Asthma is associated with memory problems in children, a new study has found. Further, the early onset of asthma might worsen potential memory deficits in kids, researchers found. This is the first study to make such a connection, researchers said. “This study underscores the importance of looking at asthma as a potential source of cognitive difficulty in children,” said senior researcher Simona Ghetti, a professor of psychology in the University of California-Davis Center for Mind and Brain. “We are becoming increasingly aware that chronic diseases, not only asthma but also diabetes, heart disease and others may place children at increased risk of cognitive difficulties,” Ghetti added in a news release. “We need to understand the factors that might exacerbate or protect against the risks.” For the study, researchers analyzed data from more than 2,000 9- and 10-year-olds with asthma. In the U.S., roughly 4.6 million children have asthma. “Childhood is a period of rapid improvement in memory and, more generally, cognition. In children with asthma that improvement may be slower,” lead researcher Nicholas Christopher-Hayes, a doctoral candidate in psychology at UC Davis, said in a news release. His team found that children with asthma had lower scores in tests of episodic memory, the specific type of memory related to experiences and emotions. In a smaller sample of nearly 500 kids followed for two years, researchers…  read on >  read on >

Americans’ well-being varies widely between different regions of the nation, a new study reports. People in the southern U.S., Appalachia and the Rust Belt states score lowest on the Human Development Index (HDI), a composite measure that includes a population’s life expectancy, education and income, researchers report in The Lancet. The highest levels of well-being occur among people living in parts of Colorado, Maryland, New York, California, Virginia and Washington, D.C., researchers said. “As a new federal administration prepares to take actions aimed at solving the most pressing economic, social, and health issues the US population faces, this study underscores the urgent need for action by policymakers, educators, and public health experts,” senior researcher Dr. Christopher Murray, director of the Institute for Health Metrics Evaluation at the University of Washington in Seattle, said in a news release. “IHME’s findings further emphasize the critical need to develop highly targeted social programs to dismantle deep-rooted structural inequalities in the US,” Murray added.   The United Nations Development Program created the HDI as a measure to help track well-being between nations, researchers said in background notes. For this study, U.S. researchers adapted the HDI to gauge well-being based on years of education, household income and life expectancy estimates. Overall, the average U.S. HDI increased gradually from 2008 to 2019, then declined in 2020 due to decreases in lifespan linked…  read on >  read on >

Lives lost to obesity-related heart disease have nearly tripled over the past twenty years, a new study reports. Heart disease deaths linked to obesity increased 2.8-fold between 1999 and 2020, according to findings presented today at the American Heart Association’s annual meeting in Chicago. The increase occurred especially among middle-aged men, Black adults, Midwesterners and rural residents, researchers found. “Obesity is a serious risk factor for ischemic heart disease, and this risk is going up at an alarming rate along with the increasing prevalence of obesity,” lead researcher Dr. Aleenah Mohsin, a post-doctoral research fellow at Brown University in Providence, R.I., said in a news release. Ischemic heart disease is caused by clogged arteries, researchers said. Less blood and oxygen can reach the heart, increasing the risk of a heart attack. Obesity contributes to the risk of this form of heart disease by increasing cholesterol levels, promoting high blood pressure, raising the likelihood of type 2 diabetes and causing poor sleep. “It is important for everyone, particularly people in high-risk groups, to take steps to manage their weight and reduce their risk of heart disease,” Mohsin said. “Lifestyle changes are key, such as eating healthier, exercising regularly and working with health care professionals to monitor heart health.” For the study, researchers analyzed public health data to review heart disease trends in recent decades. More than…  read on >  read on >

Babies born preterm face a life of lowered prospects, a new study warns. Adults who were preemies are less likely to achieve higher education or snag a high-paying job, researchers reported Nov. 6 in the journal PLOS One. What’s more, the earlier preterm a baby is born, the worse his or her future prospects appear to be. “Our findings suggest that the development of long-term supports [including psychological, education and vocational resources] that go beyond clinical care may help mitigate the longer-term effects of preterm birth,” said researcher Petros Pechlivanoglou, with The Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto. Preterm birth is known to increase a baby’s risk of intellectual and developmental difficulties, according to the March of Dimes. About 10% of all babies worldwide are born preterm. For the study, researchers analyzed health, education and employment data on all live births that occurred in Canada between 1990 and 1996, a pool of about 2.4 million people. Results showed that babies born before 37 weeks of gestation are 17% less likely to go to college, 16% less likely to graduate with a college degree and 2% less likely to be employed. The average income of adults who were born preterm is 6% lower than those born at term, researchers said. For individuals born at the earliest gestation, 24 to 27 weeks, those associations were even stronger,…  read on >  read on >

