#heart disease risk in women

[samrathaltv]

Tofu Health Benefits: Daily consumption of tofu is beneficial for health, know the best benefits for health

Consumption of tofu can also reduce the risk of heart disease. According to one study, men and women who consumed tofu once a week had a lower risk of heart disease than those who did not Read More

[hashemsamar]

Displacement Diaries [2]:

🚨Dangerous

The lack of hygiene supplies threatens my family’s life

The impact of war on hygiene and the spread of diseases: The war on Gaza has not only destroyed buildings and infrastructure but also targeted essential services that directly affect people’s lives, including clean water and sanitation systems. The Israeli occupation, by deliberately targeting these vital services, contributes to the increased spread of diseases and epidemics. The absence of basic hygiene supplies such as soap, disinfectants, and clean drinking water leads to an unhealthy environment, causing diseases to spread quickly, especially among children and the elderly. In this context, maintaining hygiene becomes nearly impossible in the absence of basic resources, exacerbating the humanitarian crisis.

My family’s suffering due to the lack of hygiene supplies: For my family, consisting of 11 members and currently living in a tent after repeated displacement, the severe shortage of hygiene supplies has made things more difficult. Both children and adults are at risk of diseases due to the inability to maintain daily cleanliness, especially as we are crowded into one small space. Even clean water has become limited, which adds to our suffering. Sadly, every time we try to meet our hygiene needs, we are faced with the harsh reality of exorbitant prices and a lack of essential supplies.

Our basic needs: Under these harsh conditions, our need for hygiene supplies such as soap, disinfectants, clean water, and sanitary products, as well as basic child care items like diapers and milk for my little son Omar, increases. Unfortunately, providing these items has become impossible given the skyrocketing prices and lack of aid, putting the health of all my family members at increasing risk day by day. Children, in particular, are highly vulnerable to skin diseases and epidemics due to the lack of a clean and healthy environment.

A call for help: In the face of this difficult humanitarian situation, we turn to kind-hearted people and anyone who has the ability to help to contribute to providing the necessary hygiene supplies for my family and other families suffering like us. Your donations will help protect the health of children, women, and the elderly who are facing the daily risk of disease. Saving a child's life could start with a bar of soap, and protecting a family from epidemics could be achieved by providing disinfectants or clean water. Do not let this plea go unanswered; every bit of help makes a big difference.

Notes:

We would like to draw your attention to our suffering due to the lack of hygiene supplies and clean water, as well as their high prices, which put the health of my family and other families at risk of diseases. Your support in providing these essential needs can help protect the lives of children and the elderly. Every contribution, no matter how small, makes a big difference. Thank you for your support.

The campaign is documented by @nabulsi @el-shab-hussein @90-ghost.

[drshermaines-wisdomnuggets]

DON'T FORGET TO WEAR YOUR "GO RED FOR WOMEN" ON TOMORROW! #HeartDiseaseInWomen❤️ #WomensHealth #AfricanAmericanWomenHigherRisk

[hackoftheyear]

"What surprised us the most was the fact that women who do muscle strengthening had a reduction in their cardiovascular mortality by 30%," Gulati says. "We don't have many things that reduce mortality in that way."

"The take home message is – let's start moving," says Eric Shiroma, a prevention-focused researcher at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, part of the National Institutes of Health, which provided grant support for the research.

Published March 11, 2024. Some good news for women’s health :)

[covid-safer-hotties]

Back in early 2020, the news of the strange illness causing terrible pneumonias in China saddened me, but I believed I was safe in Canada. Within weeks, there was a reckoning: thousands were dying on my doorstep, too.

Directors of an independent living residence at the start of the pandemic asked me to become the residence’s COVID-19 advisor. They had no qualified medical staff, despite supporting elderly residents. Back in those early days, anyone with a medical qualification was commandeered to help in any way they could.

Confronted with the task of providing guidance to the nonmedical staff taking care of these residents, I decided to learn everything I could about the pandemic. At that time, about 1,000 papers were being published every month detailing research into every aspect of the coronavirus. Of course, I couldn’t read all of them, but I read as many as I could and built a breadth and depth of evidenced-based knowledge about SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19. I wrote up the protocols and during my tenure as COVID-19 Advisor for this residence, we kept COVID out.

As a family physician seeing COVID-19 in my practice, I came to recognize that so many of my colleagues and patients had no idea how to keep themselves safe from the coronavirus, nor were they aware of its long-term risks. I saw the need to take action and effect change, which ultimately led me to becoming an advocate for Long COVID awareness.

I started the medical education company Kojala Medical, aiming to provide evidenced-based information about medical issues in a form patients could understand and reliably trust. I wanted a credible, trustworthy site to which I could refer my patients, colleagues, friends and family. We started with a focus on COVID-19 and have now expanded to Long COVID, with the site longcovidtheanswers.com.

I first learned about Long COVID in 2020 through publicity raised by the Body Politic COVID-19 support group, then became more alarmed as I read scientific articles about the disease.

Aside from the official death toll of over 7 million from COVID-19, Long COVID has emerged from the pandemic as the single biggest disaster to afflict humanity, yet very few people who are not sick with Long COVID are aware of it, want to know about it, believe in it, or even acknowledge that it’s happening. Sadly, many in the medical profession fall within that group of non and disbelievers.

This is bizarre, especially because of the impact of the disease. One recent review estimates more than 400 million global cases of Long COVID. I am furious that not enough is being done to alleviate this suffering. The injustice of yet another neglected and marginalized chronic illness that disproportionately affects women.

So, rather than sitting around waiting for ‘someone’ or ‘body’ to do something, I decided to act.

For me, medicine is fundamentally about aiding people to get as well as possible from any sickness they have — and even more importantly, preventing people from getting sick in the first place. In both of these regards, we are failing people with Long COVID dismally.

