- A "game-changer" for millions of Americans: You can now buy hearing aids over the counter
- FDA authorizes updated Covid-19 boosters for children as young as 5
"Heartbreaking" stories go untold, doctors say, as employers "muzzle" them in wake of abortion ruling Flu "gathering speed" across US as health officials and doctors prepare for a potentially rough season |
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A "game-changer" for millions of Americans: You can now buy hearing aids over the counter | A rule change by the US Food and Drug Administration allows adults with mild to moderate hearing loss to buy hearing aids online or in stores without a prescription – and probably for a lower price – beginning this week. Experts are calling the move a "game changer" that could affect millions of Americans. About 1 in 8 people in the US ages 12 and older has hearing loss in both ears, and the rate increases significantly with age. About a quarter of people 65 to 74 have hearing loss, and that number goes up to 50% around age 75. Only about 16% of the tens of millions of people with hearing loss use a hearing aid, according to the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders. Some doctors estimate that 90% of the population with hearing loss could benefit from these over-the-counter devices. Up until now, prices for the devices have varied widely: Large retailers may offer a pair for about $1,400, but some can cost as much as $6,000 per ear, depending on the technology. With the change, many more companies are expected to enter the market. Experts say that existing manufacturers will also develop lower-cost over-the-counter devices in addition to their current offerings. And with the rule change, people won't have to visit a hearing health professional and have a custom fitting, a process that can also be cost-prohibitive. |
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FDA authorizes updated Covid-19 booster shots for children as young as 5 |
Federal health officials have signed off on updated Covid-19 booster shots for children as young as 5. Now, children and teens can get the boosters from Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech as long as they're at least two months past their primary vaccine series or last booster dose. Like the boosters that became available for people 12 and older in September, these bivalent boosters target the original coronavirus strain as well as the Omicron BA.4/BA.5 subvariants. The updated Pfizer/BioNTech booster received authorization last week for use in children ages 5 to 11 and will be given as a 10-microgram dose. Pfizer's updated booster was previously authorized for people 12 and older. Moderna's updated boosters were also authorized last week for people ages 6 to 17. Moderna's updated booster was previously authorized for people 18 and older. "Since children have gone back to school in person and people are resuming pre-pandemic behaviors and activities, there is the potential for increased risk of exposure to the virus that causes COVID-19. Vaccination remains the most effective measure to prevent the severe consequences of COVID-19, including hospitalization and death," Dr. Peter Marks, director of the FDA's Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, said in a news release. "While it has largely been the case that COVID-19 tends to be less severe in children than adults, as the various waves of COVID-19 have occurred, more children have gotten sick with the disease and have been hospitalized. Children may also experience long-term effects, even following initially mild disease," Marks said. |
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"Heartbreaking" stories go untold, doctors say, as employers "muzzle" them in wake of abortion ruling |
Since the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June, a number of doctors say they are being restricted and censored from discussing abortion by their employers. "They're censoring me," one doctor told CNN. "It's shameful and embarrassing to work for an institution that is not supportive of women's rights. "I'm extremely angry," she added. "It's disgusting." A physician in another state echoed her: "I feel shackled. I feel muzzled. I feel completely restrained, and I'm outraged." Eight doctors interviewed by CNN say their employers – major public and private medical centers in five states – have asked them to not speak publicly about abortion or have instructed them that if they do speak publicly about abortion, they can do so only as private citizens and cannot mention where they work. "If [they] don't speak up, who is going to provide the evidence about the effect [abortion bans are] having on patients?" asked Dr. Erika Werner, who chairs the health policy and advocacy committee at the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine and is the chair of obstetrics and gynecology at Tufts Medical Center in Boston. Dr. Eric Rubin, editor in chief of The New England Journal of Medicine, said doctors need to be able to speak up because "the world of medicine in general – and certainly abortion – is full of misinformation, and we have not found good ways to counter that." As a physician myself, it is disheartening to hear when doctors cannot speak out about their patients' health. Health should always be prioritized over politics. |
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Flu "gathering speed" across US as health officials and doctors prepare for a potentially rough season |
