Health Media Articles

Excerpts of Key Health Media Articles in Major Media

Below are key excerpts of revealing news articles on health from reliable news media sources. If any link fails to function, a paywall blocks full access, or the article is no longer available, try these digital tools.

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Note: Explore our full index to key excerpts of revealing major media news articles on several dozen engaging topics. And don't miss amazing excerpts from 20 of the most revealing news articles ever published.

Crowdfunding gets a lot of attention when it gives rise to oddball games. But Silicon Valley's largest startup accelerator believes the real bet is on crowdfunded healthcare. Y Combinator, the company responsible for launching Airbnb, Dropbox, and Reddit, has announced that it will invest in Watsi - a nonprofit that has brought healthcare to more than 11,000 people in 24 countries through nearly 22,000 online donations. Sam Altman, president of YC, explains that Watsi's approach to healthcare avoids a huge number of operational inefficiencies. A recent report from the World Health Organization calculated that 20-40% of all health spending worldwide gets wasted. But Watsi's crowdfunding model makes transparency a top priority - each patient's received donations and healthcare provider are logged in a master spreadsheet available on Watsi's website. "Funding individual patients encourages more people to donate, but it also results in patient-level data that makes it easier to identify fraud, evaluate the quality of care, measure health outcomes, etc.," Watsi co-founder Chase Adam [said]. When a family visits a hospital that has partnered with Watsi, but the patient can't afford to pay for the necessary care, a staff member will ask if they want to put their case on the site. If he or she agrees, the site's donors will then have the opportunity to make online donations straight to the patient. The company has also created a general fund that people ... can donate to if all patients on Watsi have already been funded.

Note: Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.

The European Parliament is concerned about food safety and human health. They asked a group of experts ... to review the possible health advantages of organic food and organic farming. Our report reviews existing scientific evidence regarding the impact of organic food on human health. The most important information in this report is about pesticides in food. In conventional food, there are pesticide residues that remain in the food even after it’s washed. Organic foods are produced virtually without pesticides. Three long-term birth cohort studies in the U.S. suggest that pesticides are harming children’s brains. Women’s exposure to pesticides during pregnancy ... was associated with negative impacts on their children’s IQ and neurobehavioral development. Also, one of the studies looked at structural brain growth ... and found that the gray matter was thinner in children the higher their mothers’ exposure to organophosphates, which are used widely in pesticides. Pregnant and breastfeeding women, and women planning to become pregnant, may wish to eat organic foods as a precautionary measure because of the significant and possibly irreversible consequences for children’s health. We know that the overly prevalent use of antibiotics in farm animals is a contributing factor in the development of antibiotic resistance in bacteria - a major public health threat because this resistance can spread from animals to humans. On organic farms, the preventive use of antibiotics is restricted.

Note: For more, see this mercola.com article. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on food system corruption and health.

Extremely high radiation levels have been recorded inside a damaged reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station, almost six years after the plant suffered a triple meltdown. Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco) said atmospheric readings as high as 530 sieverts an hour had been recorded inside the containment vessel of reactor No 2, one of three reactors that experienced a meltdown when the plant was crippled. Even if a 30-percent margin of error is taken into account, the recent reading, described by some experts as “unimaginable”, is far higher than the previous record of 73 sieverts an hour detected by sensors in 2012. A single dose of one sievert is enough to cause radiation sickness and nausea; 5 sieverts would kill half those exposed to it within a month, and a single dose of 10 sieverts would prove fatal within weeks. Quantities of melted fuel are believed to have accumulated at the bottom of the damaged reactors’ containment vessels, but dangerously high radiation has prevented engineers from accurately gauging the state of the fuel deposits. The extraordinary radiation readings highlight the scale of the task confronting thousands of workers, as pressure builds on Tepco to begin decommissioning the plant – a process that is expected to take about four decades. In December, the government said the estimated cost of decommissioning the plant and decontaminating the surrounding area ... had risen to 21.5tn yen (Ł150bn), nearly double an estimate released in 2013.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing nuclear power news articles from reliable major media sources.

