Cancer patients continue to face more risk from COVID-19, even if they’ve been vaccinated. Although vaccination is effective for most people who have cancer (even though they’re immunocompromised by the disease and their cancer treatments), its effectiveness wanes more rapidly in this group, by three to six months compared to the general population, new research… read on > read on >
The COVID-19 pandemic and the isolation it imposed took a dramatic toll on kids’ mental health, increasing the demand for services in an already overburdened system. As a result, many kids found themselves being “boarded” in emergency departments as they awaited care, according to a new study conducted at Boston Children’s Hospital. The average wait… read on > read on >
Add a lower risk of Crohn’s disease to the many benefits of having a dog during childhood, a new study suggests. Sorry, cat lovers, researchers didn’t find a similar benefit for you. “We did not see the same results with cats, though we are still trying to determine why,” said senior author Williams Turpin, a… read on > read on >
Think vaping is cheap? A study from the University of California, San Francisco School of Nursing reports that annual health care costs for users of electronic cigarettes were $2,024 more per person than for those who use no tobacco products. That adds up to about $15 billion a year in the United States. “Health care… read on > read on >
Creating more parks and other green spaces could have prevented tens of thousands of deaths in dozens of large U.S. cities over the past two decades, a new study says. “We’ve known that living in greener areas can have a positive impact on our physical and mental health, but there is a lack of data… read on > read on >
If you’re poor and have a severe type of heart attack, the chance you’ll live through it is significantly lower than that of someone with more money, new research shows. The finding underscores the need to close a divide in health care that hits low-income people hard, said lead researcher Dr. Abdul Mannan Khan Minhas,… read on > read on >
Pfizer/BioNTech says a three-dose regimen of its COVID-19 vaccine appears to provoke a strong immune response in the youngest age group of children — those aged 6 months to 5 years. This is the only age group not yet approved for COVID-19 vaccination by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. According to CNN, Pfizer said… read on > read on >
COVID-19 might be easing into a new status as a widely circulating and somewhat harsher version of the common cold, experts say — a virus that folks could contract repeatedly, even if they were recently infected. “[SARS-CoV-2] is destined to join four of its family members and become an endemic coronavirus that will repeatedly infect… read on > read on >
Americans with sickle cell disease who have private insurance face average out-of-pocket costs of $1,300 a year and a lifetime total of $44,000, new research reveals. That means that their out-of-pocket expenses are nearly four times higher compared to people without the inherited blood disorder, the new study found. “Identifying ways to reduce the burden… read on > read on >
If you have both asthma and seasonal allergies, there are ways to reduce the impacts of that double whammy, an expert says. People with asthma, a chronic lung condition, should try to control or prevent allergic outbreaks, said Dr. Miranda Curtiss, an assistant professor at the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Medicine. Nasal… read on > read on >