Long COVID is not the flu, it is a multisystem debilitating infection associated chronic condition. Developing Long COVID can be disabling and life-changing. Recovery remains low — and some manifestations like heart disease, dysautonomia, and myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME) may last a lifetime.

This is a terrifying situation to be in when, as a global community, we have chosen to act as though the pandemic is over and repeatedly expose ourselves to SARS-CoV-2, a grade 3 biohazard, with little to no protection.

As I read more and more research papers about Long COVID and looked at the inaction of global governments and my own profession, I feared that we were sleepwalking into a global mass disabling event unnecessarily, since we have many technologies available to prevent this.

Infection-associated chronic conditions do not have an established medical speciality, and are rarely taught in medical school. With the medical profession disengaged, people with Long COVID have been left to find answers for themselves.

My work aims to build on support groups, which have helped establish caring communities for people with Long COVID, but have also paved the way for us as scientists and medics to change the way we conduct research in a more patient-focused way. Nevertheless, they don’t entirely fulfill the need for evidence-based information about the disease in a readable format for nonmedical individuals.

I saw a huge need for a comprehensive website that would be of use to all people with Long COVID, their caregivers, the scientists researching the disease, and the multidisciplinary team of healthcare professionals that would be needed to rehabilitate them. Our organization believes that Long COVID The Answers meets those requirements.

There is also a pressing need to train medical professionals so that they will acknowledge Long COVID and feel confident about diagnosing and managing it. Inspired by an interview with Dr. Ric Arsenaeau, an expert in managing complex chronic diseases, my team and I created a podcast series: so that medical providers can receive continuing professional development/educational credits from watching this series.

The podcast series features a range of experts, including people with Long COVID, doctors, scientists, educators, and medical clinicians. Some of these experts also serve on our advisory board, overlooking and participating in the project.

Our site aims to raise awareness about the dangers of continuously exposing ourselves to a perilous virus with no thought of what it will cost us and our children.

This will mobilize the people of the world to demand that their leaders properly provide safe spaces for us all to prevent us from ever getting infected in the first place.

We need to mandate our governments to access all the mitigating technologies that we have in our roster, not only vaccination. The best way of managing Long COVID is to prevent people getting infected with SARS-CoV-2 in the first place!

We need national and international indoor clean air acts – to protect us from emerging pathogens.

For people with Long COVID, awareness will bring an educated and mobilized medical profession, governmental resources, financial and sociological support, and money for research — to facilitate treatments and, hopefully, a cure.

These are the main reasons why I jump out of bed in the morning with gusto, focus, and determination, and why I’ve poured all my money and my time into educating people about Long COVID.

Dr. Funmi Okunola is a British Family Physician who lives and works in Vancouver, Canada. She is the President and CEO of Kojala Medical, a digital medical education company behind COVID-19 The Answers and Long COVID The Answers.

[decolonize-the-everything]

Immediate action is needed to tackle the impact of ethnic and other biases in the use of medical devices, an independent review says. It found pulse oximeter devices could be less accurate for people with darker skin tones, making it harder to spot dangerous falls in oxygen levels. And it warned devices using artificial intelligence (AI) could under-estimate skin cancer in people with darker skin. The review said fairer devices needed to be designed urgently.

In total, it made 18 recommendations for improvement. The government says it fully accepts the report's conclusions. The review was commissioned in 2022 amid mounting concern that ethnic minorities faced greater Covid risks. It looked closely at three types of device where there is potential for "substantial" harm to patients: • optical medical devices such as pulse oximeters, which send light waves through a patient's skin to estimate the level of oxygen in the blood. The light can behave differently depending on skin tone • AI in healthcare • polygenic risk scores, which combine the results of several genetic tests to help estimate an individual's risk of disease and are used mostly for research purposes

Pulse oximeters were used frequently during the Covid pandemic, for example, alongside other observations, to help judge whether a patient needed hospital admission and treatment.[...]

Chest X-rays

One example is the potential under-diagnosis of skin cancers for people with darker skin.

This would probably be a result of machines being 'trained' predominantly on images of lighter skin tones, the team explains. Another concern arises when using AI systems for reading chest x-rays - which are mainly trained on images taken of men, who tend to have larger lung capacities. This could potentially lead to underdiagnosis of heart disease in women, the report suggests, worsening an already long-standing problem.

Call me a fucking extremist but I don't think white people should be building AI and I definitely don't think it should be put in medical devices when the medical industry is already so full of its own systemic bias and especially before there's proper regulations about AI and without more expansive protections for BIPOC in the medical industry.

If you put racist medical device on the market and encourage people to use it knowing it can misdiagnose heart problems and cancer in people with dark skin then they should be able to take you to court for everything youve ever had ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[givemearmstopraywith]

this is the last thing im going to say about taylor swift because now i keep getting messages in varying degrees of outrage about off-the-cuff comments i've made about her. the problem i have with taylor swift and her fanbase is not with her as a person or really with the art she creates: all art is art even if i don't personally like it. what i have a problem with is that taylor swift has kind of became a very palatable, very white, very upper class foil on which people can plaster "morally correct" opinions, like being a feminist or a lesbian ally, without actually having to engage with the real, more difficult side of those issues. it is much easier, both socially and personally (especially if you are centrist) to hold up taylor swift's alleged bisexuality or the conspiracy about her being a lesbian as a sign of your allyship than it is to engage with real-life lesbians, who are frequently not pretty, thin, white, and upper middle class.

additionally, it is easier to pinion your feminism on someone like taylor swift than it is to engage with feminism in a world where now being feminist requires you to, for instance, speak out in support palestinians who do not have access to basic menstrual hygiene and are at risk of disease as a result, or think critically about women working outside of the home in the midst of a very prevalent movement touting the lucrative values of "traditional womanhood" to thinly disguise misogyny and chattel marriage, or engage in the very real and extraordinarily detrimental exclusion of trans women. taylor swift is easy: most women are not.

i think taylor swift is fine: i grew up with her and a lot of her music still holds value for me. but touting her as some feminist vanguard is a bit hollow to me: she's really not radical, because she looks out for her interests first and foremost (which is not a bad thing: everyone, especially women, have to be self-preservative- accusations of self interest are not automatically negative nor even really accusations) and then is treated by her fanbase as the model for all women. its a matter, i guess, of public perception, and how much easier it is to engage in white feminism than it is to delve into the real grit and heart of what feminism is or ought to be. however, if she wants to gone girl that jock she's dating, i will support her.

