In U.S. states that provide financial assistance for low-income families, the difference is evident in children’s brains, researchers report. Their study found disparities in brain structure between children from high-income households compared to low-income households. However, the disparity was more than a third lower in states offering greater cash assistance to low-income families, compared to states offering less help. In addition, the disparity in mental health symptoms was reduced by nearly a half. The study, which was funded by the U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), involved more than 10,000 children ages 9 to 11, using data from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study (ABCD) study. “The association between brain structure and a low-resource environment is not an inevitability,” said study author David Weissman, a postdoctoral fellow in the Stress and Development Lab at Harvard University. “Children’s brains are undergoing substantial development and have enhanced plasticity or capacity for further change based on their environment,” Weissman said in a NIDA news release. “These data suggest that policies and programs that work to reduce social and health inequities can directly reach children in disadvantaged environments and help support their mental health.” Emerging evidence has shown that children from families with lower income have smaller hippocampal volume than those in families with higher income, the researchers said. The hippocampus is involved in both memory and emotional…  read on >  read on >

U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy has declared war on what he calls a “loneliness epidemic” in the United States. Murthy announced a “National Strategy to Advance Social Connection” to address this “epidemic of loneliness and isolation.” “In recent years, about one-in-two adults in America reported experiencing loneliness,” Murthy said in an advisory released Monday about the strategy. “And that was before the COVID-19 pandemic cut off so many of us from friends, loved ones and support systems.” Social connection can make communities more resilient, he noted. “Loneliness I think of as a great masquerader. It can look like different things,” Murthy told CNN on Monday. “Some people, they become withdrawn. Others become irritable and angry. … I think the time you get concerned is when you start experiencing a feeling of loneliness for prolonged periods of time. If you feel lonely, you pick up the phone and call a friend, and then it goes away, or you get in the car and go see a family member, that’s OK. That’s loneliness acting like hunger or thirst, a signal our body sends us when we need something for survival. It’s when it persists that it becomes harmful.” The national strategy is part of the Biden administration’s mental health efforts, said White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, according to CNN. The Surgeon General’s framework for social…  read on >  read on >

Many common household products emit airborne toxins that can harm your health in ways up to and including cancer, a new study reports. Dozens of different types of consumer products contain toxic volatile organic compounds (VOCs), chemicals that escape as gases and accumulate in indoor air, researchers from the Silent Spring Institute and the University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley), reported. More than 100 types of products contain VOCs that can cause cancer, birth defects or other reproductive harm, according to their report published May 2 in the journal Environmental Science & Technology. More than 5,000 tons of VOCs were released from consumer products in California in 2020, the researchers estimated. The investigators identified 30 categories of products that deserve special scrutiny because they frequently contain harmful chemicals and may pose the greatest health risk. Formaldehyde, a known carcinogen, was the most common harmful VOC. It was found in nail polish, shampoo, makeup and many other types of personal care products. Other products that emit VOCs included cleaners, art supplies, laundry detergents, mothballs and adhesives. “This study is the first to reveal the extent to which toxic VOCs are used in everyday products of all types that could lead to serious health problems,” lead author Kristin Knox, a scientist at Silent Spring Institute, said in an institute news release. “Making this information public could incentivize…  read on >  read on >

Teens who are abused by a romantic partner may suffer long-lasting repercussions, and this is especially true for girls, a new analysis finds. Investigators who reviewed 38 studies concluded that teenage dating violence was linked to a higher risk for additional relationship violence in the teen years and even into adulthood. These unhealthy relationships were also associated with higher long-term risk for substance abuse (drugs and alcohol) and mental health struggles. “Teen dating violence has been defined as a variety of harmful partner-directed behaviors — including physical, sexual, psychological, cyber violence — that occur within adolescent romantic relationships,” said study lead author Antonio Piolanti. Research has shown that dating violence is “very common” in the teen years, said Piolanti, a post-doctoral assistant at the Universität Klagenfurt’s Institute of Psychology, in Austria. Among U.S. high school students who reported dating in the previous year, a 2019 survey found about 1 in 12 experienced physical dating violence. About 1 in 12 experienced sexual dating violence. But “psychological teen dating violence has been estimated to be the most common form of dating violence among adolescents,” Piolanti noted, affecting somewhere between 17% to 88% of adolescents. This can take the form of very controlling behavior or emotional abuse. Sexual violence can include forcing a partner to engage in unwanted sexual activities, while cyber violence might include aggressive online behaviors.…  read on >  read on >

