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    Real Risk to Youth Mental Health Is ‘Addictive Use,’ Not Screen Time Alone, Study Finds

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    Researchers found children with highly addictive use of phones, video games or social media were two to three times as likely to have thoughts of suicide or to harm themselves.As Americans scramble to respond to rising rates of suicidal behavior among youth, many policymakers have locked in on an alarming metric: the number of hours a day that American children spend glued to a glowing screen.But a study published on Wednesday in the medical journal JAMA, which followed more than 4,000 children across the country, arrived at a surprising conclusion: Longer screen time at age 10 was not associated with higher rates of suicidal behavior four years later.Instead, the authors found, the children at higher risk for suicidal behaviors were those who told researchers their use of technology had become “addictive” — that they had trouble putting it down, or felt the need to use it more and more. Some children exhibited addictive behavior even if their screen time was relatively low, they said.The researchers found addictive behavior to be very common among children — especially in their use of mobile phones, where nearly half had high addictive use. By age 14, children with high or increasing addictive behavior were two to three times as likely as other children to have thoughts of suicide or to harm themselves, the study found.“This is the first study to identify that addictive use is important, and is actually the root cause, instead of time,” said Yunyu Xiao, an assistant professor of psychiatry and population health sciences at Weill Cornell Medical College and the study’s lead author.Addictive behavior may be more difficult to control during childhood, before the prefrontal cortex, which acts as a brake on impulsivity, is fully developed.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Gun Deaths of Children Rose in States That Loosened Gun Laws, Study Finds

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      Researchers looked at firearm fatalities in the 13 years immediately after the Supreme Court limited local governments’ ability to restrict gun ownership.Firearm deaths of children and teenagers rose significantly in states that enacted more permissive gun laws after the Supreme Court in 2010 limited local governments’ ability to restrict gun ownership, a new study has found.In states that maintained stricter laws, firearm deaths were stable after the ruling, the researchers reported, and in some, they even declined.Guns are the leading cause of death in the United States for people under 18. Dr. Jeremy Faust, an emergency room doctor at Massachusetts General Brigham Hospital in Boston, who was the study’s lead author, said he was dismayed to find that most of the children’s deaths were homicides and suicides.“It’s surprising how few of these are accidents,” Dr. Faust said. “I always thought that a lot of pediatric mortality from guns is that somebody got into the wrong place, and I still think safe storage is important, but it’s mostly homicides and suicides.”John Commerford, executive director of the NRA Institute for Legislative Action, called the study “political propaganda masquerading as scientific research.”The study, published Monday in JAMA Pediatrics, examined the 13-year period after the June 2010 Supreme Court ruling that the Second Amendment, which protects an individual’s right to bear arms, applies to state and local gun-control laws. The decision effectively limited the ability of state and local governments to regulate firearms.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Four States Ask F.D.A. to Lift Special Restrictions on Abortion Pill

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      The states consider it a move to force the F.D.A. to review and acknowledge extensive research showing the pill’s safety.In a strategy aimed at countering efforts to further restrict the abortion pill mifepristone, attorneys general of four states that support abortion rights on Thursday asked the Food and Drug Administration to do the opposite and lift the most stringent remaining restrictions on the pill.The petition filed by Massachusetts, New York, California and New Jersey might seem surprising given the opposition to abortion expressed by Trump administration officials. But the attorneys general consider it a move that would require the F.D.A. to acknowledge extensive scientific research that has consistently found mifepristone safe and effective, said an official with the Massachusetts attorney general’s office who worked on the filing and asked not to be named in order to share background information. It would also prevent the F.D.A. from changing mifepristone regulations while the petition is pending.The petition notes that at a May senate hearing, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the health and human services secretary, responded to questions by Senator Josh Hawley, Republican of Missouri, who opposes abortion, by saying he had ordered the F.D.A. to do a “complete review” of mifepristone.“We want to make sure that when F.D.A. is making these decisions that they have all the data in front of them, all of the really powerful data that show that mifepristone is safe” the Massachusetts official said.The F.D.A. is required to respond within 180 days by granting or denying the request, or saying it needs more time. In its responses, the agency must document its position, which could be useful in lawsuits, including one that the four states could file if their petition is denied.Mifepristone, which blocks a hormone necessary for pregnancy development, was approved for abortion in America in 2000. The F.D.A. imposed an additional regulatory framework called Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy, or REMS, on mifepristone. That framework has been used for only about 300 drugs, currently covering only about 60 medications.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      A Blood Test for Alzheimer’s: What to Know

