“A whole lot of sickness out there”
“Educators faced with the reality that they cannot fix everything may be suffering from compassion fatigue. That could be summed up as a “combination of physical, emotional, and spiritual depletion.” (p.6) That’s why the authors address you first in each module before focusing on students and the school.”
“Bottom line: Respiratory season is officially in full throttle. It’s not too late to get your vaccines. I have also started wearing a KN95 mask again in crowded indoor areas, like airports. As a working mom, I just don’t have time to get sick. Risk reduction is the name of the game.”
“In case we parents didn’t have enough to manage this fall, norovirus—think stomach cramping, intense episodes of vomiting and diarrhea, and occasional fevers—has entered the chat. Levels are higher than this time last year but still far below last year’s peak. Be sure to wash those hands!”
“At least 16 of the 20 largest public school districts in the United States now offer online mental health counseling for their students, according to an analysis by the Associated Press. The contracts for those school districts total more than $70 million. The switch to online therapy is in response to the skyrocketing need for […]
“On any measure related to anxiety or depression, girls have higher absolute rates (the total number of individuals), often two or three times higher, as you see in Figure 1. For suicide it’s the opposite: as a new research brief from AIBM makes clear, the rates for boys are much higher, and their high rate […]
“Events can negatively affect people a world away from the scene, especially when this involves witnessing fear, pain, grief, and terror that others have experienced. This is the “cost of caring” …There are a number of things we can do to reduce vicarious trauma while remaining up-to-date on the Israel-Hamas War:”
“If this season mirrors the last, we will have unusual patterns of respiratory viruses: RSV peaking in early November, Flu peaking in late November, Covid-19 peaking in late December. Nonetheless, expect illness. Last year, 1 in 4 students swabbed were positive for at least one virus in November. The severity of the threat depends on […]
“The fall/winter season always means more respiratory sickness—the weather changes, people head inside, and social networks change (school starts, holiday celebrations occur). But the last four years have resulted in very unusual patterns. This makes predicting this season a fool’s game. But I’ll take the bait and give it a shot.”
“I interviewed dozens of independent scientists studying respiratory health whom I’ve known for years, and they all agreed that schools should primarily do two things.”
““It’s the best medicine we can recommend: Just going out for a walk,” said Dr. Randal Thomas, a preventive cardiology specialist at the Mayo Clinic who was not involved with the study.”
“Reading a book or looking at an electronic device up close is bad for your eyes. True. Our eyes are not meant to focus on objects close to our face for long periods of time.”
“I don’t believe we are in an endemic phase— a state of predictability. I think we are on our way, and COVID-19 will eventually fall into seasonal patterns. But this will likely take years. Until then, we will be in an awkward space between pandemic and endemic. Epidemiologists don’t have an official word for this […]
“This makes the fall booster conversation interesting. Last week, the FDA authorized a BA.4/5 vaccine formula. However, one could make the argument that the original BA.1 vaccine formula would be better with this BA.2.75 news. But, chasing variants is never going to work. Our goal should be broaden protection. An Omicron vaccine will do that, […]
“The newest Omicron variant, BA.4/5, is gaining traction, causing case, hospitalization, and death curves to trend upwards in many countries.”
“If your goal is simply to mitigate the harmful impact loneliness can have on your health, what matters most is having at least one important person in your life — whether that’s a partner, a parent, a friend or someone else, said Jeffrey Hall, a professor of communication studies at the University of Kansas. “Going […]
“In fact, it’s not just making art that improves health and mood. Almost any hobby or act of leisure helps. A 2013 study at Pennsylvania State University found that gardening, sewing, completing puzzles and other relaxing activities lowered blood pressure. A 2015 study at the University of Merced revealed that individuals who engaged in leisure reported improved moods and […]
“Unlike the flu, which has higher fatality rates in both young children and older adults, coronaviruses tend to only be more dangerous for seniors. In a paper published on Jan. 29, scientists writing in the New England Journal of Medicine recorded 0 cases of 2019-nCoV in children 15 and under. This doesn’t mean that children are immune to the […]
“The aim of this study – Predict, a collaboration between King’s College London and Harvard and Stanford medical schools in the US – is to measure thousands of people’s responses to different foods and discover why, when it comes to health, different diets suit different people. The hope is that when enough data has been […]
“After two centuries of trying, we should accept that exercise is not working as a global fitness strategy while it remains an addition to the working day. In the long view, it is starting to look a lot like a fad… What is needed are the kinds of strategies that would make exercise unnecessary… Exercise […]
I am officially declaring e-cigarette use among youth an epidemic in the United States. Now is the time to take action. We need to protect our young people from all tobacco products, including e-cigarettes.
The vaping increase was so precipitous, researchers said, that it was the largest annual jump in the use of any substance, including marijuana, they had seen in the project’s 44-year history.”