Middle-aged men who were anxious or depressed teens are at increased risk for heart attack, according to a large, long-term study. It included more than 238,000 men born between 1952 and 1956 who underwent extensive exams when they were 18 or 19 years old and were followed to age 58. Men diagnosed with anxiety or depression in their late teens had a 20% higher risk of heart attack than those who didn’t, the study showed. The findings only reflect an association. The link was partly, but not fully, explained by poorer ability to cope with everyday stress and lower physical fitness in teens with the mental health conditions, according to findings presented Wednesday at a virtual meeting of the European Society of Cardiology. The takeaway: “Be vigilant and look for signs of stress, depression or anxiety that is beyond the normal teenage angst: Seek help if there seems to be a persistent problem,” suggested study author Cecilia Bergh, a senior lecturer in health sciences at Orebro University in Sweden. “If a healthy lifestyle is encouraged as early as possible in childhood and adolescence it is more likely to persist into adulthood and improve long-term health,” she said in a meeting news release. Bergh said researchers already knew that men who were physically fit but stressed as teens seemed less likely to maintain fitness. “Our previous…  read on >

The first rapid coronavirus test that doesn’t need any special computer equipment to produce results was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday. Made by Abbott Laboratories, the 15-minute test will sell for $5, giving it an edge over similar tests that need to be popped into a small machine, the Associated Press reported. No larger than a credit card, the Abbott test is based on the same technology used to test for the flu, strep throat and other infections. BinaxNOW is the fourth rapid test in the United States that detects COVID-19 antigens, proteins found on the surface of the coronavirus, rather than the virus itself, the AP reported. It’s considered a faster, but less precise, screening method. Abbott’s entry into the rapid COVID-19 test market offers yet another option to expand testing, the AP reported. The FDA also recently gave its blessing to a saliva test from Yale University that bypasses some of the supplies that have led to testing bottlenecks, the wire service said. Neither test can be performed at home. But several companies are developing rapid at-home tests, though none have yet won FDA approval, the AP reported. Abbott’s new test still requires a nasal swab be taken by a health worker, like most older coronavirus tests. The Yale saliva test eliminates the need for a swab, but…  read on >

President Donald Trump announced on Thursday that his administration will have a coronavirus vaccine ready for Americans before the year ends. The lofty promise came during his acceptance speech on the final night of the Republican National Convention. “In recent months, our nation and the entire planet has been struck by a new and powerful invisible enemy,” Trump said to a largely mask-less crowd of 1,500 supporters gathered on the White House lawn. “We are delivering lifesaving therapies. And we’ll produce a vaccine before the end of the year, or maybe even sooner.” The pledge is ambitious by any measure. Several companies are vying for vaccine approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration by the end of this year or by early 2021, but approval is just the beginning, The New York Times reported. Patients must be willing to take the vaccine, and there must be enough doses produced to be distributed widely. Medical experts noted that the audience setting for Trump’s speech posed the danger of community spread and set another bad example when Americans are being told they need to continue to wear masks, maintain social distancing and limit large gatherings, the Washington Post reported. “When you look at the way the president has handled the pandemic, it has basically been one evasion after another evasion,” Amesh Adalja, an infectious disease expert…  read on >

Back-to-school season can be a time of stress for many kids — even in the best of times. But pandemic fears add to the anxiety many kids will experience with the start of the 2020-2021 academic year, according to David FitzGerald, a child and adolescent psychologist at UConn Health in Farmington, Conn. “COVID-19’s continued presence for this year’s back-to-school season will bring with it more challenges than ever before,” he said in a university news release. “We need to model calm for the kids at all times, and provide as much structure as possible, especially during these unpredictable times.” FitzGerald said parents need to pay close attention to their children’s emotional health and well-being, and give them the support they need for a smooth transition back to class. Here are some tips to help reduce back-to-school and pandemic-associated anxiety, stress and behavior issues: Keep calm: Parents need to lead by example. Slow down and give your family extra time in the morning so you aren’t anxious and rushed. Teach kids to take deep breaths to calm themselves. Start a healthy routine: A nutritious diet, exercise and good sleep are important. Children need a routine and a serene, structured schedule. Keep informed: Parents need to know what is happening with the COVID-19 virus. Consult trusted health organizations and your local school district. Don’t rely on social…  read on >