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      The test may make it easier to identify whether people with memory and thinking problems have Alzheimer’s or not.A blood test that can help diagnose Alzheimer’s disease has received clearance from the Food and Drug Administration. This is a step toward a goal of scientists and doctors to one day be able to diagnose a confounding illness with the prick of a finger. But there is still a long way to go.Here is what to know:What is the test, and how should it be used?The test, manufactured by Fujirebio Diagnostics, is intended to be used only by specialists in Alzheimer’s, the F.D.A. said. Its mouthful of a name — Lumipulse G pTau217/ß-Amyloid 1-42 Plasma Ratio — describes what the test measures: levels of two proteins, amyloid and tau, that are hallmarks of Alzheimer’s disease.In people who develop Alzheimer’s, amyloid begins to accumulate and form plaques in the brain more than 20 years before any symptoms of cognitive impairment. Tau accumulates later, forming tangles in the brain, and is much more closely correlated with cognitive decline.Can people who don’t have memory problems take the blood test?No. The F.D.A., and Alzheimer’s experts, emphasized that the blood test should be given only to people who are already experiencing cognitive decline and are ages 55 and older. Moreover, it should not be used on its own to diagnose or to rule out Alzheimer’s.“Other clinical evaluations or additional tests should be used for determining treatment options,” the F.D.A. said in a statement, adding that “the results must be interpreted in conjunction with other patient clinical information.”The current gold standard for diagnosing Alzheimer’s still involves either imaging using PET scans, which are expensive, or spinal taps, which are invasive. The blood test can help flag the presence of the Alzheimer’s-related proteins, and doctors might then order confirmatory testing with one of the other methods.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Surgeons Perform First Human Bladder Transplant

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      Surgeons in Southern California have performed the first human bladder transplant, introducing a new, potentially life-changing procedure for people with debilitating bladder conditions.The operation was performed earlier this month by a pair of surgeons from the University of California, Los Angeles, and the University of Southern California on a 41-year-old man who had lost much of his bladder capacity from treatments for a rare form of bladder cancer.“I was a ticking time bomb,” the patient, Oscar Larrainzar, said on Thursday during a follow-up appointment with his doctors. “But now I have hope.”The doctors plan to perform bladder transplants in four more patients as part of a clinical trial to get a sense of outcomes like bladder capacity and graft complications before pursuing a larger trial to expand its use.Dr. Inderbir Gill, who performed the surgery along with Dr. Nima Nassiri, called it “the realization of a dream” for treating thousands of patients with crippling pelvic pain, inflammation and recurrent infections.“There is no question: A potential door has been opened for these people that did not exist earlier,” said Dr. Gill, the chairman of the urology department at U.S.C.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Drug Overdose Deaths Plummeted in 2024, C.D.C. Reports

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      The progress comes as the Trump administration is proposing to cut funding for many programs believed to have contributed to the improvement.Overdose deaths in the United States fell by nearly 30,000 last year, the government reported on Wednesday, the strongest sign yet that the country is making progress against one of its deadliest, most intractable public health crises.The data, released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is the latest in a series of reports over the past year offering hints that the drug-related death toll that has gutted families and communities could be starting to ease.Public health experts had been carefully watching the monthly updates, with skepticism at first, and then with growing hope. Wednesday’s report was the most encouraging yet. Deaths declined in all major categories of drug use, stimulants as well as opioids, dropping in every state but two. Nationwide, drug fatalities plunged nearly 27 percent.“This is a decline that we’ve been waiting more than a decade for,” said Dr. Matthew Christiansen, a physician and former director of West Virginia’s drug control policy. “We’ve invested hundreds of billions of dollars into addiction.”Addiction specialists said that changes in the illicit drug supply as well as greater access to drug treatment and the use of naloxone to reverse overdoses seemed to be playing a role, but whether the country could sustain that progress was an open question.In announcing the new numbers, the C.D.C. praised President Trump, saying in a statement that since he “declared the opioid crisis a public health emergency in 2017” the government had added more resources to battle the drug problem.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Who Is Casey Means, Trump’s Pick for Surgeon General?

