Lockdown drills have become a shudder-inducing part of American life, preparing kids to lie low and keep quiet if a gunman chooses to roam their school. But a new study finds these drills help children who’ve been exposed to violence, helping them feel safer at school. The findings contradict claims that drills traumatize children rather than making them feel secure, researchers said. “Participating in drills may be a way to help students who have been exposed to violence feel safer in schools,” said researcher Jaclyn Schildkraut, executive director of the Regional Gun Violence Research Consortium at the Rockefeller Institute of Government in the U.S. Lockdown drills, now carried out at almost all public schools, involve locking classroom doors, turning off the lights, staying out of sight and remaining quiet. The drills were introduced following the Columbine High School massacre in 1999, in which two teens shot dead 12 classmates and a teacher and wounded 24 others. For this study, students in fifth grade and above at a large urban school district in New York State responded to a survey about how safe they felt at school and how prepared they were for lockdowns and other emergencies. The students were also asked about their exposure to violence, such as seeing or hearing that someone brought a gun or knife to school or being involved in or…  read on >  read on >

Toddlers who are really into their food might have a higher risk of developing an eating disorder once they enter adolescence, a new study shows. Kids ages 4 and 5 with a strong urge to eat when teased with tasty food appear more likely to report a range of eating disorder symptoms by ages 12 to 14, researchers report Feb. 20 in The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health journal. For example, teens who responded to food most strongly as a toddler were nearly three times more likely to report binge eating symptoms as those who were least interested in food, results show. “Although our study cannot prove causality, our findings suggest food cue responsiveness may be one predisposing risk factor for the onset of eating disorder symptoms in adolescence,” said researcher Ivonne Derks, with the University College London Institute of Epidemiology & Health Care. “However, high responsiveness to food is also a normal and very common behavior and should be seen as just one potential risk factor among many rather than something to cause parents worry,” Derks added in a university news release. High food responsiveness is defined as the urge to eat when seeing, smelling or tasting good food, researchers said in background notes. For the study, researchers analyzed data from 3,670 youngsters in the U.K. and the Netherlands to see how appetite traits…  read on >  read on >

Former talk show host Wendy Williams has been diagnosed with primary progressive aphasia and frontotemporal dementia, her representatives announced in a statement on Thursday. The conditions are the same diagnoses actor Bruce Willis received in 2022; his aphasia later progressed to frontotemporal dementia. Williams’ team said the 59-year-old’s decision to reveal her diagnoses was “difficult and made after careful consideration.” Williams is receiving treatment and is still able to “do many things for herself,” they added. Primary progressive aphasia is a nervous system disorder that brings a gradually increasing inability to communicate, the Cleveland Clinic explained. According to the Alzheimer’s Association, frontotemporal dementia is “a group of disorders caused by progressive nerve cell loss in the brain’s frontal lobes [the areas behind your forehead] or its temporal lobes [the regions behind your ears].” It is a progressive, debilitating neurological condition for which there is no effective treatment, the association said. The illness can also affect speech, language comprehension and movement. Behavioral changes are common. Unlike Alzheimer’s disease, frontotemporal dementia is typically diagnosed at a younger age, often in a person’s 40s or 50s. Williams was diagnosed in 2023 after a series of medical tests, her team said. Aphasia and frontotemporal dementia have already “presented significant hurdles in Wendy’s life,” they said. “Wendy would not have received confirmation of these diagnoses were it not for the diligence…  read on >  read on >

Burnout: It’s a common enough concept, but how do you know if you’re experiencing it at work and at home? According to experts at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, a myriad of daily pressures placed on individuals can culminate in burnout. “Burnout is not a result of one singular thing,” explained Dr. Eric Storch, vice chair of psychology at Baylor. “Work, familial responsibilities and everyday stressors can all contribute to a sense of depleting motivation.”  Storch lists the common signs of burnout: a persistent sense of being mentally overwhelmed and stressed each day little sense of satisfaction at work or in the home, even during moments of success physical tension and difficulties relaxing chronic sleep issues fatigue that doesn’t ease There are ways to help prevent or ease burnout. Having honest conversations about issues is crucial, Storch said. “If you find that you are beginning to show signs of becoming burned out at work, speak with a trusted colleague for their advice or talk to a supervisor about what you both can do to change your work environment into one that allows for a healthier balance between personal and professional responsibilities,” he advised in a Baylor news release.   If you believe that someone else is suffering from burnout, reaching out to them in the correct way is key. First off, be clear that…  read on >  read on >