US health officials are becoming increasingly concerned about this year's flu season – and are already seeing signs that the virus is spreading. Flu activity in the United States often starts to increase in October and usually peaks between December and February. As the 2022-23 flu season gets underway, one high school in California has faced a "high number of absences" among students due to possible flu cases. San Diego County Public Health Services said one high school had nearly 4,000 students absent over two days due to cold- and flu-like symptoms. An early increase in seasonal flu activity has been reported in most of the United States, with the nation's Southeast and South Central areas reporting the highest levels, according to the CDC. More than a thousand people were hospitalized with flu last week, the agency said. Although current influenza activity is still overall low, the CDC's report finds that its increasing in most of the country, with three jurisdictions experiencing moderate activity and six jurisdictions experiencing high or very high activity. Last week, the CDC found that 3.3% of respiratory specimens sent to labs tested positive for flu, suggesting that the nation might be returning to pre-Covid levels. Around this time in 2019, 3.1% of specimens were reported as testing positive for flu. But levels plummeted in 2020 and 2021, largely thanks to coronavirus prevention measures like masks and distancing. Predicting what influenza activity might look like in a particular year can be tricky, but doctors are bracing for "a very substantial" flu season, said Dr. William Schaffner, a professor in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Vanderbilt University Medical Center and medical director of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases. "We know that this virus is now spreading out in the community already. It's gathering speed already. It looks to me to be about a month early," Schaffner said. Concern has grown as officials also brace for possible surges this winter in Covid-19 and other common respiratory viruses, such as respiratory syncytial virus or RSV, a leading cause of lower respiratory tract infection in infants and young children. |
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| Imparting life lessons to your own kids is part and parcel of parenting, but what about doing that for other people's kids? When (if ever) is it appropriate to step in to issue a value judgment and draw a hard line in the sand when it involves not just your child, but other children as well? |
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A new review of cancer registry records from 44 countries around the world has found that incidences of cancer in people under 50, or early-onset cancers, are rising rapidly for colorectal and 13 other types of cancers, many of which affect the digestive system. Much of this is happening in middle- and high-income nations. The review's authors note that the upswing is happening in part because of more sensitive testing for some cancer types, such as thyroid cancer. Lifestyle is also a large factor. But Shuji Ogino, a professor of pathology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and co-author of the study, says the spike is due to an unhealthy stew of risk factors that are probably working together, some which are known and others that need to be investigated. He notes that many of these risks have established links to cancer like obesity, inactivity, diabetes, alcohol, smoking, environmental pollution and Western diets high in red meat and added sugars, not to mention shift work and lack of sleep. Ogino thinks the fact that so many of these cancers – eight out of 14 studied – involve the digestive system points to a big role for diet and the bacteria that live in our gut, called the microbiome. Another interesting takeaway from the review was that the risk of an early-onset cancer increased for each successive group of people born at a later time. Those born in the 1990s had a higher risk of developing an early-onset cancer in their lifetime than those born in the 1980s, for example. Among the cancers seeing spikes among younger adults are colorectal, breast, endometrium, gallbladder and bile duct, kidney, pancreas, thyroid, stomach and plasma cells in the blood – a cancer called myeloma. Cancer is a serious diagnosis at any age, but when it shows up in younger adults, the tumors are typically more aggressive. They often go undetected for longer because routine cancer screening isn't recommended for some of the most common cancer types, such as breast and prostate, until age 50. Although we don't know the root causes of cancer, we know that we can take some preventive measures in our own hands. We can eat better and move more. For those of who smoke, cigarettes are still a significant risk. Lung cancer kills more men and women than any other type of cancer – and people who smoke today have a higher risk of cancer than those who smoked in the 1960s, even though they may smoke fewer cigarettes. This may be because of changes in how cigarettes are produced and what chemicals are used. We may still be working on a cure for cancer, but we can all still take steps to reduce our risk. |
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| How do you treat a disease where the cause is unknown and each patient's symptoms are unique? We talk to pain expert Dr. Carmen Green about what causes chronic pain, how it can be treated, and which patients are more likely to get care. |
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