Wednesday, January 14

HEALTH

Human Nature Means You’re Both Selfish And Selfless
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SELF-CARE

Human Nature Means You’re Both Selfish And Selfless

Looking out for number one has been important for survival for as long as there have been human beings. But self-interest isn’t the only trait that helped people win at evolution. Groups of individuals who were predisposed to cooperate, care for each other and uphold social norms of fairness tended to survive and expand relative to other groups, thereby allowing these prosocial motivations to proliferate. So today, concern for oneself and concern for others both contribute to our sense of fairness. Together they facilitate cooperation among unrelated individuals, something ubiquitous among people but uncommon in nature. A critical question is how people balance these two motivations when making decisions. We investigate this question in our work at the Social Cognitive Neuroscience Lab...
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Why Women Shouldn’t Have To Risk Trading Their Freedom For Safety, The Sarah Everard Story
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Why Women Shouldn’t Have To Risk Trading Their Freedom For Safety, The Sarah Everard Story

Earlier this month, Sarah Everard was allegedly abducted and killed while walking home from a friend’s house in London. In response to her disappearance, women were reportedly advised to avoid going out alone. Yet at the same time, the Metropolitan Police commissioner, Cressida Dick, sought to reassure women that incidences of abduction and murder are rare. Heavy police presence and use of force during a recent gathering to remember Everard also raised issues about the way women are treated by authorities when demonstrating against sexual harassment and violence. It’s an issue which, in some circles, has led to demands for police reform and Dick’s resignation as commissioner. As one popular argument goes, penalising and physically handling women at a vigil didn’t just ignore some women’s ...
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New Research Finds – Staying Active Throughout Adulthood Is Linked To Lower Healthcare Costs In Later Life
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SELF-CARE, VIDEO REELS

New Research Finds – Staying Active Throughout Adulthood Is Linked To Lower Healthcare Costs In Later Life

Exercise is good for your health at every age – and you can reap the benefits no matter how late in life you start. But our latest research has shown another benefit of being physically active throughout life. We found that in the US, people who were more physically active as teenagers and throughout adulthood had lower healthcare costs. These findings are especially relevant to people who live in countries without universal healthcare, such as the US. However, our findings apply indirectly to countries with universal healthcare, such as the UK, as a healthier population could result in lower costs for the healthcare system as a whole. For our study, we drew on data from the National Cancer Institute’s study on diet and health, which looked at over half a million adults. As part of this ...
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Using Indoor Air Filters Near Busy Highways Can Reduce Blood Pressure
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Using Indoor Air Filters Near Busy Highways Can Reduce Blood Pressure

The big idea For people living near busy highways, using air filters indoors results in short-term improvements to blood pressure, according to a new study I co-authored. Busy highways are large sources of air pollution. Larry D. Moore via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA Next to busy highways and major roadways, there are high concentrations of air pollution – including exceptionally tiny, invisible and odorless ultrafine particles from burning fuel. My colleagues Neelakshi Hudda, Misha Eliasziw and I tested how using air filters indoors near a highway can reduce exposure to ultrafine and other particulate pollutants – and what effect that has on blood pressure. Our team tested 77 participants over three two-hour sessions in a room next to a busy highway. We manipulated the level of air pollu...
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More Than Half Of People Using Medical Cannabis For Pain Experience Weed Withdrawal Symptoms
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More Than Half Of People Using Medical Cannabis For Pain Experience Weed Withdrawal Symptoms

In stark contrast to the overblown fears portrayed during decades past, these days, most people think cannabis is relatively harmless. While weed is indeed less dangerous than some other drugs, it is not without risks.   CC BY-ND In a study published Jan. 5, my colleagues and I found that 59% percent of people using medical cannabis for chronic pain experienced moderate to severe withdrawal symptoms if they stopped ingesting weed for hours or days. Most states in the U.S. have legalized cannabis for medical purposes and 15 have legalized it for recreational use. More people are using cannabis, especially older adults, and the perceived harms from weed use are steadily decreasing. While many people report therapeutic benefits or enjoy recreational use of cannabis, it is important peo...
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Black Licorice Spooky And Dangerous Side
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Black Licorice Spooky And Dangerous Side