[she-is-ovarit]

"Approximately 80% of all patients diagnosed with autoimmune diseases are women."

For those of you who might wonder why this is the case, to shock nobody, we can add this to the list of mysterious medical conditions women experience that still remain elusive to the medical field.

However, there's some speculation:

Female sex hormones

The X chromosome

Microchimerism

Environmental factors

The microbiome

Antibodies

Interesting, considering female human beings actually have stronger immune systems than males.

To briefly talk about maybe the most overlooked and dismissed cause of high rates of autoimmune diseases in women, chronic stress (which presumably falls under "environmental factors") has been found to be strongly correlated with autoimmune diseases across multiple studies ("...up to 80% of patients reported uncommon emotional stress before disease onset), which can be triggered by even just one traumatic event, and anxiety disorders such as generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder, PTSD, etc. are extremely high for women in comparison to men.

Women experience PTSD two to three times the rate as men do (source), panic disorder is 2.5 times more common in women and girls than in men and boys (source), and generalized anxiety disorder (which is often treated as trivial and grossly overlooked) is again 2-3 times higher for women and girls than it is for men and boys (source). Behaviorally chronic stress and trauma also often presents differently between the sexes - "fight or flight" for men and "tend and befriend" (fawn and freeze) for women.

Men are more likely to commit physical, psychological, and sexual violence and women are more likely to respond to this violence by continuously be on the receiving end of their behavior and never leaving, even when their children are caught in the middle.

Chronic stress means persistent high levels of cortisol in women's bodies. There is sexual dimorphism in our immune systems. High cortisol leads to Hypothalamic–Pituitary–Adrenal (HPA) axis dysregulation (please, learn more about this).

This leads to heart issues, susceptibility to infectious diseases and auto-immune disorders, an unexplainable debilitating chronic fatigue that can lead to a bedridden life, multiple sclerosis, the progression and reoccurance of cancers, earlier HIV disease progression, and dementia. There's also the bidirectional problem in which HPA axis dysregulation, created from high levels of cortisol from chronic stress in the first place, also in turn biologically causes increased anxiety.

So...

Approximately 80% of all patients diagnosed with auto-immune diseases are women.

And auto-immune diseases are found to be strongly, strongly linked with stress disorders.

And women are several more times likely to experience trauma and stress disorders than males across the board.

And when stress is triggered, men are more likely to throw punches or leave and women are more likely to freeze and people please.

And men are vastly less likely to seek out a therapist to fix their issues or even demonstrate empathy for other men, instead using women as emotional crutches and punching bags.

And freezing and fawning for women often means staying in those same conditions even when there's a risk of death.

And staying in those same conditions when a woman has children and the means those children learn those behaviors and likely develop chronic stress themselves, and the cycle of trauma continues.

And even when women leave those conditions, we're far more likely to end up in re-traumatizing situations as we seek out familiar dynamics.

And even when we're able to break free from this dynamic, because we're far more likely to seek out and stay in therapy, we're still left with trying to resolve chronic, disabling, sometimes life-threatening health issues caused by HPA-axis dysregulation from chronic stress.

While HPA-axis dysregulation in turn generates anxiety, which then creates high cortisol, which results in a feedback loop.

This was supposed to be a short post, but I want to leave off with solutions. Please don't give up on your mental health. Religiously go to therapy. Have extremely high standards for yourself in your relationships. Practice diaphragmatic breathing, meditation, exercise. It's been found that moving your body through exercise, Thai-chi, sports, short walks, dance, whatever (to the best of your ability, if you're able) can really help - just know your limits. If you're not there yet take liquid vitamins as needed (vitamin deficiencies such as low B-vitamins, low magnesium, low good fats, and D3 also cause chronic stress, immunity issues, and chronic fatigue). Make those medical appointments. Eat well, socialize, rest (especially during a PEM or immunity crash), aim for 64 ounces of water a day. Leave miserable situations when you find your chance to. Learn the language of your body and listen to it, and have patience. I've had periods of being bedridden and unable to work. I'm getting better, but it hasn't just been one thing that has been a "fix". If this list overwhelms you, just pick one thing that's most doable. We matter.

[jpitha]

Drives like Crazy

So, humans have this thing where they underestimate risks that are long term, and overestimate risks that are short term. Since we come from such a dangerous world, it kind of makes sense. In the deep recesses of the past, if you were overly wary about that bear over there, you were more likely to survive. But eating healthy all life long to avoid heart disease? That's a problem for Tomorrow Me.

It could be that Xenos that come from less dangerous words have a different view of risk than we do, and would be... concerned by the things that we do all the time because we underestimate their risk.

****

"Set helm to manual, I have control." Jesse's voice was smooth and confident as she sat forward in the leatherette upholstered seat on the command deck. A joystick and a panel with buttons rose out of the floor as foot pedals rose up to meet her booted feet.

"Captain, I would like to register a concern." Unity said. They were the transport freighter that Jesse was now controlling, and they were clearly against this.