Corporate spin is nothing new. Whether it’s cigarettes or sugar-laden sodas, the companies that make billions from such products employ a variety of strategies to promote the good and bury the bad. But the tactics being unveiled by Monsanto and surrogates over glyphosate, the key ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide and the lynchpin for the success of genetically engineered crops, are noteworthy for the depths of their deception. The latest move, the formation of a group called “Campaign for Accuracy in Public Health Research”, (CAPHR) clearly promotes an agenda opposite to that which its name implies. Formed this month by the American Chemistry Council, whose membership includes Monsanto and other chemical industry titans, the group’s express purpose is to discredit the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), a unit of the World Health Organization. An IARC scientific team declared in March 2015 that glyphosate was a probable human carcinogen after reviewing an extensive body of published research on the subject. Monsanto and friends have been harassing IARC ever since through a series of demands, threats and legal maneuvers, including lobbying the U.S. House of Representatives to cut funding for IARC. The new campaign takes the assault further. Embedded in the industry’s truth-twisting tactics is the characterization of anyone who gives credence to scientific research showing problems with glyphosate, or the GMOs that go with it, as “anti-science.”

Note: The negative health impacts of Monsanto's Roundup are well known. Big lawsuits are building over Monsanto's lies to regulators and the public about the safety of glyphosate. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on GMOs and the corruption of science.

California can require Monsanto to label its popular weed killer Roundup as a possible cancer threat even though the chemical giant insists it poses no risk to people, a judge tentatively ruled Friday. California would be the first state to order such labeling if it carries out the proposal. Monsanto had sued the nation's leading agricultural state, saying California officials illegally based their decision for carrying the warnings on findings by an international health organization based in France. Critics take issue with Roundup's main ingredient, glyphosate. It is sold in more than 160 countries, and farmers in California use it on 250 types of crops. The chemical is not restricted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. But the International Agency for Research on Cancer, a Lyon, France-based branch of the U.N. World Health Organization, classified the chemical as a “probable human carcinogen.” Shortly afterward, the most populated U.S. state took its first step in 2015 to require the warning labels. Once a chemical is added to a list of probable carcinogens, the manufacturer has a year before it must attach the label. Dozens nationwide ... are suing Monsanto, claiming the chemical gave them or a loved one cancer.

Note: The negative health impacts of Monsanto's Roundup are well known. More lawsuits are building over Monsanto's lies to regulators and the public about the safety of glyphosate. Yet the EPA used industry studies while ignoring independent studies to declare Roundup safe. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on food system corruption and health.

Scientists announced today that they have created the first successful human-animal hybrids. The project proves that human cells can be introduced into a non-human organism, survive, and even grow inside a host animal, in this case, pigs. This biomedical advance has long been a dream and a quandary for scientists hoping to address a critical shortage of donor organs. An international team of researchers led by the Salk Institute ... created what’s known scientifically as a chimera: an organism that contains cells from two different species. Such experiments are currently ineligible for public funding in the United States. Public opinion, too, has hampered the creation of organisms that are part human, part animal. The Salk-led group [used] the genome editing tool called CRISPR to hack into mouse blastocysts—the precursors of embryos. There, they deleted genes that mice need to grow certain organs. When they introduced rat stem cells capable of producing those organs, those cells flourished. The mice that resulted managed to live into adulthood. Pigs have a notable similarity to humans. Not that these similarities made the task any easier. In order to introduce human cells into the pigs without killing them, [the team] had to get the timing just right. When those just-right human cells were injected into the pig embryos, the embryos survived. Then they were put into adult pigs, which carried the embryos for between three and four weeks before they were removed. In all, the team created 186 later-stage chimeric embryos that survived.

Note: For lots more on the disturbing topic of human-animal hybrids, see this Washington Post article. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on genetically modified organisms and health.

