- Cancer death rates fall steadily in the US, with more survivors than ever
- What is rainbow fentanyl? Colorful pills drive new warnings about deadliest drug in the US
- Women's health got worse in 2021, global survey finds
- Years after water crisis, Flint residents reported high rates of depression, PTSD
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Cancer death rates fall steadily in the US, with more survivors than ever |
More people are surviving cancer than ever before in the United States, according to a new report from the American Association for Cancer Research. In the past three years, the number of cancer survivors in the US – defined as living people who have had a cancer diagnosis – increased by more than a million. There are 18 million survivors in the US as of January, and that number is expected to grow to 26 million by 2040, the association said. The report notes that there were only 3 million US cancer survivors in 1971. Declines in smoking and improvements in catching and treating cancer early are driving the change, according to the AACR Cancer Progress Report 2022, released last week. Dr. Lisa Coussens, president of the association, said in a statement that part of the credit goes to an investment in research – both for treatments and for understanding the disease. "Targeted therapies, immunotherapy, and other new therapeutic approaches being applied clinically all stem from fundamental discoveries in basic science," Coussens said. "Investment in cancer science, as well as support for science education at all levels, is absolutely essential to drive the next wave of discoveries and accelerate progress." Increased funding for cancer research is a cornerstone of President Joe Biden's relaunched Cancer Moonshot initiative. Biden – who lost a son to brain cancer – said this month that his goal is to cut cancer death rates in the United States by at least half in the next 25 years. |
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What is rainbow fentanyl? Colorful pills drive new warnings about deadliest drug in the US |
A new wave of concern has spread across the United States over multicolored "rainbow fentanyl" pills, powders and blocks – that look similar to candy or sidewalk chalk – being sold and used in several states, potentially posing a threat to young people. But parents of young children should not panic. The emergence of this product is just one small part of the larger opioid crisis. Rainbow fentanyl comes in bright colors and can be used in the form of pills or powder that contain illicit fentanyl, a powerful synthetic opioid that's intended to help patients manage pain. It's extremely addictive and potentially deadly if someone overdoses while trying to achieve a high. This multicolored fentanyl may appeal to young people or fool them into thinking it's safe, but experts say illicit fentanyl has been hiding in other products for a long time, and fentanyl is fentanyl: It's all dangerous, no matter the color. "Colored fentanyl pills have been around for a few years. Typically, they've been blue pills labeled 'M30' to counterfeit oxycodone, which is a much weaker opioid," Joseph Palamar, an associate professor in the Department of Population Health at NYU Langone Health, who has studied trends in illicit fentanyl, said in an email to CNN. "I think the big difference people are concerned about is with regard to accidental ingestion. People are worried that their kids will take one of these pills thinking they're another drug or even thinking they're some sort of candy," Palamar said. "I don't think the color of the pills greatly increases danger to people who don't use fentanyl, but there is always a possibility of someone who uses fentanyl leaving their pills around in the reach of children." "We need to keep in mind that these pills cost money, so people aren't going to be throwing them on the ground for kids to find. I don't think people will be giving these pills out as Halloween candy." |
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Women's health got worse in 2021, global survey finds |
For women around the globe, the second year of the Covid-19 pandemic brought more health challenges than the first. In 2020, the medical technology company Hologic launched a global survey in partnership with Gallup to assess how well women's health needs were being met. Countries were scored based on women's responses to questions in five categories: general health, preventative care, mental health, safety and basic needs like food and shelter. The overall score for the Global Women's Health Index in 2021 was just 53 out of 100, one point lower than in 2020. No country scored higher than 70 points in 2021, with Taiwan, Latvia, Austria and Denmark in the top spots. Three countries scored fewer than 40 points: Afghanistan, Congo and Venezuela. The United States landed in 23rd place, with 61 points out of 100. "The economic and psychological burden of the pandemic will weigh down many households for a while, and we know that it particularly affected women," said Gertraud Stadler, director of the Institute of Gender in Medicine at the Charite hospital in Berlin, who was not involved in the survey. In fact, women were more stressed, worried, sad and angry in 2021 than they were at any other point in the past decade, according to a Gallup survey that factored into the Global Women's Health Index rankings. Women were also more likely than men to say that they didn't have enough money to afford food in 2021, a share that rose from 34% of women in 2020 to 37% in 2021. "We understand you can only impact and improve what you measure," said Dr. Susan Harvey, vice president of worldwide medical affairs at Hologic and former director of breast imaging at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. "Overall, the data is sobering. And we understand that we need women to be healthy to fully engage and be empowered. It's clear that the time has come to work together and begin to find solutions and improve women's health care." |