"Your concern is registered and noted" Jessie didn't stop setting up the controls. "But as you are aware, manual controls must be tested and verified working quarterly."

Mer'ally, the chief engineer, and unofficial voice of the K'laxi crew onboard Unity turned from her station and looked at Jesse. "I mean, Unity has a point. While we do have to test the manual control system, we don't have to test it while coming to dock at Hyacinth during one of the busiest times of the year."

Jesse's smile was thin and strained. "Once again, your concern has been noted." Jesse's eyes flicked up to the K'laxi staring at her. Mer'ally was unusually tall for a K'laxi, she was nearly Jesse's height. Her reddish orange fur complimented her large green eyes. With her large expressive ears flicking as she spoke her worries, Jesse couldn't help wonder why she was so distracted by her. She shook her head slightly. "Regardless. We have to test manual controls, and I want to practice docking with Hyacinth. We need to know how to pilot Unity in all situations, including docking."

Unity sighed. They weren't going to be able to talk her out of this. "As you wish, Captain, relinquishing control."

Jesse harumphed and got back to work. She ran the joystick in all directions, and everyone felt the ship wiggle in response. With a satisfied nod, Jesse adjusted the inertial compensators down a touch. She wanted to be able to feel the ship move, but not enough to get people motion sick. She nodded in satisfaction and looked up at the other people with her.

"Yen. Please request docking with Hyacinth."

"Aye Captain." Yen bustled at her station. Jesse wondered how she lucked out that all the officers on the command deck today were women, and once again had to push that thought out of her mind. She was on duty now.

After a moment Yen called out. "Docking approved. We're clear to dock on the lower ring, bay 33."

"Bay 33 aye." Jesse punched in the location on her control screen, and her vision was overlayed with the best path to the dock. She'll have to match rotation with Hyacinth, but since it's so large, they shouldn't have to go too fast. She goosed the thrusters and Unity started moving forward.

As they trundled towards bay 33, Jesse put Unity's controls through their paces. She gently rolled the ship to make sure the maneuvering thrusters worked correctly, she tumbled it end-over-end and she yawed it in place all the way around. It was actually a lot of fun. She could imagine the looks the other ships gave as Unity spun and pirouetted in place as it moved slowly towards their docking bay, but Jesse didn't care. Maybe she wanted to show off.

As the last maneuver finished, Jesse spun Unity such that with a few puffs from the main drive they'd match rotation with Hyacinth and being docking. Right before she fired the main drive, her console squawked.

"Collision imminent! Collision imminent! CHANGE DIRECTION NOW"

"What?" Jesse pulled hard on the joystick, and the front thrusters fired, sending the noise high while also stopping their forward momentum. With the compensators set low, everyone lurched forward in their seats. In the distance, Jesse heard a crash as something tipped over.

Unity called out. "Captain! There's a Starjumper that's thrusting away from Hyacinth without getting departure permission. Hyacinth is firing on it, and it's coming this way!"

"Why would they be shooting at a Starjumper?" Mer'ally's tail flicked. "Did they skip out on their docking fee?"

"Doesn't matter why right now." Yen didn't move her head from her console. "Comms are screaming with people yelling at them. They're not responding to anyone. They're on the run."

Jesse's screen was filled with the sight of one of the gigantic old interstellar starships bearing down on them. Orange lights of the tracers from the slug launchers oh Hyacinth were zipping past them. She felt ice in her veins as she realized that the Starjumper was going to hit them unless she did something drastic. An instant later, the collision alarm screamed loud again in the ship.

Jesse toggled ship-wide comms. "Juke charges! Brace for shock!" She fired the juke charges; small emergency explosives fired out of Unity and immediately exploded with their characteristic double boom. The area around the juke charge launchers were reinforced and bowl shaped to catch as much of the energy from the explosion as possible. The blast pushed the ship away with a lurch just as the Starjumper and slugs from Hyacinth passed where they were not a second ago.

"Hold tight everyone, I'm going get us away from here" Jesse's hands and feet danced over the panel as she increased power and started to thrust away. With the compensators still turned down, everyone felt the sickening drop as Unity dove and spun and turned as they were trying to get away from the attack.

"Jesse! You're too close to that ship!" Unity didn't even bother to call her Captain. Jesse saw the ship that Unity mentioned almost too late. She came hard on the portside thrusters and everyone held their breath as they glided by the ship.

"You were close enough to scorch their paint Jes-Captain." Mer'ally sighed in relief and grinned.

"The important thing is we missed, Mer." Jesse looked up and flashed a smile and a wink. Mer'ally quickly turned back to her station, but not before a ripple of fur went down her body, a K'laxi blush.

Unity sounded testy. "Captain. The danger has passed and you have more than proven your piloting ability as well as the function of the manual controls. Can I please have the helm?"

Jesse leaned back from her station and stretched. She was concentrating so hard it felt like no time at all had passed. "All right Unity. I release the helm. You have control."

"Aye Captain. Resuming docking with Hyacinth."

Now all Jesse had to do was wait for docking to complete and stress about whether she could ask Mer'ally out on a date. Unity was a civilian ship and they all worked for Houndstooth, one of the major Sol based corporations, so it wasn't like they had to worry about a higher ranked officer hitting on a lower ranked one, but Jesse still worried. She might say no. It was going to be a long wait to dock.

[afeelgoodblog]

🦜 - Why did the parrot learn to video call? Because he wanted to see his tweetheart!

The Best News of Last Week - May 2, 2023

1. Engineers develop water filtration system that permanently removes 'forever chemicals'

Engineers at the University of British Columbia have developed a filtration system that would permanently remove "forever chemicals" from drinking water. This news comes after a recent study revealed nearly 200 million Americans have been exposed to PFAS in their tap water. Dr. Madjid Mohseni, a professor at British Columbia, shares his research.