Vaccines are ... under investigation for the possible side effects they can cause. In order to supply new information, an electron-microscopy investigation method was applied to the study of vaccines, aimed at verifying the presence of solid contaminants by means of an Environmental Scanning Electron Microscope equipped with an X-ray microprobe. The results of this new investigation show the presence of micro- and nanosized particulate matter composed of inorganic elements in vaccines’ samples which is not declared among the components and whose unduly presence is, for the time being, inexplicable. A considerable part of those particulate contaminants have already been verified in other matrices and reported in literature as non biodegradable and non biocompatible. The evidence collected is suggestive of some hypotheses correlated to diseases that are mentioned and briefly discussed. Not all the vaccines analyzed contain the same contamination, though the same vaccine belonging to different batches and, in some cases, coming from different countries can contain a similar contamination Vaccines by Glaxo – Infarix, Typherix and Priorix – contain Tungsten. Tungsten was also identified in [the vaccines] Menjugate Kit by Novartis, and Prevenar, Meningitec by Pfizer and Meningitec by Wyeth. Feligen, the only veterinary vaccine tested, proved to be the only sample free from inorganic contamination.

Note: This important study showed that nanoparticles were found in vaccines that should not be there. The scientists were attacked by the vaccine lobby, which attempted to discredit them. Here is their rebuttal to these attacks on the website of the highly respected BMJ (British Medical Journal). More here. Another informative article reveals that the same scientists who debunked any link between agent orange and veteran illnesses are now in charge of vaccine safety. For more along these lines, see summaries of revealing vaccine controversy news articles from media sources.

Vaccines are ... under investigation for the possible side effects they can cause. In order to supply new information, an electron-microscopy investigation method was applied to the study of vaccines, aimed at verifying the presence of solid contaminants by means of an Environmental Scanning Electron Microscope equipped with an X-ray microprobe. The results of this new investigation show the presence of micro- and nanosized particulate matter composed of inorganic elements in vaccines' samples which is not declared among the components and whose ... presence is, for the time being, inexplicable. A considerable part of those particulate contaminants have already been verified in other matrices and reported in literature as non biodegradable and non biocompatible. The evidence collected is suggestive of some hypotheses correlated to diseases that are mentioned and briefly discussed. Recently, with the worldwide-adopted vaccines against Human Papillomavirus (HPV), the debate was reawaken[ed] due to some adverse effects reported by some young subjects. Specific studies communicated the existence of symptoms related to never-described-before syndromes developed after the vaccine was administered. For instance, Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS), Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome (POTS), and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) ... side-effects that can arise within a relatively short time can be local or systemic.

Note: For lots more, see this highly revealing article. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on vaccines from reliable major media sources.

As a social worker, Susannah Rose referred clients with cancer to patient advocacy groups she trusted to dispense unbiased advice - until she heard the groups might be taking money from pharmaceutical companies. So she set out to investigate. Two-thirds of patient advocacy organizations reported receiving industry funding, Rose, now a bioethicist, finds in a new study. Her research was published ... in JAMA Internal Medicine along with other studies showing a host of ways pharmaceutical manufacturers appear to pay for influence. Rose and her colleagues identified 7,865 patient advocacy organizations in the U.S., most involving cancer and rare or genetic disorders. They surveyed a random sample of the organization's leaders. More than 67 percent of 245 patient advocacy groups reported receiving industry funding in the past year. Of those, nearly 12 percent reported that more than half their funding came from industry. When the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention drafted guidelines for prescribing opioids for chronic pain in an effort to curtail a growing epidemic of abuse of the painkillers in 2015, nonprofit organizations stepped in to challenge the effort. The CDC postponed releasing the guidelines and solicited public comments for 30 days. Opioid manufacturers gave money to 45 of 158 patient advocacy and professional organizations that commented on the proposed guidelines. Organizations with funding from opioid manufacturers were significantly more likely to oppose them, researchers found.