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Years after water crisis, Flint residents reported high rates of depression, PTSD |
Researchers say the experiences of residents of Flint, Michigan, show that environmental disasters like the water crisis can have long-term consequences for mental health. Flint residents reported changes to the water's color, smell and taste soon after the city turned to the Flint River as a water source in April 2014. Following outraged pushback by residents and reports of children with mysterious illnesses, tests by the US Environmental Protection Agency and scientists at Virginia Tech detected dangerous levels of lead in the water. For the new study, nearly 2,000 adults living in Flint throughout the crisis were asked about their experiences, their psychological symptoms five years after the crisis and whether they had access to or used mental health services between August 2019 and April 2020. Most of the responses were gathered before the Covid-19 pandemic. Researchers found that 1 in 5 Flint residents met the criteria for presumptive major depression, 1 in 4 for presumptive post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and more than 1 in 10 for both disorders. "Our findings from the study conducted with Flint residents five years after the water crisis indicate that Flint residents report extremely high levels of PTSD and depression, which are higher than rates found in Veterans post-deployment and US and global prevalence rates," Angela Moreland-Johnson, one of the study authors and an assistant professor at the National Crime Victims Research and Treatment Center at the Medical University of South Carolina, told CNN in an email. More than half of the people surveyed were women, and more than half of all respondents identified their race as Black or African American. "The Flint community may require expanded mental health services to meet continued psychiatric need," the researchers wrote. "National disaster preparedness and response programs should consider psychiatric outcomes." The study did not examine the mental health of residents in other communities such as Jackson, Mississippi, which recently experienced its own water crisis. But Moreland-Johnson said the findings suggest that people involved in crises like Flint "may experience heightened PTSD and depression." The research is especially relevant for those who went through a potentially traumatic event before an environmental disaster, as "these prior experiences may place them at heightened risk for mental health concerns including PTSD and depression." |
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| How do you get your teen to break a sweat? It can often be a challenge, but there are many ways to add physical activity into children's lives. |
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Nearly every day, I take my three dogs for a walk. It is one of the most enjoyable parts of my day, but after speaking to Ed Yong for our first episode of "Chasing Life," I'll never look at this activity the same way. What I never appreciated before is that when dogs take time to sniff (sometimes for annoyingly long periods of time), it's their way of processing the world. It is their social media, and they are catching up on all the neighborhood activities through their sense of smell. Ed explains that all creatures, not just humans, live in their own "sensory bubble" through which they experience a sliver of reality – the very specific sliver of reality that happens to be crucial to their survival and well-being. The phenomenon is called the umwelt, a concept pioneered in 1934 by Baltic German biologist Jakob von Uexküll. No matter what sense you or your dog might be using, it's really incredible to realize that our bodies ca pick up on these external stimuli and convert them into experiences. But what's even more amazing to me is that each of us, humans or otherwise, does this differently. The thing that all the senses have in common is that they are processed through the brain. In fact, everything we see, hear, feel, smell and taste is perceived by – and many would even argue created by – our brains. That's right: It is our brains that can translate tiny, invisible airborne molecules into the smell of baking bread or a stinky sock. Our brains can turn pressure waves or vibrations into the sound of a loved one's whisper or a distant thunderclap. Our brains can also weave the visible light portion of electromagnetic radiation into a beautiful mountain or the glow on our mother's face. And our brains can recognize the infrared portion of that same electromagnetic radiation as the warmth we feel when we sit by a lit fireplace. It is pretty amazing. Our five traditional senses might seem straightforward, but they're actually not. Each is multifaceted and nuanced, with many variations among humans. Take touch, for example. Some people need to be touched and others much less so. And far from being only one sense, touch can be broken down further into pressure, temperature, tactile sensations and pain. And we are still in the process of learning how it all works. It was only last year, in 2021, that two scientists, working separately, shared the Nobel Prize in Medicine for their work in identifying a sensor in the nerve endings of our skin that responds to heat and other sensors that respond to pressure. And just this year, researchers published a paper describing some of the possible neuronal underpinnings of pleasant sensations like cuddling and caressing. What's more, the traditional five are not the only senses we have. It might surprise you to learn that we have at least seven, maybe eight. You'll learn more about the other secret senses most humans have in this season of "Chasing Life." |
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| Imagine if your coffee smelled like rotting garbage one morning, or if your favorite comfort food had no taste at all. For some Covid long haulers, this is their new reality. What causes these distortions in smell and taste in the first place? And what treatment options are available? | |
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