All Sauce from Weekly Gravy:

Some people mistrust the safety and effectiveness of human vaccines for COVID-19 and other diseases, a fact that became abundantly clear during the pandemic. Now, a new survey of 2,200 dog owners shows this mistrust may often extend to canine vaccinations. The finding suggests there is spillover between the issues, with those who have negative feelings about human vaccines more likely to hold these same views about vaccinating their pets, even when it comes to deadly conditions like rabies. “We knew that this phenomenon existed, but we didn’t know how prevalent it was. We didn’t know where it came from and what policy and public health implications might be, and that’s why we set out to do this research,” said Matt Motta, an assistant professor of health law, policy & management at Boston University School of Public Health, who conducted the research with his sister, Dr. Gabriella Motta, a veterinarian at Glenolden Veterinary Hospital in Pennsylvania. “A lot of our motivation for this project was born out of conversation that she and I had, her lived experience as a vet, encountering folks who didn’t want to vaccinate their pets and trying to understand why,” he explained. What they found is that nearly 40% of dog owners think dog vaccines aren’t safe. About 20% think they’re not effective. And 30% think they aren’t medically necessary. About…  read on >  read on >

“Vain” isn’t a word normally associated with football players, but many wide receivers believe they look slim and fleet-footed with a lower number on their jersey rather than a higher one. New research shows these players are onto something. In two experiments, subjects shown images of players consistently said that those wearing jerseys numbered 10 to 19 looked thinner than those in jerseys 80 to 89 — even when their body sizes were the same, according to a new report in the journal PLOS ONE. Researchers say this is because the way we perceive numbers appears to influence our perceptions of body sizes. “How we perceive the world is highly influenced by our prior knowledge,” said senior researcher Ladan Shams, a professor of psychology and neuroscience at the University of California, Los Angeles. “In our daily lives, numbers written on objects — on a bag of sugar in the supermarket or weights in the gym — usually represent the magnitude of the objects,” she said in a university news release. “The higher the number, the bigger or more massive the object generally is.” The study followed up on a 2019 ESPN report exploring why many football wide receivers prefer to wear jersey numbers between 10 and 19. A longtime NFL rule required wide receivers to wear uniform numbers between 80 and 89, but the league…  read on >  read on >

The blockbuster drug Ozempic has become a household name for its ability to spur weight loss. Now an early study hints at an intriguing possibility: The drug might allow people newly diagnosed with type 1 diabetes to drop their daily insulin shots. Experts emphasized that the findings are based on only 10 patients, and larger, longer-term studies are necessary. However, all 10 patients were able to stop their meal-time insulin injections after starting semaglutide, the active ingredient in Ozempic. And most were also able to drop their long-acting insulin, which is used to keep overnight blood sugar levels in check. “It sounds like science fiction, that people with type 1 diabetes can stop taking insulin,” said lead researcher Dr. Paresh Dandona of the State University of New York at Buffalo. “This really opens up a new area of research,” he said. “Could we use this drug to change the natural course of type 1 diabetes?” Type 1 diabetes arises when the immune system mistakenly goes after cells in the pancreas that produce the hormone insulin. Insulin has the critical job of moving sugars from food into the body’s cells to be used as fuel. In order to survive, people with type 1 diabetes have to take synthetic insulin, via daily injections or a pump attached to the body. The disease is far less common than…  read on >  read on >

New COVID-19 booster shots could soon pass the needed hurdles for vaccinations to begin next week. Sources familiar with U.S. Food and Drug Administration plans say boosters could be approved as soon as Friday, NBC News reported. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices is scheduled to meet on Tuesday. CDC director Dr. Mandy Cohen could sign off soon after, allowing vaccinations to begin. The boosters from Pfizer and Moderna target the XBB.1.5 omicron subvariant. That’s no longer the dominant variant circulating, but those that are spreading are closely related, and health experts say this booster could still offer some protection. This time, the FDA may grant full approval for the boosters rather than emergency use authorization, according to NBC News sources. If the FDA doesn’t approve the boosters on Friday, it could do so early next week. While protection wanes over time, about 97% of adults have some level of protective immunity from past COVID infections and vaccinations. These shots are expected to boost that coverage. They will, however, come at a price. For the first time, the federal government is not covering costs of the shots. Most people with private and public health insurance should still be able to receive them for free. Those who are uninsured may be able to get them at community health centers.…  read on >  read on >

Your thinking and memory skills may take a hit decades after recovering from a concussion, a new study indicates. Scientists who studied male twins, from an average age of 67, found that earlier concussions were tied to lower scores on tests of thinking and memory. These men also had a more rapid decline in their cognitive skills — skills needed for reasoning and the acquisition of knowledge. “It is concerning and, honestly, since previous studies had not been able to capture the cognitive decline, it was not something I really was expecting to see,” said study author Marianne Chanti-Ketterl, a gerontologist at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C. “But it is also promising because it’s something that we can intervene on.” Studying identical twins makes sense because they share the same genes and many of the same early life exposures. In this research, one person from each pair had sustained a traumatic brain injury (TBI) during their lifetime and the other hadn’t been injured. This study worked with data from nearly 7,200 white, male World War II veterans who were twins. The men took a thinking skills test when the study began, at age 67 on average. They took the tests three more times over 12 years. Those with a history of concussion had the brain injury 34 years earlier on average. Participants started…  read on >  read on >