Note: It's interesting to note that apparently no other major media picked up this Reuters article. Drug company executives have recently been caught bribing doctors to over-prescribe opioids, and ex-DEA official has publicly accused Congress of helping drug makers avoid responsibility for their role in the US opioid epidemic. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing Big Pharma corruption news articles from reliable major media sources.

Monsanto Co. and officials within the Environmental Protection Agency are fighting legal efforts aimed at exploring Monsanto’s influence over regulatory assessments of the key chemical in the company’s Roundup herbicide, new federal court filings show. The revelations are contained in a series of filings made ... as part of litigation brought by more than 50 people suing Monsanto. The plaintiffs claim they or their loved ones developed non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) after exposure to Roundup herbicide, and that Monsanto has spent decades covering up cancer risks linked to the chemical. Lawyers for the plaintiffs want the court to lift a seal on documents that detail Monsanto’s interactions with former top EPA brass Jess Rowland regarding the EPA’s safety assessment of glyphosate, which is the key ingredient in Roundup. They also want to depose Rowland. But Monsanto and the EPA object to the requests. The World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) declared in March 2015 that glyphosate is a probable human carcinogen, with a positive association found between glyphosate and NHL. Monsanto has been fighting to refute that classification. Rowland has been key in Monsanto’s efforts to rebut the IARC finding. He chaired the EPA’s Cancer Assessment Review Committee (CARC) that issued an internal report in October 2015 contracting IARC’s findings. That 87-page report, signed by Rowland, determined that glyphosate was “not likely to be carcinogenic to humans.”

Note: The negative health impacts of Monsanto's Roundup are well known. More lawsuits are building over Monsanto's lies to regulators and the public about the safety of glyphosate. Yet the EPA used industry studies while ignoring independent studies to declare Roundup safe. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on food system corruption and health.

As eight states plus the District of Columbia have moved to fully legalize recreational marijuana, debates on the merits of legalization have focused on the effects of marijuana use on individuals and society. The National Academies of Sciences, Medicine and Engineering have brought a great deal of clarity to the situation with an encyclopedic report summarizing pretty much everything researchers know (and don't know) about the health effects of marijuana use. For the 395-page report, a team of dozens of drug policy experts at some of the nation's most prestigious universities analyzed 24,000 scientific papers to arrive at more than 100 conclusions regarding the effects of marijuana use. The committee found strong evidence showing marijuana is effective at treating chronic pain in adults. Given the current public health crisis involving tens of thousands of deaths annually because of painkiller overdoses, this is a potentially significant finding. The report also turned up strong evidence that marijuana is effective at treating nausea and vomiting, [as well as] muscle spasticity. The literature shows limited evidence that marijuana use is linked to the use of other substances. The report does not address the implications of these findings for current legalization debates. The researchers do, however, state emphatically that the current designation of marijuana as a Schedule 1 controlled substance ... is one of the chief barriers to conducting more badly needed research.

Note: Big Pharma has been caught systematically bribing doctors to over-prescribe deadly painkillers, and an ex-DEA official has publicly accused Congress of helping drug makers avoid responsibility for their role in the US opioid epidemic. Meanwhile, more people are arrested in the US for marijuana use than for all violent crimes combined. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption and health.

It was 1956. Papers had run a photograph of President Dwight D. Eisenhower sweetening his coffee with saccharin, with the news that his doctor had advised him to avoid sugar if he wanted to remain thin. The [sugar] industry responded with a national advertising campaign. The ads explained that there was no such thing as a “fattening food”: “All foods supply calories and there is no difference between the calories that come from sugar or steak or grapefruit or ice cream.” More than 60 years later, the sugar industry is still making the same argument, or at least paying researchers to do it for them. The stakes have changed, however, with a near tripling of the prevalence of obesity in the intervening decades and ... an almost unimaginable 655 percent increase in the percentage of Americans with diabetes diagnoses. When it comes to weight gain, the sugar industry and purveyors of sugary beverages still insist, a calorie is a calorie, regardless of its source. The assumption ignores decades of medical science, including much of what has become textbook endocrinology (the science of hormones and hormone-related diseases) and biochemistry. Different carbohydrates, like glucose and fructose, are metabolized differently, leading to different hormonal and physiological responses. Fat accumulation and metabolism [are] influenced profoundly by these hormones. In light of this research, arguing today that your body fat responds to everything you eat the exact same way is almost inconceivably naďve.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing food system corruption news articles from reliable major media sources.