Growing numbers of American kids and teens are cutting or burning themselves, banging their heads against walls, pulling out their hair and even trying to die by suicide. But figuring out who is at highest risk for harming themselves has been a daunting challenge. Until now. Researchers report they have developed risk profiles that can help doctors pinpoint which kids or teens are in the most danger. “The U.S. is in the midst of a mental health crisis, with mental health diagnoses and hospitalizations surging over the past few years, and many of these hospitalizations are for self-harm events or concern for future self-harm,” said study author Dr. James Antoon, an assistant professor of pediatrics and hospital medicine at Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn. “Self-harm is a big bucket of events from mild things like cutting on the arms or thighs to taking so much Tylenol that you die on purpose or jumping out of a window, and we wanted to find out which kids require hospitalization and more intensive treatment and monitoring,” he said. There’s a pronounced shortage of in-patient hospital beds for kids with mental health issue in the United States, which makes the situation even more dire. Knowing which kids are at the highest risk can help make better use of these limited resources, Antoon noted.…  read on >  read on >

Suicides among the youngest U.S. teenagers were rising for years before the pandemic — with school stress, social media and guns standing as potential factors, according to a new study. Researchers found that between 2008 and 2018, the suicide rate among 13- and 14-year-olds nationwide more than doubled — from roughly two deaths per 100,000 teens in 2008, to five per 100,000 a decade later. It was a stark reversal of a decline that began in the late-1990s. And, in fact, suicide is now the leading cause of death for 13- and 14-year-olds in the United States, said senior researcher Dr. Sarah Wood, a professor of pediatrics at Florida Atlantic University’s Schmidt College of Medicine. The study — published online recently in the Annals of Pediatrics and Child Health — comes amid growing concerns about U.S. kids’ mental well-being. For years, studies have been charting rising rates of depression, anxiety, and suicidal thoughts and behavior. And the latest government surveys of U.S. high school students continue to paint a bleak picture. “In my mind, this study is another warning bell,” Wood said. “Things are not improving. They’re getting worse.” Much has been said about the pandemic’s effects on kids’ mental health. And while that’s true, the pandemic added to problems that have long existed, said Joseph Feinglass, a research professor at Northwestern University Feinberg School…  read on >  read on >

While COVID-19’s toll on health and wellness has been obvious, the virus has also hit people in the wallet. A new study links surviving COVID to financial challenges later, especially for folks who were hospitalized with the virus. “More than half of Americans now report having had COVID-19, and more than 450,000 have been hospitalized, so the potential number experiencing serious financial issues linked to their experience with the virus is high,” said Dr. Nora Becker of the University of Michigan Institute for Healthcare Policy and Innovation, in Ann Arbor. Compared to people whose financial health was measured before the virus, those who had COVID-19 were more likely to have bills so overdue that they were sent to a collection agency. They were also more likely to have a low credit score. To learn more, researchers from University of Michigan and Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore linked health care records and financial records of more than 132,000 people in Michigan. Patients’ identification was removed. About 42% of patients who had been hospitalized with COVID-19 had a low credit score six months later, the study found. That compared to 34% of a similar group who hadn’t yet required a hospital stay for COVID-19 but later needed one. The gap was smaller, but significant, between the two groups of non-hospitalized patients. About 27% of the patients who…  read on >  read on >