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What Happened to the Canadian Teen Who Became Critically Ill With H5N1 Bird Flu?
Canadian public health officials closed their investigation into the teenager who became critically ill with the H5N1 bird flu virus, with no source of infection identified. It’s not clear whether the teenager recovered or was released from the hospital. Andy Watson, director of communications for the Office of the Provincial Health Officer in British Columbia, said in an email to MedPage Today that the office does not provide patient status updates due to privacy.
The office “won’t be providing any updates on the status of the teenaged patient or this now complete investigation unless there is a need from a public health perspective to do so,” Watson said in the email.
Reducing Screen Time Boosts Children’s Mental Health and Prosocial Behaviors, Study Finds
A new study published in JAMA Network Open offers experimental evidence supporting the idea that reducing leisure-time screen media use can improve the mental health of children and adolescents. The research, a secondary analysis of the SCREENS randomized clinical trial, found that reducing leisure-time screen media use led to notable improvements in psychological well-being. Participants showed a reduction in behavioral difficulties, particularly internalizing symptoms like emotional and peer-related issues, along with enhanced prosocial behaviors.
Concerns about the potential negative effects of digital screen use on young people’s mental health have grown in recent years. With children and adolescents increasingly reliant on devices for entertainment and communication, researchers sought to explore whether limiting leisure screen time could have tangible benefits. Previous studies have found small but significant associations between high screen time and poor mental health. However, these studies couldn’t establish causation due to their reliance on self-reported data and the lack of experimental control.
How We Can Better Protect Kids From Online Predators
It’s a scourge that no one wants to think about. Last year, technology companies reported tens of millions of online images of children being sexually abused in people’s digital photos, emails, chats and more. The boom in reported abuse images and other online child exploitation is probably a vast undercount.
Just in the past week, Apple was sued for failing to stop child abuse images from recirculating through the company’s iCloud online photo and file system. (An Apple spokesman, Fred Sainz, said that “child sexual abuse material is abhorrent and we are committed to fighting the ways predators put children at risk.”) And the New York Times reported on mobile apps through which parents and other abusers collected money for live videos of child sexual abuse.
Child abuse and the desire to watch it long predated the internet, and there are no easy fixes. But experts said that technology companies, policymakers and families can take steps to better protect kids.
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Study Finds Folic Acid May Protect Mothers and Children Against Liver Damage From Prenatal Chemical Exposure
A study by researchers from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai reveals that prenatal exposure to environmental chemicals and endocrine disruptors may pose significant risks to liver health for both mothers and their newborns. Additionally, the researchers found that treating folic acid and other B vitamin deficiencies in pregnancy may help counter some of the adverse effects of prenatal exposures on the livers of children.
The study, published in the Journal of Hepatology and titled “Metabolism-Disrupting Chemical Mixtures, Folic Acid Supplementation, and Liver Injury and Steatosis in Mother-Child Pairs,” examined how prenatal exposure to metabolism-disrupting chemical mixtures impacts liver health in mother-child pairs in a Mexican population.
It found evidence of increased risk for liver injury and steatosis (fat accumulation in the liver) in mothers and especially in their children, linked to air pollutant, phthalate and pesticide exposures during pregnancy.
Air Pollution Likely Killed Millions of Indians Over a Decade, Study Finds
Prolonged exposure to pollution contributed to millions of deaths across India over a decade, according to a new study that called for stricter air quality regulations. The study, published in The Lancet Planetary Health, assessed the link between tiny air pollution particles and mortality between 2009 and 2019 across hundreds of districts. It warned that there could be high rates of death across the country even at pollution levels below the current national air quality standards.
Researchers from Sweden’s Karolinska Institutet looked especially into the role played by PM2.5, pollution particles less than 2.5 micrometres in diameter that are known to enter the lungs and bloodstream and pose major health risks. The study warned that India’s entire population lived in areas where PM2.5 levels exceeded WHO guidelines, meaning that about 1.4 billion people were exposed throughout the year to air pollution that negatively affected their health.
Warning Issued to Parents Over ‘Extremely Dangerous’ Superman Online Trend
Parents have been warned to speak to their children about a potentially “extremely dangerous” new trend spreading on TikTok and other social media sites. Videos of the Superman craze show young people linking arms, while one person jumps forward in a Superman pose, landing on the arms and being thrown up in the air.
A U.K. school has now issued a warning to parents that students taking part are risking serious injury. A TikTok spokesperson told Newsweek: “For the safety of our community, we proactively detect and remove content that shows or promotes dangerous activity or challenges.”
Grandparents Raising Kids in Decline Due to Pandemic
The number of U.S. grandparents living with and caring for grandchildren declined in the first part of the 2020s compared to the late 2010s, according to U.S. Census Bureau data released on Thursday. This trend reflects broader societal shifts, including the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and changes in family dynamics. The survey revealed that the number of grandparents raising grandchildren dropped from 7.2 million to 6.8 million during this period.
Experts attribute this to a reduction in opioid-related deaths, which often leave grandparents as caregivers, and a decline in the incarceration of women. “It’s very rarely for positive reasons that grandparents find themselves in this situation. Usually, it’s a tragic situation in an adult child’s life, either a death, incarceration or mental health issues which correlate with substance abuse,” said Susan Kelley, professor emerita of nursing at Georgia State University. A stronger economy may also have played a role, making it less necessary for adult children to seek housing assistance from their parents, Kelley added.