Emergency room visits for injuries related to driving under the influence of cannabis skyrocketed in Canada after the drug was legalized there, a new study reports. In October 2018, Canada became the second country to nationally legalize recreational or nonmedical cannabis for adult use. While known cannabis-involved emergency department (ED) visits for traffic injuries were still rare, they grew by 475% over 13 years, with a sharper rise in accidents after legalization, the researchers found. “Our findings highlight a concerning increase in cannabis-involvement in traffic-injury emergency visits over time, with even sharper spikes following the phases of legalization and commercialization,” said lead author Dr. Daniel Myran, a post-doctoral trainee at the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences (ICES) and a family physician at the Ottawa Hospital. “Conversely, alcohol-involvement in traffic injury ED visits did not increase over the study period, which suggests that legalization of cannabis has played an important role in rising rates,” Myran said in an ICES news release. For the study, the researchers looked at cannabis-involved ED visits for traffic injuries between 2010 and 2021, looking for changes after the October 2018 commercialization of the legal cannabis market, which expanded products and retail stores. The investigators reviewed data from more than 947,000 ED visits for traffic injuries in the province of Ontario. Annual rates of cannabis-involved visits surged from 0.18 visits per 1,000…  read on >  read on >

Just like adults, kids face daily stressors. Luckily, a new study suggests that teaching them creative thinking can help them manage it all. Researchers found that when school-age children learned some “narrative creativity” techniques — such as shifting your perspective and imagining “what if” scenarios — they quickly became better problem-solvers. After a week-long creativity camp, or even just a single lesson, kids showed more confidence in their ability to face life’s daily problems and come up with a “plan B” when necessary. The study was small, based on 60 kids attending the same summer camp. But experts said the findings just make sense. When kids can think flexibly, they are less likely to “panic” in the face of challenge, said study author Angus Fletcher, a professor at Ohio State University. Instead of simply giving up, he said, they are more apt to hunt for alternative solutions — a capacity called resilience. “Kids have some of the same daily challenges that adults do,” Fletcher said. “Their biggest problems aren’t in math, they’re in interacting with other kids.” Yet, Fletcher noted, schools typically focus on test scores rather than life skills. Meanwhile, parents, however well-intentioned, can also get in the way — if they rush to fix their child’s dilemma or tell them the “correct” solution. “It’s very challenging for some parents to resist that,” Fletcher…  read on >  read on >

Going vegan doesn’t have to mean going broke, with new research finding that steering clear of meat and dairy can lower food costs by about 16%. “A vegan diet based on fruits, vegetables, grains and beans has always been a more affordable diet than one that includes meat, dairy and other animal products,” said study author Dr. Hana Kahleova, director of clinical research for the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine in Washington, D.C. “Like any diet, the cost of a vegan diet can vary based on the foods you are purchasing,” Kahleova added. “But as our research shows, a vegan diet will actually save you money, when compared to one that includes animal products.” That conclusion follows four months spent tracking 244 overweight study participants at some point between 2017 and 2019. Though none had been vegan prior to the study, investigators randomly assigned half to make the switch to a vegan diet, while the remaining half made no changes to their diet. An earlier analysis of the data determined that making the switch triggered a variety of health benefits. For example, those who embarked on a vegan diet tended to lose significant weight. A vegan diet was also linked to improved metabolism, along with a drop in fat accumulation in liver and muscle cells. The latter development meant improvements in the way those in…  read on >  read on >

Lee-Anne Mosselman-Clarke knows firsthand what it’s like to battle with postpartum mental health crises. She experienced difficulties after the births of her two children. “I have an 11 and 9 year old and I didn’t actually know that I had postpartum anxiety with my oldest. He had very significant health problems and I just thought I am having an awful first journey as a new mum,” she said. “It wasn’t until I got pregnant with my second that the midwife said, ‘I’d like you to talk to somebody because I think you are at risk for having postpartum depression again.’” Mosselman-Clarke, of Brant County, Ontario, Canada, has a background in social work and now works as a postpartum doula, supporting women through pregnancy and childbirth. When she heard about a new Canadian study involving group peer-delivered therapy for people battling postpartum depression, she applied immediately and was accepted as a peer facilitator. The sessions have been her passion since then. “The peer program is an incredible way to be able to talk to other people who have struggled the way you struggle without judgment or guilt or shame. And it gives an opportunity to not feel alone and to feel a lot less isolated,” Mosselman-Clarke said. The study, published Aug. 31 in Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, had some considerable findings. Postpartum depression patients who received treatment…  read on >  read on >

Obesity taxes many parts of the body, but new research suggests the heart might take the hardest hit of all. Between 1999 and 2020, deaths from heart disease linked to obesity tripled in the United States, and some groups were more vulnerable than others. Specifically, Black adults had some of the highest rates of obesity-related heart disease deaths, with the highest percentage of deaths seen in Black women. The new study was published Sept. 6 in the Journal of the American Heart Association. “Our study is the first to demonstrate that this increasing burden of obesity is translating into rising heart disease deaths,” study author Dr. Zahra Raisi-Estabragh, a cardiologist and clinical lecturer at the William Harvey Research Institute in London, said in a journal news release. About 42% of Americans are now obese, an increase of almost 10% from the last decade, according to the American Heart Association. For the study, researchers analyzed data on more than 281,000 deaths from 1999 to 2020 in which obesity was listed in a contributing cause of death in a database. They also looked at race, gender and whether people lived in urban or rural areas. Overall, obesity-related heart disease deaths jumped from 2.2 per 100,000 people in 1999 to 6.6 per 100,000 people in 2020, the study showed. The rate of heart disease deaths not related to…  read on >  read on >