2. Berkeley diner provides free meals to anyone who's hungry, no questions asked

The Homemade Cafe in Berkeley, California, is giving away free breakfasts to anyone who is hungry, no questions asked. Owner Collin Doran's Everybody Eats Program started when he saw people panhandling outside his diner. Customers can add $5 to their bill to help the program or grab a coupon for a free meal. Doran's act of kindness has resulted in a 15% increase in business, and he hopes that more businesses will follow his lead in making the world a better place.

3. Pope Francis gives women right to vote in bishops’ meeting for first time

Pope Francis has decided to give women the right to vote at an upcoming meeting of bishops, an unprecedented change that reflects his hopes to give women greater decision-making responsibilities.

Francis approved changes to the norms governing the Synod of Bishops, a Vatican body that gathers the world’s bishops together for periodic meetings, following decades of demands by women to have the right to vote.

4. US adult cigarette smoking rate hits new all-time low

U.S. cigarette smoking dropped to another all-time low last year, with 1 in 9 adults saying they were current smokers, according to government survey data released Thursday. Cigarette smoking is a risk factor for lung cancer, heart disease and stroke, and it’s long been considered the leading cause of preventable death. In the mid-1960s, 42% of U.S. adults were smokers. The rate has been gradually dropping for decades, due to cigarette taxes, tobacco product price hikes, smoking bans and changes in the social acceptability of lighting up in public.

Last year, the percentage of adult smokers dropped to about 11%, down from about 12.5% in 2020 and 2021.

5. Scientists taught pet parrots to video call each other - and the birds loved it

When humans are feeling lonely, we can call or video chat with friends and family who live far away. The idea for this study was not random: In the wild, parrots tend to live in large flocks. But when kept in captivity, such as in people’s homes as pets, these social birds are often on their own. Feeling bored and isolated, they may develop psychological issues and can even resort to self-harming tendencies like plucking out their feathers. New research suggests that these chatty creatures may also benefit from virtually connecting with their peers.

Domesticated parrots that learned to initiate video chats with other pet parrots had a variety of positive experiences, such as learning new skills. The parrots that learned to initiate video chats with other pet parrots had a variety of positive experiences, such as learning new skills including flying, foraging and how to make new sounds. Some parrots showed their toys to each other.

I wanted to see this experiment so bad, so here’s a video from the paywalled study. I uploaded it on my youtube channel.

6. World’s First Carbon Import Tax Approved by EU Lawmakers

The European Union’s parliament approved legislation to tax imports based on the greenhouse gases emitted to make them, clearing the final hurdle before the plan becomes law and enshrines climate regulation in the rules of global trade for the first time.

Tuesday’s vote caps nearly two years of negotiations on the import tax, which aims to push economies around the world to put a price on carbon-dioxide emissions while shielding the EU’s manufacturers from countries that aren’t regulating emissions as strictly, or at all. The tax gives credit to countries that put a price on carbon, allowing importers of goods from those countries to deduct payments made for overseas emissions from the amount owed at the EU’s borders.

7. Genetic Driver of Anxiety Discovered

An international team of scientists has identified a gene in the brain responsible for anxiety symptoms and found that modifying the gene can reduce anxiety levels, offering a novel drug target for anxiety disorders. The discovery highlights a new pathway that regulates the brain’s response to stress and provides a potential therapeutic approach for anxiety disorders.

Critically, modification of the gene is shown to reduce anxiety levels, offering an exciting novel drug target for anxiety disorders.

That's a driver I'd like to uninstall.

----

That's it for this week :)

This newsletter will always be free. If you liked this post you can support me with a small kofi donation:

Buy me a coffee ❤️

Also don’t forget to reblog

[pandemic-info]

What Is Long COVID? Understanding the Pandemic’s Mysterious Fallout > News > Yale Medicine

Originally published: April 15, 2024. Updated: June 4, 2024

Just weeks after the first cases of COVID-19 hit U.S. shores, an op-ed appeared in The New York Times titled “We Need to Talk About What Coronavirus Recoveries Look Like: They're a lot more complicated than most people realize.”

...

Unlike most diseases, Long COVID was first described not by doctors, but by the patients themselves. Even the term “Long COVID” was coined by a patient. Dr. Elisa Perego, an honorary research fellow at University College in London, came up with the hashtag #LongCOVID when tweeting about her own experience with the post-COVID syndrome. The term went viral and suddenly social media, and then the media itself, was full of these stories.

Complaints like "I can't seem to concentrate anymore" or "I'm constantly fatigued throughout the day" became increasingly common, seemingly appearing out of nowhere. With nothing abnormal turning up from their many thorough lab tests, patients and their physicians were left feeling helpless and frustrated.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has defined Long COVID as the "continuation or development of new symptoms three months after the initial SARS-CoV-2 infection, with these symptoms lasting for at least two months with no other explanation." This deliberately broad definition reflects the complex nature of this syndrome. We now understand that these symptoms are wide-ranging, including heart palpitations, cough, nausea, fatigue, cognitive impairment (commonly referred to as "brain fog"), and more. Also, many who experience Long COVID following an acute infection face an elevated risk of such medical complications as blood clots and (type 2) diabetes.

In April 2024, an estimated 5.3% of all adults in the United States reported having Long COVID, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Data from the CDC suggest that Long COVID disproportionately affects women, and individuals between the ages of 40 and 59 have the highest reported rates of developing this post-acute infection syndrome.

...

Inderjit Singh, MBChB, a YSM assistant professor specializing in pulmonary, critical care, and sleep medicine, and director of the Pulmonary Vascular Program, is actively engaged in clinical trials aimed at uncovering the fundamental underpinnings of Long COVID.

...