Morphine is an opioid pain medication which can have severe adverse effects. These include drowsiness, dizziness, constipation, stomach pain, nausea, vomiting, headache, tired feeling, anxiety and mild itching. Other risks associated with morphine use include misuse, abuse and addiction. In addition, scientific research has shown that prescription opioids may actually worsen chronic pain. It appears that a holistic alternative to treating pain is much-needed in order to mitigate the dangers of conventional pharmaceutical pain treatment. Now, a groundbreaking study shows that acupuncture is one of these effective holistic alternatives. Considering the study results, it may perhaps be even more effective than morphine. The [new] research evaluated 300 emergency patients. 150 were administered up to 15 mg of morphine per day. The other 150 were given acupuncture treatment. The acupuncture group in the study experienced significant pain reduction, and the effect occurred faster and with fewer side effects when compared to the morphine group. In 1996, acupuncture became an accepted form of medical treatment endorsed by the World Health Organization (WHO). The WHO based their endorsement on data from numerous controlled clinical trials conducted over the two previous decades. Undoubtedly, acupuncture can play a powerful role in pain management. It is an effective drug-free alternative to reducing pain with very few side effects that has been proven over the ages.

Note: Why wasn't this important study reported in the major media? Could it be that big Pharma has bought out the media with their billions in advertising dollars such that they won't report on discoveries that eat into their profits? For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on pharmaceutical corruption from reliable major media sources.

President-elect Donald Trump met with Robert Kennedy Jr., a prominent vaccine skeptic, on Tuesday. According to incoming White House press secretary Sean Spicer, the two discussed “the issues pertaining to vaccines and immunizations.” After the meeting concluded, Kennedy told reporters that Mr. Trump had asked him to “chair a commission on vaccination safety and scientific integrity.” Kennedy said he told Mr. Trump he would chair such a commission, and that their meeting was held at Mr. Trump’s request. Kennedy, the eldest son of liberal icon Sen. Robert Kennedy, was best known as an environmental advocate before increasingly devoting his time to the supposed dangers of vaccines. Mr. Trump has repeatedly shared his belief that there is a link between vaccines and autism. Kennedy has argued that vaccines, specifically those containing the element thimerosal, may cause autism, a view ... dismissed as a conspiracy theory by experts. Many parents continue to insist that their children were damaged by immunizations. Kennedy, who criticized Mr. Trump during the election campaign, has also written a book ... on the subject.

Note: Read Kennedy's most excellent, well researched article "Deadly Immunity" to understand why he questions the current vaccine regimen And then check out an excellent interview from Dec. 2016 on how Kennedy was "dragged kicking and screaming into this brawl," yet ultimately convinced of its importance. What's amazing is that the vast majority of people never knew Robert Kennedy's son was an advocate for safe vaccines. Now they know and the media are attacking him fiercely. For more, see concise summaries of revealing vaccine controversy news articles.

Anti-vaccine rant exposes conflict over hospitals’ embrace of alternative medicine
January 9, 2017, Boston Globe/Statnews.com
https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/science/2017/01/09/anti-vaccine-rant-exposes...

