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 >

With the arrival of late summer, it’s essential to know the signs of heat exhaustion and how to intervene before it escalates to a more severe condition like heat stroke, emergency medicine experts say. Heat exhaustion comes with symptoms including: heavy sweating; breathlessness; a fast, but weak, pulse; headache; dizziness; nausea or vomiting. “Heat exhaustion can happen to anyone overexerting themselves in extreme heat,” said Dr. Laura Burke, an emergency medicine physician at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston. “If symptoms are severe, call for medical help right away.” Some people have an increased risk of heat exhaustion, including: People with heart disease or high blood pressure. People over age 65. Infants and children. People with sunburn, which impairs the cooling mechanism of the skin. If heat exhaustion occurs and appropriate measures are not taken to cool down, it can sometimes escalate to a life-threatening condition called heat stroke. “During heat stroke, the body can no longer cool itself down through sweating, which can result in damage to major organs,” Burke said in a hospital news release. Symptoms of heat stroke include hot and dry skin, a fever higher than 102 degrees Fahrenheit, headache, confusion and unconsciousness. “If you see someone suffering from heat stroke, try to cool the person down by getting to shade or into the air conditioning. Apply cool water with…  read on >

It may seem like a paradox, but giving someone a gift to help them save money is a sure way to make them hate it. The reason: It will make the recipient feel inferior to you, researchers say. In contrast, a gift that helps a recipient save time is taken as a compliment. The findings, from a series of experiments, are outlined in a study recently published in the Journal of the Association for Consumer Research. “Most of us have this belief that any gift we give is going to be appreciated — but the way a gift is presented can influence how people feel about it,” said study co-author Grant Donnelly, assistant professor of marketing at Ohio State University, in Columbus. “When you don’t have time, you’re perceived as busy and in high demand. There’s something high-status about that, compared to not having enough money, which is seen as low status,” Donnelly said in a university news release. In one experiment, the researchers asked 405 people how they felt about receiving a gift they thought was intended to save them either time or money. Those who received a gift that was intended to save them money were more likely to say it made them feel embarrassed, ashamed and bad, compared to those who received a time-saving gift. “They thought the gift-giver was implying they…  read on >

It may seem like a paradox, but giving someone a gift to help them save money is a sure way to make them hate it. The reason: It will make the recipient feel inferior to you, researchers say. In contrast, a gift that helps a recipient save time is taken as a compliment. The findings, from a series of experiments, are outlined in a study recently published in the Journal of the Association for Consumer Research. “Most of us have this belief that any gift we give is going to be appreciated — but the way a gift is presented can influence how people feel about it,” said study co-author Grant Donnelly, assistant professor of marketing at Ohio State University, in Columbus. “When you don’t have time, you’re perceived as busy and in high demand. There’s something high-status about that, compared to not having enough money, which is seen as low status,” Donnelly said in a university news release. In one experiment, the researchers asked 405 people how they felt about receiving a gift they thought was intended to save them either time or money. Those who received a gift that was intended to save them money were more likely to say it made them feel embarrassed, ashamed and bad, compared to those who received a time-saving gift. “They thought the gift-giver was implying they…  read on >

As the World Health Organization cautioned on Monday that using plasma from COVID-19 survivors to treat other patients is still an experimental therapy, American scientists challenged a key statistic cited by U.S. officials as grounds for emergency approval of the treatment. In announcing the approval on Sunday, President Donald Trump and two of his top health officials spoke of the same stunning statistic — that the treatment had reduced deaths by 35 percent, the New York Times reported. Dr. Stephen Hahn, the commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, went so far as to say that 35 out of 100 COVID-19 patients “would have been saved because of the administration of plasma.” But many scientists, including a researcher on the Mayo Clinic study from which the statistic was supposedly gleaned, said Monday they could not ascertain where the number came from and that Hahn had appeared to overstate the treatment’s benefits, the Times reported. “Do I know where the 35 percent comes from?” said Dr. Arturo Casadevall, one of the May Clinic study’s main authors who hails from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. “No.” The actual data from the Mayo Clinic study shows that, among a group of more than 35,000 patients, when plasma was given within three day of diagnosis, the death rate was about 22 percent, compared with 27 percent when it was…  read on >

Just weeks after colleges across the United States reopened their campuses for the fall semester, thousands of coronavirus infections are cropping up in students and staff alike. More than 1,500 American colleges and universities were tallied in The New York Times survey. That included every four-year public institution, every private college that competes in NCAA sports and others that identified cases. The case total: At least 26,000 cases and 64 deaths have been reported since the pandemic began, the Times reported. The trend is unfolding everywhere. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill sent most undergraduates home after COVID-19 clusters popped up in campus housing. In-person classes were delayed at Notre Dame as students tested positive by the hundreds. Clemson, Baylor, Louisville and dozens of other Division I universities have confirmed COVID-19 cases in their athletic departments. Meanwhile, aggressive testing of students moving into dorms turned up scores of cases at Iowa State, the Times reported. Meanwhile, the potential of convalescent plasma as a treatment for severe COVID-19 was still unclear Tuesday, as the World Health Organization cautioned the therapy remains experimental and American scientists challenged a key statistic cited by U.S. officials as grounds for emergency approval of the treatment. In announcing the approval this week, President Donald Trump and two of his top health officials stirred controversy when they used the same…  read on >

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 >