More teens in the United States are reporting their sexual identity as gay, lesbian or bisexual, nationwide surveys show. Between 2015 and 2019, the percentage of 15- to 17-year-olds who said they identified as “non-heterosexual” rose from 8.3% to 11.7%, according to nationwide surveys by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “Although our…  read on >  read on >

Suffering through a case of COVID-19 unleashed a host of other health problems in hundreds of thousands of Americans participating in the largest study yet of the long-term effects of coronavirus infection. Tracking the health insurance records of nearly 2 million people who caught the coronavirus last year, researchers found that one month or more…  read on >  read on >

Children may have an increased risk of obesity if their mothers were exposed to high levels of air pollution during pregnancy, researchers say. In a new study, 123 Hispanic mother-infant pairs were enrolled in an ongoing trial in the Los Angeles region. Before pregnancy, about one-third of the mothers were normal weight, one-third were overweight…  read on >  read on >

Novavax, a Maryland biotechnology company that has struggled mightily with delays in developing its coronavirus vaccine, announced Monday that its two-shot regimen was over 90% effective overall in a trial that unfolded even as more contagious variants emerged. Among 30,000 volunteers — all of them from either the United States or Mexico — vaccinated people…  read on >  read on >

A rising number of young Americans, including children, are taking their own lives using firearms, a new study finds. Researchers found that between 2008 and 2018, gun suicides showed an “alarming” increase among Americans aged 5 to 24. And while those suicides remain rare among children, the rate among kids under 15 quadrupled during the…  read on >  read on >