If all cars and trucks sold in America were “zero emission” by 2040 and the country’s electric grid was also powered by clean energy, nearly 2.8 million child asthma attacks would be prevented annually, a new report finds. The American Lung Association (ALA) report also estimates that with cleaner air, 508 infant lives would also be saved each year. A nationwide shift to clean energy would also result in: almost 2.7 million fewer cases of upper respiratory illnesses in kids annually Almost 1.9 million fewer cases of lower respiratory pediatric illnesses 147,000 fewer cases of bronchitis in kids “Air pollution harms children’s health and well-being today, and the transportation sector is a leading source of air pollution,” said ALA president Harold Wimmer. “Vehicle emissions are also nation’s biggest source of carbon pollution that drives climate change and associated public health harms.” It’s not just about the direct effect of auto exhaust on young lungs, Wimmer stressed. Fossil fuels are also a key driver of climate change, which is having its own effects on child health, he explained. “As families across the country have experienced in recent months, climate change increases air pollution, extreme weather, flooding events, allergens, as well as heat and drought, leading to greater risk of wildfires,” Wimmer said in an ALA news release. “Kids are more vulnerable to the impacts of climate…  read on >  read on >

Unexpected medical bills and high health care costs are dominating an election where kitchen table economic problems weigh heavily on voter’s minds, a new KFF poll has found. Voters struggling to pay their monthly bills are most eager to hear presidential candidates talk about economic and health care issues, according to the latest KFF Health Tracking Poll. Nearly three in four adults are worried about being able to afford unexpected medical bills (74%) and the cost of health care services (73%), the poll found. More than half also said the same about paying for prescription drugs (55%), as well as other everyday expenses like gas, utilities, food and housing. About half of voters (48%) said health care costs are a major reason for their negative views of the economy, and heath care worries top the list, regardless of partisanship. Overall, two-thirds of voters (67%) view the economy negatively, but Republican voters are more than twice as likely as Democratic voters to hold such negative views, the poll found. The poll also found that one in five adults (19%) have trouble affording their monthly bills, and another four in 10 (37%) can just afford their monthly bills. Those groups had very different views than those who said they can pay their bills with money left over. They are more likely to view the national economy negatively,…  read on >  read on >

A popular asthma inhaler was discontinued on Jan. 1, and the business move has left families scrambling to find a replacement for their kids. Flovent was one of the most commonly prescribed drugs for childhood asthma, but maker GSK took it off shelves to replace it with a generic version, fluticasone. The problem is that many insurance companies haven’t added fluticasone to their list of covered medications, CNN reported. Parents and doctors are now being required to fill out paperwork to get fluticasone, even though it’s the same drug kids have been using for years. In some cases, insurers are requiring patients to show they’ve tried other asthma drugs already on their approved list — and that those drugs haven’t worked — before approving fluticasone, CNN reported. “The discontinuation of Flovent has been an unmitigated disaster,” Dr. Christopher Oermann, a pediatric pulmonologist and director of the Division of Allergy, Immunology and Pulmonary at Children’s Mercy Kansas City, told CNN. Flovent contains a corticosteroid that reduces airway inflammation. Patients use the inhaler twice a day. The family of Bryce Cohen, a 4-year-old asthma patient in New York City, relied on Flovent to keep him out of the hospital during asthma flares. But his family hasn’t been able to get fluticasone over the past month. “This is a really big issue, and it’s scary to think that…  read on >  read on >

Nearly $6 billion in funding will soon be spread through every U.S. state and territory as part of a massive, ongoing effort to clean up the nation’s water supply, the Biden Administration announced Tuesday. EPA Adminstrator Michael Regan and Vice President Kamala Harris will travel to Pittsburgh on Tuesday to announce the latest infusion of funding, the White House said in a news release. Projects underway in that city — including efforts to remove lead water pipes — are among several across the country that are being funded through bipartisan legislation passed in 2021 that devoted $50 billion to improving the nation’s water supply. “With $50 billion in total, the largest investment in water infrastructure in our nation’s history, EPA will enable communities across the nation to ensure safer drinking water for their residents and rebuild vital clean water infrastructure to protect public health for decades to come,” Regan said in an agency news release. Instead of choosing which projects to fund, the federal government will deliver the money to states, territories and tribes through the Clean Water and Drinking Water State Revolving Fund programs, the EPA said. Many of the country’s water infrastructure problems stem from a general lack of investment, according to the EPA. Local governments typically can’t afford to update water systems on their own. Even when changes are made, that can still prompt crises…  read on >  read on >

Being an angry hard-charger won’t win you any points in the workplace, new research has found. Prior evidence had suggested that workers who express anger are judged to be competent and hold a higher status, the researchers noted. But the new studies refute those earlier findings, according to researchers from Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Princeton University. “We found that anger isn’t a catalyst for higher status in the workplace,” said researcher Roni Porat, a senior lecturer of political science and international relations at the Hebrew University. “Moreover, we found that anger is regarded more poorly than other emotional expressions like sadness,” Porat said in a university news release. “The only instance in which anger is considered as positive is when it is expressed in response to another person’s clear wrongdoing. These findings hold for both men and women expressing anger in the workplace.” Data from the study show that people assume that individuals expressing anger have higher status, researchers said. However, they do not reward anger with more status because they find that anger to be inappropriate, cold, an overreaction and counter-productive, results show. Researchers also found that people hold many negative attitudes toward expressions of anger in the workplace. Such expressions were cited as more harmful, foolish and worthless than other emotional reactions. Across four studies, researchers experimentally manipulated people’s expression of emotion…  read on >  read on >