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Majority of Parents Believe Children’s Physical and Mental Health Is Getting Worse
Most parents think that the health of U.S. children is going in the wrong direction, a national poll suggests. Two-thirds of parents believe children’s physical health is declining while four in five say mental health is getting worse, according to the University of Michigan Health C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital National Poll on Children’s Health.
Leading the list of child health concerns were social media, too much screen time, and internet safety. “These concerns from parents reflect a growing awareness that today’s children are facing increasing challenges impacting both their physical and mental health,” said Mott Poll co-director and Mott Children’s pediatrician Susan Woolford, M.D.
“Parents continue to express concern about the pervasive role of technology in their children’s lives,” she added. “Excessive screen time and social media exposure are linked to poor sleep, less physical activity, and negative mental health outcomes, including anxiety, low self-esteem, and unhealthy social comparisons.”
Physicians for Informed Consent Publishes Silver Booklet, Shows Childhood Vaccines Not Proven Safer Than the Diseases They Target
Physicians for Informed Consent (PIC) has announced the publication of “Vaccines and the Diseases They Target: An Analysis of Vaccine Safety and Epidemiology,” also known as the Silver Booklet, a groundbreaking book that challenges the belief that vaccines are unequivocally safer than the diseases they intend to prevent.
Drawing on peer-reviewed studies, government health statistics, and over a decade of research and development by PIC, the book presents a reader-friendly analysis of the risks of childhood vaccines compared to that of infectious diseases — and equips parents, healthcare professionals, and policymakers with clear, concise data to support informed decision-making.
“Vaccine policies have operated within a paradigm that assumes vaccines are inherently safer than the diseases they target,” said Shira Miller, M.D., PIC founder and president. “However, the data tell a different story — particularly for children at normal risk. That’s why vaccine mandates deserve immediate and serious reconsideration.”
Prenatal Pesticide Exposure Alters Children’s Brain Development, Impairing Motor Skills
A joint observational study by Children’s Hospital Los Angeles and Columbia University has found that prenatal exposure to a common pesticide also used as an insecticide could impair children’s brain development and motor function for years to come.
In this long-term study of children between six and 14 years old, followed since birth, prenatal exposure to the pesticide chlorpyrifos (CPF) was associated with alterations in brain structure and impairments in motor function. This is the first study to show that prenatal exposure to a pesticide produces enduring and widespread molecular, cellular, and metabolic effects in the brain. The results were published in JAMA Neurology.
“More CPF exposure led to more thickening of the cerebral cortex — the area of the brain that directs functions like thinking, memory and movement,” says Bradley Peterson, MD, first author on the study and Chief of the Division of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry at Children’s Hospital, where he also leads the Brain Imaging Lab. “We don’t know the consequences of these brain effects, but we found that CPF exposure most impairs motor functioning.”
Excessive Screen Time Impacts Children’s Heart Health, According to AHA Data
The endless hours your children spend on cell phones and similar devices could be risking their heart health. The American Heart Association released a study linking excessive screen time to heart disease in individuals at an earlier stage of their lives.
“I am seeing younger and younger patients come in,” said Baptist Heart cardiologist Dr. Shawn Sanders. What he encounters coincides with new research published in the Journal of the American Heart Association.
That research found the time children and young adults spend on cell phones, gaming consoles, and other devices jeopardizes their heart health. In the study of more than 1,000 10 and 18-year-olds, excessive screen time is associated with Cardiometabolic Disease, such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and insulin resistance.
“We’ve seen bad effects on attention span, stress hormones, stress anxiety, depression, but now recent studies from Denmark are showing that screen time in particular is affecting people’s heart health even at young ages,” said Sanders. While scrolling through websites may seem harmless, scientists have discovered that long hours can elevate heart rates and detract from the needed eight hours of rest in growing children.
Medical Mistrust, Religious Exemptions Cited in Sharp Drop of Florida Immunizations
Herd immunity of close to 95% is needed to prevent outbreaks of infectious diseases. And yet, the state continues to see a decline in the vaccination rate among children since the pandemic. Childhood vaccinations against diseases like whooping cough, polio and measles in Florida are down 10 percentage points in the last decade, as distrust of the medical establishment in the post-COVID era takes hold and exemptions on religious grounds rise.
By age two, children are recommended to have received immunizations against 16 diseases, including measles, mumps, rubella, polio, hepatitis A and B, and chickenpox, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Major medical associations, including the CDC, continue to recommend these immunizations, saying they are safe and effective.
Herd immunity of close to 95% is needed to prevent outbreaks of infectious diseases and protect people with medical conditions like immune disorders and certain allergies who cannot get vaccinated. And yet, Florida continues to see a steep decline in the immunization rate among children. It began in 2021, a year after the COVID-19 pandemic began.