Rates of anxiety and depression among U.S. adults, especially younger folks, continues to rise, the latest federal data shows. Nearly 1 in every 5 (18.2%) adults reported anxiety issues in 2022, up from 15.6% in 2019, reported Emily Terlizzi and Benjamin Zablotsky, researchers at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As for depression, rates among adults rose from 18.5% to 21.4% during the same time period, the new survey found. Young adults were the most affected: More than a quarter (26.6%) of people ages 18 through 29 said they’d struggled with anxiety symptoms over the prior two weeks, compared to about 21% of those aged 30 to 44, just under 16% for those aged 45 to 64, and 11.2% among people 65 or older. For nearly 10% of young adults, their anxiety was rated as moderate or severe, the researchers noted. Age-related trends were similar for depression: nearly 27% of young adults surveyed said they’d felt depressed at some point over the past two weeks, with rates dropping off with increasing age. The rate among seniors, for example, was 18.6%. For almost 10% of young adults, depression symptoms were rated as moderate or severe. None of these statistics will come as a surprise to health experts. In 2021, U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy issued a report outlining a “crisis” in mental health…  read on >  read on >

Nearly 16% of American adults — that’s close to 1 in 6 — now has diabetes, according to the latest data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Increasing age and widening waistlines greatly increase the odds for the disease, which happens when the body doesn’t use insulin properly, resulting in high blood sugar levels. If left unchecked, diabetes can be disabling and even life-threatening. The vast majority (95%) of diabetes cases are type 2 diabetes, which occurs when the body’s cells no longer respond to insulin as they should. Insulin regulates levels of sugar in the blood. Type 2 diabetes is strongly connected to excessive weight. The new data, collected from mid-2021 through mid-2023, found a big rise in diabetes rates since 1999-2000, when 9.7% of adult Americans had the disease. There was a significant gender gap in diabetes rates in 2023: Nearly 1 in 5 men (18%) have the illness, compared to 13.7% of women, according to researchers at the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS). Not surprisingly, diabetes rates rose with age: While just 3.6% of adults under 40 had the illness, rates rose to 12.1% for folks ages 40 to 59, and to 20.5% for people 60 and older. Obesity also mattered: Nearly a quarter (24.2%) of obese adults now have diabetes, the NCHS report found. That’s compared…  read on >  read on >

Many Americans experience a “winter funk” as the days grow shorter and temperatures turn colder, a new American Psychiatric Association poll reports. Two-fifths of Americans (41%) said their mood declines during the winter months, according to the APA’s Healthy Minds Poll. Midwesterners and Northeasterners are most affected, where 52% and 46%, respectively, said they tend to have the wintertime blues, results show. “The winter months have less light, the time change can feel abrupt and the holidays for some are overwhelming,” said APA President Dr. Ramaswamy Viswanathan. The poll showed that wintertime causes some Americans to: Sleep more (41%) Feel fatigued (28%) Feel depressed (27%) Lose interest in things they like (20%) Things that help people best cope with the winter blues include talking with friends and family (46%), sleeping more (35%) and going outside (35%). The poll also showed a difference in wintertime mood changes between women and men. More women than men said their mood declines in the winter, 45% versus 37%. The end of Daylight Savings Time also has a greater impact on women, with 33% saying the “fall back” was bad for their mental health versus 26% of men. Rural residents also are more likely than city dwellers to feel the winter blues (46% versus 36%) and struggle with the time change (31% versus 24%). These winter blues are usually mild,…  read on >  read on >

Eating fewer burgers and steaks could pay big dividends for Mother Earth, and human health, by combatting climate change, a new study suggests. Small cutbacks in beef production among wealthy nations could remove 125 billion tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, researchers report — an amount that exceeds the total number of global fossil fuel emissions for the past three years. That could be accomplished by cutting back beef farming back by just 13%, researchers reported Nov. 4 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Such a cutback would reduce the amount of land needed for cattle grazing, allowing forests to regrow on pastureland, researchers said. These forests would serve as a sponge for carbon dioxide emitted by cars and power plants, the study added. “We can achieve enormous climate benefits with modest changes to the total global beef production,” said Matthew Hayek, an assistant professor in New York University’s Department of Environmental Studies. “In many places, this regrowth could occur by seeds naturally dispersing and trees regrowing without any human involvement,” Hayek said in a university news release. “However, in some places, with especially degraded environments or soils, native and diverse tree-planting could accelerate forest restoration, giving regrowth a helping hand,” Hayek added. “This long-term regrowth would benefit the climate for decades to come, with significant regrowth and carbon capture beginning…  read on >  read on >