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      Dr. Means, President Trump’s new pick for surgeon general, has focused on the prevalence of chronic diseases and called on the government to scale back on childhood vaccines.President Trump said on Wednesday that he would nominate Casey Means, a Stanford-educated doctor turned critic of corporate influence on medicine and health, as surgeon general.Dr. Means, an ally of the health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has described becoming disillusioned by establishment medicine. She rose to prominence last year after she and her brother, Calley Means, a White House health adviser and former food industry lobbyist, appeared on Tucker Carlson’s show.What is her field of medicine?Dr. Means, who trained as an otolaryngologist and head and neck surgeon, left surgery behind without finishing her training to practice so-called functional medicine, which focuses on addressing the root causes of disease. She published a diet and self-help book last year titled “Good Energy: The Surprising Connection Between Metabolism and Limitless Health.” Before that, she had been best known for founding Levels, a company that offers subscribers wearable glucose monitors to track their health.She has focused on the prevalence of chronic diseases in the United States and has taken aim at obesity, diabetes and infertility, problems she has attributed to the use of chemicals and medications and Americans’ sedentary lifestyles.What has she said about vaccines?Dr. Means has echoed some of Mr. Kennedy’s skepticism of vaccines, calling on the new administration to study their “cumulative effects” and to weaken liability protections offered to vaccine makers as a way of encouraging them to develop new shots.“There is growing evidence that the total burden of the current extreme and growing vaccine schedule is causing health declines in vulnerable children,” she wrote in an October newsletter.Child health experts are adamantly opposed to trimming the list of recommended immunizations, warning that such changes would trigger outbreaks of deadly infectious diseases. And they have noted that the government makes available the safety data used to license vaccines and the safety data generated after they are put into use.What has she said about the food supply?Dr. Means has also pushed for a concerted campaign to pare back corporate-friendly policies related to the production and sale of food and medicine. For example, she has supported serving more nutritious meals in public schools, investigating the use of chemicals in American food, putting warning labels on ultra-processed foods, forbidding pharmaceutical companies from advertising directly to patients on television and reducing the influence of industry among drug and food regulators.“American health is getting destroyed,” she said at a Senate round table event on food and nutrition in September. “If the current trends continue, if the graphs continue in the way that they’re going, at best we’re going to face profound societal instability and decreased American competitiveness, and at worst, we’re going to be looking at a genocidal-level health collapse.” More

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      RFK Jr. to Kick Off MAHA Tour on Fighting Chronic Disease

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      After a second measles death in West Texas, the health secretary is expected to begin a tour through the Southwest to showcase nutrition legislation, among other priorities.A day after attending the funeral of an unvaccinated child who died of measles, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will kick off a tour through Southwestern states on Monday, spotlighting initiatives that emphasize nutrition and lifestyle choices as tools for combating disease.The Make America Healthy Again tour, which will take Mr. Kennedy through parts of Utah, Arizona and New Mexico, is intended to draw attention to some of the secretary’s common-ground interests, but the first day is scheduled to end with a highly contentious one: a news conference to highlight Utah’s new law that bans adding fluoride to public drinking water supplies.The tour comes as questions grow about the federal government’s response to a measles outbreak in West Texas that has spread to other states. The death of an unvaccinated 8-year-old girl there last week was the second confirmed fatality from measles in a decade in the United States. Mr. Kennedy attended the girl’s funeral on Sunday and met with her family before continuing to Utah.Mr. Kennedy’s staff said that over the course of three days, he planned to visit multiple health centers, including a medical school’s “teaching kitchen” to train students on managing chronic disease using dietary choices. He is scheduled to meet with leaders of Navajo Nation to discuss the cultural and logistical challenges of providing high-quality health care to tribal groups and to visit a charter school in New Mexico that “integrates healthy eating and physical fitness into its daily student life.”During his first months in office, Mr. Kennedy’s policies have been unfurled with great brouhaha, but the secretary himself has been relatively low profile, particularly for an official with his degree of fame. The White House has encouraged Mr. Kennedy to take a more public-facing approach to his role, but the timing of his first major push out in the country will require toeing a careful line around the most conspicuous issue on the table.Public health experts say the measles outbreak that has now infected nearly 500 people in West Texas is driven by low vaccination rates. Mr. Kennedy, who is famously skeptical of vaccine safety, shifted his rhetoric after the little girl’s funeral, posting on X: “The most effective way to prevent the spread of measles is the MMR vaccine.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Shingles Vaccine Can Decrease Risk of Dementia, Study Finds

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      A growing body of research suggests that preventing the viral infection can help stave off cognitive decline.Getting vaccinated against shingles can reduce the risk of developing dementia, a large new study finds.The results provide some of the strongest evidence yet that some viral infections can have effects on brain function years later and that preventing them can help stave off cognitive decline.The study, published on Wednesday in the journal Nature, found that people who received the shingles vaccine were 20 percent less likely to develop dementia in the seven years afterward than those who were not vaccinated.“If you’re reducing the risk of dementia by 20 percent, that’s quite important in a public health context, given that we don’t really have much else at the moment that slows down the onset of dementia,” said Dr. Paul Harrison, a professor of psychiatry at Oxford. Dr. Harrison was not involved in the new study, but has done other research indicating that shingles vaccines lower dementia risk.Whether the protection can last beyond seven years can only be determined with further research. But with few currently effective treatments or preventions, Dr. Harrison said, shingles vaccines appear to have “some of the strongest potential protective effects against dementia that we know of that are potentially usable in practice.”Shingles cases stem from the virus that causes childhood chickenpox, varicella-zoster, which typically remains dormant in nerve cells for decades. As people age and their immune systems weaken, the virus can reactivate and cause shingles, with symptoms like burning, tingling, painful blisters and numbness. The nerve pain can become chronic and disabling.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More