Black licorice may look and taste like an innocent treat, but this candy has a dark side. On Sept. 23, 2020, it was reported that black licorice was the culprit in the death of a 54-year-old man in Massachusetts. How could this be? Overdosing on licorice sounds more like a twisted tale than a plausible fact. I have a longstanding interest in how chemicals in our food and the environment affect our body and mind. When something seemingly harmless like licorice is implicated in a death, we are reminded of the famous proclamation by Swiss physician Paracelsus, the Father of Toxicology: “All things are poison, and nothing is without poison; the dosage alone makes it so a thing is not a poison.” I am a professor in the department of pharmacology and toxicology and author of the book “Pleased...
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What’s in your medicine may surprise you – a call for greater transparency about inactive ingredients
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What’s in your medicine may surprise you – a call for greater transparency about inactive ingredients

There are many more ingredients in every pill you take than what is listed on the bottle label. These other ingredients, which are combined with the therapeutic one, are often sourced from around the world before landing in your medicine cabinet and are not always benign. Earlier this year, the U.S. Congress passed the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act, which requires manufacturers to report real or potential drug shortages to the FDA. Manufacturers are now required to report disruptions in the manufacturing of an active pharmaceutical ingredient – the part of the medicine that produces the intended therapeutic benefit. But the CARES Act doesn’t include excipients - the “inactive” ingredients that make up the bulk of a final medicine. It also doesn’t include the materials...
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To stop police shootings of people with mental health disabilities, I asked them what cops – and everyone – could do to help
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MENTAL HEALTH

To stop police shootings of people with mental health disabilities, I asked them what cops – and everyone – could do to help

When Joe Prude called the police on his brother, he was asking for help: Daniel Prude, who suffered from mental health problems, had run almost naked out of his Rochester, New York, house into the snow. When officers arrived, new video footage shows, the March 23 encounter quickly turned violent, and Prude died from asphyxiation under a hood officers had put over his head. Two years prior, in 2018, Shukri Ali Said of Georgia also wound up dead after leaving her house during a mental health crisis on April 23, 2018. Police, called in to help, found Said standing at an intersection holding a knife. Officers shot her five times in the neck and chest, killing her. That same month, in New York, officers answered a 911 call about a black man waving something that looked like a gun. In fact, it...
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How dangerous heat waves can kill
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How dangerous heat waves can kill

Heat waves are the leading cause of weather-related deaths in the United States, not the more photogenic windstorms and floods. Hotter summers from climate change are causing concerns over new dangers to people. As a medical school professor, I’ve focused on physiology, neuroscience, the evolution of the big brain and, more recently, climate science and civilization’s vulnerability to abrupt shocks from climate change. Today I’m wearing my physiologist’s hat and asking: How do heat waves kill? We can take the heat – usually Thanks to our meat-eating ancestors, who could run down prey in long midday chases on the African savanna, we humans are able to keep our body temperature in the range where we function best in a wide range of conditions, even those combining extreme heat with extreme...
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Your Bestest Friend – You
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SELF-CARE

Your Bestest Friend – You

I have a friend, Maggie, who has been my friend since 1968, and she calls me her "bestest" friend as a way of appreciating our connection. It always makes me smile, and I feel the same about her. Often, my clients have trouble learning to appreciate and trust themselves, and I think Maggie's phrase should apply to the only relationship we'll have from birth to death-the relationship with self. Are you your own bestest friend? Whether you realize it or not, the relationship you have with yourself sets the pattern for how you connect with others. By developing a nurturing way to relate to yourself, you create a personal experience of both giving and receiving friendship. (This is also an advance peek at my newest book, "Commuter Marriage: How to stay close when you're far apart") Best of a...
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