Through this work, a significant revelation emerged. They observed that patients grappling with Long COVID and facing exercise difficulties were unable to efficiently extract oxygen from their bloodstream during physical exertion. This discovery identifies a specific cause underlying the biological underpinnings of Long COVID.

... Dr. Singh, along with other researchers, is focused on the identification of blood-based markers to assess the severity of Long COVID. For example, a research group, led by Akiko Iwasaki, PhD, Sterling Professor of Immunobiology and Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology, and director of the Center for Infection & Immunity at YSM, most recently created a new method to classify Long COVID severity with circulating immune markers.

Further investigations conducted by Dr. Singh's team identified distinctive protein signatures in the blood of Long COVID patients, which correlated with the degree of Long COVID severity. Researchers identified two major and distinct blood profiles among the patients. Some of them exhibited blood profiles indicating that excessive inflammation played a prominent role in their condition, while others displayed profiles indicative of impaired metabolism.

...

Researchers currently believe that the impairment of a spectrum of key bodily functions may contribute to these diverse symptoms. These potential mechanisms include compromised immune system function, damage to blood vessels, and direct harm to the brain and nervous system. Importantly, it's likely that most patients experience symptoms arising from multiple underlying causes, which complicates both the diagnosis and treatment of Long COVID.

...

The last word from Lisa Sanders, MD:

I’m the internist who sees patients at Yale New Haven Health’s Multidisciplinary Long COVID Care Center. In our clinic, patients are examined by a variety of specialists to determine the best next steps for these complex patients. Sometimes that entails more testing. Often patients have had extensive testing even before they arrive, and far too often—when all the tests are normal—both doctors and patients worry that their symptoms are “all in their head.”

One of our first tasks is to reassure patients that many parts of Long COVID don’t show up on tests. We don’t know enough about the cause of many of these symptoms to create a test for them. The problem is not with the patient with the symptoms, but of the science surrounding them. If any good can be said to come out of this pandemic, it will be a better understanding of Long COVID and many of the other post-acute infection syndromes that have existed as long as the infections themselves.

[allthecanadianpolitics]

The pressure on the government to put cancer warning labels on alcohol containers is growing, as experts say the majority of Canadians don't know the risks that come with consuming even moderate amounts.

The latest catalyst is Canada's new Guidance on Alcohol and Health, which updates the 2011 Low Risk Drinking Guidelines. The Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction (CCSA), which released its final report today, points out that no amount of alcohol is safe and that consuming any more than two drinks a week is risky.

It's a drastic shift from previous guidance, which recommended no more than 15 drinks for men and 10 drinks for women per week to reduce long-term health risks. The CCSA says the new advice reflects thousands of studies in the last decade that link even small amounts of alcohol to several types of cancer.

The new recommendations lay out a continuum of risk. Three-to-six drinks a week increases the risk of developing certain cancers, including colorectal and breast cancer, and more than seven drinks a week also increases your risk of heart disease and stroke. The danger goes up with every additional drink. [...]

According to the report, many Canadians are already in risky drinking territory, with 17 per cent of Canadians consuming three-to-six drinks a week, while 40 per cent drink more than six drinks a week. [...]

Continue Reading.

Tagging: @politicsofcanada

[hackoftheyear]

A 2013 study in the journal Obstetrics and Gynecology found that among more than 750,000 women, about 46% removed their ovaries at the time of hysterectomy whereas 54% didn’t. Even premenopausal women who preserve their ovaries during a hysterectomy are at increased risk of dementia and heart disease but less so, according to multiple studies.

The health risks associated with the removal of ovaries are significant.

Rocca was co-author of a 2021 Jama Network Open study that found that women under 46 who removed both of their ovaries with or without a hysterectomy had an increased risk of mild cognitive impairment and performed worse on cognitive tests 30 years later compared with women who didn’t undergo the procedure.

Another study Rocca co-wrote found that women who had ovaries removed before age 50 faced higher risks for several conditions years later, including heart disease and osteoporosis.

Other studies have linked the procedures to an increased risk of dementia, Parkinson’s disease and accelerated aging.

Partial quote. Just got this as a little news alert and it’s something I think about semi frequently because of my job. Really under discussed and kind of wild

[covid-safer-hotties]

Also preserved on our archive

By Robert Pearl, M.D.

In the late 1970s and early ‘80s, a mysterious illness spread through America’s overlooked communities, mainly affecting intravenous drug users and homosexual men.

The disease, which caused a sudden and devastating collapse of the immune system, was unlike anything doctors had seen before. Patients arrived at hospitals with rare infections like Kaposi’s sarcoma and fungal pneumonia.

But despite the rising number of cases, public health officials remained silent for years. Few Americans saw it as a national emergency, especially since the disease seemed confined to society’s fringes, at least initially.

By the time the government and public fully grasped the threat in 1986—following Dr. C. Everett Koop’s “Surgeon General’s Report on AIDS”—tens of thousands of Americans had already died.

Looking back on this and other public health crises, it’s clear that medical science alone isn’t enough to save lives. To prevent similar tragedies, public health leaders and elected officials must first understand the role denial plays in people’s perception of medical threats. They must then develop effective strategies to overcome it.

The Psychological Basis For Denial Denial is a powerful, usually unconscious defense mechanism that shields individuals from uncomfortable or distressing realities. By repressing objective facts or experiences—especially those that provoke fear or anxiety—people can maintain a sense of stability in the face of overwhelming threats.

Historically, denial was vital to daily life. With little protection against illnesses like smallpox, tuberculosis or plague, people would have been immobilized by fear if not for the ability to repress reality. Denial, mixed with superstition, took the place of facts, allowing society to function despite the ever-present risks of death and disability.

Today, even with tremendous advances in medical knowledge and technology, denial continues to influence individual behavior with detrimental consequences.

