In the 1800s, consumption was the name of a terrible, yet weirdly chic, wasting disease later known as tuberculosis, glamorized in both society and the arts. “I should like to die from consumption,” the romantic poet Byron reportedly said. The novelist George Sand said of her lover, the composer Frédéric Chopin, that he “coughs with…
In his orthographically freewheeling 2017 best seller “everyone’s a aliebn when ur a aliebn too,” the author-illustrator Jonny Sun explores the melancholia of life on Earth as seen through the eyes of an extraterrestrial. The inquisitive outsider, an alter ego birthed on Mr. Sun’s Twitter account, stumbles through heart-melting highs and lip-quivering lows, meeting such…
One of the most important benefits of exercise is in how it reduces our risk of developing a number of types of cancer — especially colorectal cancer, which according to some estimates is the malignancy most influenced by physical activity. But how workouts guard against colon cancer remains largely unknown. Physical activity speeds the movement…
SINGAPORE — Singapore’s health care system is sometimes held up as an example of excellence, and as a possible model for what could come next in the United States. When we published the results of an Upshot tournament on which country had the world’s best health system, Singapore was eliminated in the first round, largely…
Every pediatrician knows that it’s important to diagnose autism when a child is as young as possible, because when younger children get help and intensive therapy, their developmental outcomes improve, as measured in everything from improved language, cognition and social skills to normalized brain activity. “The signs and symptoms for most children are there between…
A meta-analysis of trials comparing the health effects of red meat consumption with those of other diets found that substituting healthful plant protein for red meat helps lower the risk of cardiovascular disease. Eating plant proteins, such as tofu, may benefit cardiovascular health. Many studies throughout the years have linked the consumption of red meat…
There are the Sacklers, the family that controls Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin. There are the doctors who ran pill mills, and the rogue pharmacists who churned out opioid orders by the thousands. But the daunting financial muscle that has driven the spread of prescription opioids in the United States comes from the distributors…
Older adults with end-stage kidney disease who start dialysis–a treatment that keeps their blood free of toxins–appear to die at higher rates than previously thought, according to findings of a new study by researchers at Harvard Medical School, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Veterans Affairs Boston Healthcare System and Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai,…
IMAGE: The self-grooming behavior of wild honey bees like these can be affected by pesticides. view more A University of Guelph study is the first to uncover the impact of neonicotinoid pesticides on honey bees’ ability to groom and rid themselves of deadly mites. The research comes as Health Canada places new limits on the use…
Psychiatrists often disregard their patients’ smoking even though tobacco use accounts for 50 percent of deaths among people with mental illness, a Rutgers-led study finds. The researchers developed a web-based training program for psychiatry residents on how to assess and intervene with tobacco addiction in patients, according to the study in The American Journal on…