Settlements totaling $26 billion have been finalized between drugmaker Johnson & Johnson plus three major pharmaceutical distributors and state and local governments, over the companies’ role in America’s opioid crisis. The settlement plan — involving Johnson & Johnson, AmerisourceBergen, Cardinal Health and McKesson — was first announced last year and is the largest to date…  read on >  read on >

Newly diagnosed diabetes in many COVID-19 patients may be a temporary type triggered by COVID, according to a new study. Blood sugar levels returned to normal in about half of the newly diagnosed diabetes patients after they left the hospital, and only 8% required insulin after one year, according to the report published online recently…  read on >  read on >

Black women who often encountered racism before age 20 have an increased risk of depression, new research shows. Of the 1,600 Black women in Detroit, aged 25 to 35, who took part in the study, nearly two-thirds said they’d been subjected to some form of racism during adolescence, and more than one-third had symptoms of…  read on >  read on >

Pain or cramping in your legs during physical activity may be an early sign of a condition called peripheral artery disease (PAD) — and you should get checked out by your doctor, an expert says. PAD occurs when plaque develops in the arteries of the extremities and restricts blood flow to the legs, and sometimes…  read on >  read on >

Spring allergies are a perennial annoyance, but if you’re focusing on the pandemic, they still could catch you by surprise, an expert says. “People still have COVID on their minds,” said Dr. Mark Corbett, president of the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology. “They might not be thinking about spring allergies, so symptoms could…  read on >  read on >

FRIDAY, Feb. 25, 2022 (American Heart Association News) — Women with high blood pressure conditions during pregnancy may face double the risk for kidney disease within several years after giving birth, according to a new study that finds the risk climbs to nearly fourfold for women who already had high blood pressure before pregnancy. The…  read on >  read on >

Science could be well on its way to a cure for type 1 diabetes, as researchers hone transplant therapies designed to restore patients’ ability to produce their own insulin, experts say. At least one patient — a 64-year-old Ohio man named Brian Shelton — can now automatically control his insulin and blood sugar levels without…  read on >  read on >

Headphones have a much greater impact on listeners than external speakers because they put voices “inside your head,” a new study explains. “Headphones produce a phenomenon called in-head localization, which makes the speaker sound as if they’re inside your head,” said study co-author On Amir, a professor of marketing at the University of California, San…  read on >  read on >

An increase in telemedicine during the pandemic and easier access to prescription drugs to end a pregnancy may help explain why more than half of U.S. abortions are now done with a combination of medicines instead of surgery, researchers report. The percentage of abortions done with U.S. Food and Drug Administration-approved mifepristone pills rose from…  read on >  read on >