For example, more than 46 million Americans use tobacco products, despite their links to cancer, heart disease and respiratory illness. Similarly, tens of millions of people refuse vaccinations, disregarding scientific consensus and exposing themselves—and their communities—to preventable diseases. Denial extends to cancer screenings, as well. Surveys show that 50% of women over 40 skip their annual mammograms, and 23% have never had one. Meanwhile, about 30% of adults between 50 and 75 are not up to date on colorectal cancer screenings, and 20% have never been screened.

These examples demonstrate how denial leads individuals to make choices that jeopardize their health, even when life-saving interventions are readily available.

A Pattern of Denial: How Inaction Fuels Public Health Crises When individual denial scales up to the collective level, it fuels widespread inaction and worsens public health crises. Throughout modern medical history, Americans have repeatedly underestimated or dismissed emerging health threats until the consequences became impossible to ignore.

Early warnings of the HIV/AIDS epidemic were largely ignored, as the stigma surrounding affected populations made it easier for the broader public to deny the severity of the crisis. Even within at-risk populations, the lengthy delay between infection and symptoms created a false sense of security, leading to risky behaviors. This collective denial allowed the virus to spread unchecked, resulting in millions of deaths worldwide and a public health challenge that persists in the United States today.

Even now, four decades after the virus was identified, only 36% of the 1.2 million Americans at high risk for HIV take PrEP (Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis), a medication that is 99% effective in preventing the disease.

Chronic diseases like hypertension and diabetes mirror this pattern of denial. The long gap between early signs and life-threatening complications—such as heart attack, stroke and kidney failure—leads people to underestimate the risks and neglect preventive care. This inaction increases morbidity, mortality and healthcare costs.

Whether the issue is an infectious disease or a chronic illness, denial causes harm. It allows medical problems to take root, it delays care and it leads to tens of thousands preventable deaths each year.

The Unseen Parallels: COVID-19 And Mpox Our nation’s responses to COVID-19 and mpox (formerly known as monkeypox) similarly illustrate how denial hampers effective management of public health emergencies.

By March 2020, as COVID-19 began to spread, millions of Americans dismissed it as just another winter virus, no worse than the flu. Even as deaths rose exponentially, elected officials and much of the public failed to recognize the growing threat. Critical containment measures—such as travel restrictions, widespread testing and social distancing—were delayed. This collective denial, fueled by misinformation and political ideology, allowed the virus to take root across the country.

By the time the severity of the pandemic was undeniable, hospitals and health systems were overwhelmed. The opportunity to prevent widespread devastation had passed. More than 1 million American lives were lost, and the economic and social consequences continue today.

Mpox presents the most recent example of this troubling pattern. On August 14, the World Health Organization declared mpox a global health emergency after identifying rapid spread of the Clade 1b variant across several African nations. This strain is significantly more lethal than previous variants, having already caused over 500 deaths in the Democratic Republic of Congo, primarily among women and children under 15. Unlike earlier outbreaks associated mainly with same-sex transmission, Clade 1b spreads through both heterosexual contact and close family interactions, increasing its reach and putting everyone at risk.

Despite these alarming developments, awareness and concern about mpox remains low in the United States. International aid has been limited, and vaccination efforts have fallen far behind the growing threat. As a result, by the time the WHO issued its emergency declaration, only 65,000 vaccine doses had been distributed across Africa, where more than 10 million people are at risk. Already, cases have appeared in Sweden and Thailand, and the U.S. may soon follow.

Even with the added danger of the new variant and the proven efficacy of the JYNNEOS vaccine, only one in four high-risk individuals in the United States has been vaccinated against mpox. Our slow and delayed response to Covid-19, mpox, HIV/AIDS and nearly-all chronic diseases demonstrate how widespread denial is, the lives it continues to claim and the urgent need to address this hidden defense mechanism. The best way to overcome denial—both individually and collectively—is to bring the risks into clear focus. Simply warning people about the dangers isn’t enough. Strong leadership is crucial in breaking through this subconscious barrier.

Lessons To Learn, Actions To Take Dr. C. Everett Koop’s public health campaign on AIDS in the 1980s demonstrated how clear, consistent messaging can shift public perception and drive action. Similarly, former Surgeon General Luther L. Terry’s landmark 1964 report on smoking educated the public about the dangers of tobacco. His report spurred subsequent efforts, including higher taxes on tobacco products, restrictions on smoking in public places and health campaigns using vivid imagery of blackened lungs—leading to a significant decline in smoking rates.

Unfortunately, government agencies often fall short, hampered by bureaucratic delays and overly cautious communications.

Officials tend to wait until all details are certain, avoid acknowledging uncertainties, and seek consensus among committee members before recommending actions. Instead of being transparent, they focus on delivering the least risky advice for their agencies. People, in turn, distrust and fail to heed the recommendations.

Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, and more recently with mpox, officials hesitated to admit how little they knew about the emerging crises. Their reluctance further eroded public trust in government agencies. In reality, people are more capable of handling the truth than they’re often given credit for. When they have access to all the facts, they usually make the right decisions for themselves and their families. Ironically, if public health officials focused on educating people about the risks and benefits of different options—rather than issuing directives—more people would listen and more lives would be saved.

With viral threats increasing and chronic diseases on the rise, now is the time for public health leaders and elected officials to change tactics. Americans want and deserve the facts: what scientists know, what remains unclear and the best estimates of actual risk.

[metalheadsforblacklivesmatter]

Today's contribution for Disability Pride Month

Obligatory "I don't have this disorder. I'm raising awareness because I'm so fucking sick of women that drink while pregnant bitching about how hard it is being an 'autism mom'". (Autism mom in quotes because a) it's probably not autism and b) the phrase "autism mom" to describe "mom if an autistic kid" is stupid.)