In the span of a few days, the anti-vaccine screed of a Cleveland Clinic doctor prompted a social media firestorm, an apparent retraction from the physician, and promises of disciplinary action by administrators of his prestigious hospital system. The anti-vaccine column that triggered the weekend’s outcry was written by Dr. Daniel Neides, director and CEO of the Cleveland Clinic’s Wellness Institute, which advertises homeopathic remedies and alternative weight loss and pain management treatments. In his commentary posted on Cleveland.com, Neides, who is a family doctor, said that preservatives and other ingredients in vaccines are dangerous and are likely behind the increase in diagnosed cases of neurological diseases such as autism. “Does the vaccine burden - as has been debated for years - cause autism? I don’t know and will not debate that here. What I will stand up and scream is that newborns without intact immune systems and detoxification systems are being over-burdened with preservatives and adjuvants in the vaccines,” he wrote. Adjuvants are added to vaccines to prompt a stronger immune response. Neides issued an apology and apparent retraction on Sunday, saying in a statement released by the Cleveland Clinic: “I fully support vaccinations and my concern was meant to be positive around the safety of them.”

Note: It is highly unusual that at the time of writing this, the above Boston Globe link automatically forwards to another website. The lack of willingness to entertain the wealth of documented evidence of vaccines dangers by the media is astounding. See the original article on this webpage and note how this very respected physician is being ridiculed by so many who parrot the official line about vaccine safety. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing vaccine controversy news articles from reliable major media sources.

Jackson Leyden had always been a healthy kid. But in 2011, a few months after his eighth birthday, he began having seizures several times a day. His parents took him to more than 20 doctors. He tried more than a dozen medications. Nothing worked. Two years ago, the Leydens ... decided to see whether marijuana might help. “Within a few days, he was having hardly any seizures,” says his mother, Lisa. “I was shocked.” Over the next few months, he stopped taking other medications. Not only did the medicine help, it did so without making him high. The strain of marijuana that Jackson takes is unusual: It contains high levels of cannabidiol, or CBD, one of the two main molecules in marijuana; the other is tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC. While THC is famously mind-altering, CBD is not. Over decades, researchers have found that THC may help treat pain, nausea, loss of appetite and other problems, while CBD was thought to be biologically inactive. But in the past 10 years ... dozens of studies have found evidence that the compound can treat epilepsy as well as a range of other illnesses, including anxiety, schizophrenia, heart disease and cancer. Now 13, Jackson ... continues to use marijuana every day. He still has seizures, but they are less severe and they occur once every week or two, down from around 200 a month before he started using cannabis. Although it doesn’t make users high, CBD ... is classified by the federal government as a Schedule 1 drug [with] no accepted medical use.

Note: While more people are arrested in the US for marijuana use than for all violent crimes combined and the US federal government continues to regard non-psychoactive CBD as a dangerous drug, the UK government recently announced it will regulate CBD as medicine. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing health news articles from reliable major media sources.

Suicide - not combat - is the leading killer of U.S. troops deployed to the Middle East to fight Islamic State militants, according to newly released Pentagon statistics. U.S. casualties have been relatively low since the U.S.-led war effort began with a bombing campaign in August 2014, reflecting the limited combat exposure for troops. Of the 31 troops who have died as of Dec. 27 in Operation Inherent Resolve, 11 have taken their own lives. Eight died in combat, seven in accidents and four succumbed to illness or injury. The cause of one death is under investigation. The reasons suicide ranks as the No. 1 cause of troop deaths ... likely include mental illnesses that enlistees brought with them to boot camp, post-traumatic stress, multiple combat deployments and heightened anxiety in a military at war for 16 years. By far, 2016 has been the most dangerous for U.S. forces since the war began. Seven of the eight combat deaths have occurred in 2016, and 21 of the 26 troops wounded in action suffered their injuries this year. But the military's suicide problem continues. Between 2001 and 2010, the rate of suicide in the military doubled. The chief spike occurred around 2005 when fighting and combat deaths soared in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the Army shouldered most of the war’s burden. The Army still has the highest percentage among the services for suicide. As a whole, the military’s rate of suicide of about 20 per 100,000 troops in 2014 was comparable to the same civilian population.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles about military corruption and health.

