking about mental health can take practice; the more we do it, the easier it gets. Having these conversations even while things are going well is ...Read more

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Student loan caps might worsen the national doctor shortage, critics say

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

Twenty-eight-year-old Michaela Bonner has been working 12-hour shifts as an emergency medical technician in Norfolk, Virginia, for the past four years, while attending and paying for college to finish her prerequisites for medical school.

But now that President Donald Trump’s signature tax and spending law bars students from borrowing more ...Read more

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Commentary: Ending LGBTQ+ health research will leave science in the dark

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

In recent months, the Trump administration has terminated thousands of federally funded medical research grants, gutting $9.5 billion in critical health science efforts. More than half of those cuts — 1,246 grants worth $5.5 billion — targeted studies focused on LGBTQ+ health. These cuts don’t just reflect shifting policy priorities. They ...Read more

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A brain-dead pregnant woman was kept alive in Georgia. It's unclear if state law required it

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

A Georgia woman declared brain-dead and kept on life support for more than three months because she was pregnant was removed from a ventilator in June and died, days after doctors delivered her 1-pound, 13-ounce baby by emergency cesarean section. The baby is in the neonatal intensive care unit.

The case has drawn national attention to Georgia�...Read more

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More Americans are family caregivers; states struggle to help them, report finds

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

More than 63 million Americans are caregivers for a family member with complex medical needs, a 20 million increase over the past decade, according to a new report.

But state policies, workplaces and the American health system haven’t kept up with this surge in family caregiving responsibilities, said Dr. Myechia Minter-Jordan, a physician ...Read more

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Doctors perceive some patients' pain differently. Can neuroscience explain why?

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

People tend to think about pain as a biological process, says Elizabeth Losin, a biobehavioral health professor at Pennsylvania State University.

“You step on a thumbtack, it sends a message up to your brain and sets off an alarm, and that’s it,” she said in a recent interview.

But people of different genders and races often report ...Read more

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Older Coloradans nearly back to pre-pandemic death rates, but middle-aged people dying younger than expected

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

DENVER — Older Coloradans have mostly recovered from a pandemic-era increase in death rates, but middle-aged people continue to die younger than expected, mostly from overdoses.

In the long run, everyone dies, but state health officials watch how death rates compare to what they’d expect based on the size of the population and the mix of ...Read more

DACA recipients will no longer be eligible for ACA health coverage

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Young California residents who arrived in the U.S. as children without legal permission are reeling in the wake of a new policy stripping them of health insurance coverage under the Affordable Care Act.

The policy, announced by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in June, reclassifies recipients of Deferred ...Read more

John J. Kim/Chicago Tribune/TNS

Free air conditioner programs help amid life-threatening heat

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

With heat advisories blanketing the eastern half of the U.S., air conditioners are once again working over time as essential resources to keep millions cool. But they’re unevenly distributed: Many poor households are unable to afford them.

To reduce the gap between the air conditioning haves and have nots, a growing number of programs are ...Read more

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What wildfire smoke is doing to your health

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

MINNEAPOLIS -- Wildfire smoke has been easy to spot in Minnesota this week, coating the Twin Cities in a brownish haze that obscured the downtown skylines. But experts in lung health are more concerned about the particles you can’t see.

Particles in the smoke are so small that they can evade some of the lung’s natural defenses, causing not ...Read more

Trump voters wanted relief from medical bills. For millions, the bills are about to get bigger

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

President Donald Trump rode to reelection last fall on voter concerns about prices. But as his administration pares back federal rules and programs designed to protect patients from the high cost of health care, Trump risks pushing more Americans into debt, further straining family budgets already stressed by medical bills.

Millions of people ...Read more

Marissa Edwards vs. Sono Bello; Body Contour Centers; Matthew Cooper, MD; Superior Court of the State of California-County of San Diego/KFF Health News/TNS

Cosmetic surgeries led to disfiguring injuries, patients allege

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

A few days after a harrowing cosmetic surgery procedure, Erin Schaeffer said, she woke up with fluid leaking from an open wound in her stomach.

Schaeffer went on to spend a week in a Florida hospital battling a severe infection after a type of tummy tuck and liposuction at the Jacksonville branch of Sono Bello, a national cosmetic surgery chain...Read more

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Fearing Medicaid coverage loss, some parents rush to vaccinate their kids

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

For two decades, Washington, D.C., pediatrician Lanre Falusi has counseled parents about vaccine safety, side effects, and timing. But this year, she said, the conversations have changed.

“For the first time, I’m having parents of newborns ask me if their baby will still be able to get vaccines,” Falusi said.

Throughout the country, ...Read more

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Lawfully present immigrants help stabilize ACA plans. Why does the GOP want them out?

Health Advice / Health & Fitness /

If you want to create a perfect storm at Covered California and other Affordable Care Act marketplaces, all you have to do is make enrollment more time-consuming, ratchet up the toll on consumers’ pocketbooks, and terminate financial aid for some of the youngest and healthiest enrollees.

And presto: You’ve got people dropping coverage; ...Read more