(I'm going to use the term "women" instead of "uterus haver" not to be exclusionary or transphobic. But because I have a severe headache effecting my ability to find words. I am trans-masc. Don't cancel me. I'm not a FART.)

(This is not to demonize people that suffer from alcoholism. Addiction is a very real disability. This is to raise awareness for one of the only known preventable birth defects and hopefully seek help.)

Thank you for the people at @bfpnola discord for checking my post to make sure this doesn't sound eugenics-y.

Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD)

FASD (previously known as fetal alcohol syndrome) is a disability that can range from mild to severe dependant on how much the mother drank while pregnant. It only takes one glass of wine while pregnant to cause this disorder

I already know what the fuck this is. Why are you talking about it?

Because your only know about the severe cases diagnosed as fetal alcohol syndrome. You THINK you know what it is. But the reclassification has only come up in like... 2003? Fetal alcohol syndrome is like... the far end worst severity of FASD. And since the new information of it being a spectrum disorder, estimates have the disorder as high as 5% of the population (and I really think it's higher based on some information I'm about to share).

Fine. So what is this... spectrum disorder?

Very good! So this disorder is HIGHLY misdiagnosed as autism. So all those boomers bitching about "the rates of autism going up?" Yeah they probably caused it. Symptoms include low body weight, facial differences, poor coordination, difficulty maintaining attention, poor memory, poor emotional regulation, slower development, poor reasoning skills, issues with the heart, bones, and kidneys, shorter height, shorter head size,

I have all of those things. How do I know it's FASD and not the autism?

That's kinda the issue. The only real way you can know is ask your mom if there's ANY possibility she's had a drink while she was pregnant. I can't stress this enough IT ONLY TAKES ONE DRINK. For instance I have a lot of those issues, but my mom was so paranoid she wouldn't even dye her hair or drink coffee. Like there's NO WAY.

Like what do I do about it?

Mostly get your accommodations met and raise awareness. Like people are still actively drinking while pregnant because they are still under the pre-2000 belief that just a couple of drinks are okay. It's really not. Not to mention most women don't know they're pregnant until 4-6 weeks in. So they shouldn't be drinking if they're actively trying to have a child. Because that increases the risk.

What the fuck. People are drinking while pregnant? I don't believe you.

Each of these claims are linked.

30.3% of all women reported drinking alcohol at some time during pregnancy, of which 8.3% reported binge drinking (4+ drinks on one occasion)

According to the Center for Disease Control, one in 10 (10.2%) of pregnant women in the United States reports drinking alcohol in the past 30 days.

Despite clear evidence that primary prevention of FASD is possible if prenatal alcohol exposure is avoided, up to 80 % of women drink during pregnancy, many before pregnancy recognition

What? Women are drinking while pregnant? That's fucked up.

This is not to say people with FASD are lesser than.

But all of this "curing autism" when most of this "autism" is caused by a pregnant person's ability to stop fucking drinking for literally 5 minutes. THESE WOMEN THAT ARE DRINKING WHILE PREGNANT ARE THE ONES CAUSING ALL OF THIS GIVING "AUTISM". IF YOU DRANK WHILE PREGNANT. IF THERE'S EVEN A SLIVER OF A CHANCE THAT YOUR DRANK WHILE PREGNANT? ITS PROBABLY NOT AUTISM. ITS PROBABLY THIS DISORDER.

I'm just really fed up with all of these "autism moms" that also make "wine mom" jokes and making light of literal alcoholism bitching about how hard it is to be an "autism mom" because YOU'RE THE PROBLEM. STOP LAUGHING ABOUT YOUR ALCOHOLISM AND PUT THE DAMN GLASS DOWN.

But my parents are literally autistic

So they don't really know the generational effect of FASD because the new knowledge is so new. But since FASD is literally genetic issues caused by alcohol while you're in the womb. It's assumed that it can cause issues that are passed down.

But like this diagnosis is SO NEW that we really don't know much.

-fae

[liquidpaperfoundation]

Is there a middle ground between toxic diet culture and fat activism? I'm really sick of the only sides of discourse being either "IF YOU HAVE EVEN THE SLIGHTEST HINT OF BELLY POOCH OR GOD FORBID CELLULITE YOU ARE A DISGUSTING PERSON" or "ACTUALLY OBESITY IS ALL GENETICS AND BEING 400 POUNDS IS HEALTHY ACKSHUALLY". Like, You Are Both Insane.

Yes, obesity is unhealthy. It increases your risk of so many problems, like heart disease, stroke, diabetes, arthritis, skin infections (from moisture trapped under fat rolls), blood clots, infertility, and so much more.

No, shaming people is not kind or helpful in any way.

Yes, genetics, chemical exposure, mental illness, and so much more can make it difficult to control your weight. Yes, different people have different natural body types.

No, weight loss is not impossible. No, you are not "genetically" 300 pounds.

Yes, society's beauty standards for women and men are ridiculous and even contradictory and have nothing to do with what a healthy human body actually looks like. Yes, you can't necessarily tell if somebody is healthy just by looking at them. Yes, BMI is BS. Yes, the ghouls are always making up some shit about cellulite or buccal fat or hip dips just to make you feel bad about having a perfectly normal body.

No, that doesn't mean that all bodies are healthy. Eugenia Cooney is too goddamn thin and Tess Holliday is too goddamn fat.

Toxic diet culture tells us that our bodies are bad and morally wrong and we should be willing to do anything to get thinner. That's bad.

Toxic fat positivity tells us that becoming addicted to junk food and getting morbidly obese is "self love" and that wanting to eat healthy or exercise at all is tantamount to anorexia, and that if you don't want to be hundreds of pounds overweight you are a bigot. Also bad.

People really need to stop spitefully taking the most extreme opinions. It helps nobody except the jerks who want to sell us stuff.