Last year, the city of Flint, Michigan, burst into the world spotlight after its children were exposed to lead in drinking water. 5 percent of the children screened there had high blood lead levels. Flint is no aberration. In fact, it doesn't even rank among the most dangerous lead hotspots in America. In all, Reuters found nearly 3,000 areas with recently recorded lead poisoning rates at least double those in Flint during the peak of that city's contamination crisis. And more than 1,100 of these communities had a rate of elevated blood tests at least four times higher. The poisoned places ... stretch from Warren, Pennsylvania, a town on the Allegheny River where 36 percent of children tested had high lead levels, to a zip code on Goat Island, Texas, where a quarter of tests showed poisoning. In some pockets of Baltimore, Cleveland and Philadelphia, where lead poisoning has spanned generations, the rate of elevated tests over the last decade was 40-50 percent. Like Flint, many of these localities are plagued by legacy lead: crumbling paint, plumbing, or industrial waste left behind. Unlike Flint, many have received little attention or funding to combat poisoning. Even in some of the highest risk areas around the country, many small children go untested. In South Bend, Indiana, where health officials face a cash crunch, lead testing is in sharp decline even as existing data points to a serious problem. In one tract there, 31 percent of small children tested from 2005 to 2015 had high levels - more than six times Flint's rate last year.

Note: Read more about the widespread lead contamination in low-income neighborhoods throughout the US. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption and health.

Social isolation is a growing epidemic — one that’s increasingly recognized as having dire physical, mental and emotional consequences. Since the 1980s, the percentage of American adults who say they’re lonely has doubled from 20 percent to 40 percent. About one-third of Americans older than 65 now live alone, and half of those over 85 do. People in poorer health — especially those with mood disorders like anxiety and depression — are more likely to feel lonely. Those without a college education are the least likely to have someone they can talk to about important personal matters. A wave of new research suggests social separation is bad for us. Individuals with less social connection have disrupted sleep patterns, altered immune systems, more inflammation and higher levels of stress hormones. One recent study found that isolation increases the risk of heart disease by 29 percent and stroke by 32 percent. Another analysis that pooled data from 70 studies and 3.4 million people found that socially isolated individuals had a 30 percent higher risk of dying in the next seven years, and that this effect was largest in middle age. Loneliness can accelerate cognitive decline in older adults, and isolated individuals are twice as likely to die prematurely as those with more robust social interactions. These effects start early: Socially isolated children have significantly poorer health 20 years later. All told, loneliness is as important a risk factor for early death as obesity and smoking.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on health from reliable major media sources.

Social isolation is a growing epidemic. Since the 1980s, the percentage of American adults who say they’re lonely has doubled from 20 percent to 40 percent. About one-third of Americans older than 65 now live alone. People in poorer health - especially those with mood disorders like anxiety and depression - are more likely to feel lonely. Social separation is bad for us. Individuals with less social connection have disrupted sleep patterns, altered immune systems, more inflammation and higher levels of stress hormones. One recent study found that ... socially isolated individuals had a 30 percent higher risk of dying in the next seven years, and that this effect was largest in middle age. These effects start early: Socially isolated children have significantly poorer health 20 years later, even after controlling for other factors. The evidence ... is clear. What to do about it is less so. Loneliness is an especially tricky problem because accepting and declaring our loneliness ... can feel as if we’re admitting we’ve failed in life’s most fundamental domains: belonging, love, attachment. Dr. John Cacioppo, a psychology professor ... has tested various approaches to treat loneliness. His work has found that the most effective interventions focus on addressing “maladaptive social cognition” - that is, helping people re-examine how they interact with others and perceive social cues. A great paradox of our hyper-connected digital age is that we seem to be drifting apart. However ... human connection lies at the heart of human well-being.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing health news articles from reliable major media sources.

Important Note: Explore our full index to key excerpts of revealing major media news articles on several dozen engaging topics. And don't miss amazing excerpts from 20 of the most revealing news articles ever published.