High levels of air pollution may increase young children’s risk of developing asthma and persistent wheezing, researchers warn. The findings “support emerging evidence that exposure to air pollution might influence the development of asthma,” according to a report by Torben Sigsgaard, of Aarhus University in Denmark, and colleagues. For the new study, the researchers analyzed data on more than 797,000 Danish children who were born between 1997 and 2014 and followed from ages 1 year up to 15 years of age. Nearly 123,000 of the children developed asthma or persistent wheezing, just before age 2 on average. The researchers then checked data on air pollution levels at the children’s home addresses, parents’ asthma, mothers’ smoking, parental education and income. After accounting for other potentially influential factors, the investigators found higher levels of asthma and persistent wheezing in children of parents with asthma and in children of mothers who smoked during pregnancy. Lower levels of asthma and persistent wheezing were found in children of parents with high levels of education and high incomes. The researchers also found that children exposed to higher levels of fine particulate air pollution (PM2.5) were more likely to develop asthma and wheezing than those who weren’t exposed. In people with asthma, the airways become inflamed and produce extra mucus, which makes it difficult to breathe. The study was published online Aug.…  read on >

The Trump administration has blocked the U.S. Food and Drug Administration from regulating a wide swath of laboratory tests, including ones for the coronavirus. The new policy, which was posted Wednesday and is strongly opposed by the FDA itself, stunned health experts and laboratories because of its timing, the Washington Post reported. The change could result in unreliable coronavirus tests getting on the market, potentially worsening the testing crisis in the United States, experts told the newspaper. The one thing the change won’t do is solve testing shortages, because those are due mostly to a lack of the swabs and chemical reagents needed to perform COVID-19 tests, the Post reported. However, supporters claimed it could help get innovative tests to market more quickly. They said that the FDA review process sharply slowed testing at the beginning of the pandemic, and that the new policy could guard against future bottlenecks, the Post reported. Administration officials told the Post that the decision was made for legal reasons. But FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn staunchly opposed the change, arguing that such authority is critical during a public health emergency like the pandemic, the newspaper reported. The tests affected by the change are those developed by and used at laboratories regulated under the federal government’s Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments program, the newspaper said. Such labs are in big academic medical…  read on >

FRIDAY, Aug. 14, 2020 (HealthDay News) The novel coronavirus is surging once more in U.S. nursing homes, where it killed tens of thousands at the start of the pandemic. Federal data cited by two long-term care associations this week illustrated the troubling trend: The number of new cases in nursing homes bottomed out at 5,468 during the week of June 21, but it climbed to 8,628 for the week of July 19, the Washington Post reported. That’s a 58 percent increase, which roughly parallels the rise in overall U.S. cases during that period. On Thursday, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis warned that more COVID-19 deaths at nursing homes and assisted-living facilities may be coming, even as total caseloads have begun to decline. Florida has seen an outbreak of coronavirus cases this summer and has a large elderly population, the Post reported. “Over the next couple weeks, I’m concerned of seeing kind of a tail, where we start to see some of these long-term-care deaths,” DeSantis said at a forum in Tallahassee. In a different analysis of 35 states, the Kaiser Family Foundation found that cases in long-term care facilities jumped 11 percent in the two weeks ending July 10. But in 23 hot spot states, they rose 18 percent, compared with just 4 percent in 12 states that had the virus under better control, the Post…  read on >

Scientists say they are seeing signs of lasting immunity to the coronavirus, even in those who only experience mild symptoms of COVID-19. A slew of studies show that disease-fighting antibodies, as well as B-cells and T-cells that can recognize the virus, appear to persist months after infections have run their course, The New York Times reported. “This is exactly what you would hope for. All the pieces are there to have a totally protective immune response,” said Marion Pepper, an immunologist at the University of Washington and an author of one of the new studies, which is now undergoing review by the journal Nature. “This is very promising,” said Smita Iyer, an immunologist at the University of California, Davis, who is studying immune responses to the coronavirus in rhesus macaques, told the Times. “This calls for some optimism about herd immunity, and potentially a vaccine.” Although researchers cannot predict how long these immune responses will last, experts consider the data to be the first proof that the body has a good chance of fending off the coronavirus if exposed to it again. “Things are really working as they’re supposed to,” Deepta Bhattacharya, an immunologist at the University of Arizona, told the Times. Bhattacharya is an author on one of the new studies, which was published on medRxiv, a pre-print server for health research that has…  read on >