TimeMagazine Comedian Tig Notaro said receiving her cancer diagnosis in 2012—which followed a series of tragic events that had upended her life—was so horrific, she had to laugh. Notaro, known for disarming, deadpan-style of comedy, spoke about finding the humor in devastating moments during an interview at the TIME 100 Health Summit on Thursday. “I kept … Read more
(WASHINGTON) — Juul Labs stopped selling fruit and dessert flavors Thursday, acknowledging the public’s “lack of trust” in the vaping industry. The voluntary step is the company’s latest attempt to weather a growing political backlash blaming its flavored-nicotine products for hooking a generation of teenagers on electronic cigarettes. Juul, the best-selling e-cigarette brand in the … Read more
During the first TIME 100 Health Summit on Thursday, NBA commissioner Adam Silver said that he’s willing to deal with the business consequences of Daryl Morey’s Oct. 4 tweet supporting protesters in Hong Kong. The Houston Rockets general manager angered the Chinese government and caused Chinese sponsors to pull away from the NBA during two … Read more
Seema Verma, the administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services under the Trump Administration, called Medicare for All “scary” and said the government is to blame for many problems with the United States health care system during an interview at the TIME 100 Health Summit on Thursday. “A lot of the problems that … Read more
Leana Wen, the former head of Planned Parenthood and a professor at George Washington University, addressed a controversial statement she made on abortion during the TIME 100 Health Summit on Thursday. Wen kicked off a firestorm on Twitter Tuesday when she broke with typical Planned Parenthood language and said that abortion should be “safe, legal … Read more
There are many factors that influence how long somebody lives. Some, like their genes, are out of their control. Others, like their lifestyle and environment, are a bit easier to alter. A new paper published in Nature finds another factor that falls somewhere in between those extremes. It suggests that excessive neural activity in the … Read more
Between 1997 and 2016, spending on direct-to-consumer healthcare advertising skyrocketed, from $2.1 billion to $9.6 billion. Where advertising once represented 12% of total medical marketing expenditures, it came to represent 32%. There was a time when reputable doctors wouldn’t dream of such flagrant self-promotion. As medicine became more professionalized throughout the nineteenth century, doctors began … Read more
A new 33-patient case study published in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine provides some of the strongest proof yet that exposure to asbestos-tainted talcum powder may cause malignant mesothelioma, a rare and deadly cancer that affects tissues lining internal organs. This isn’t only an important scientific discovery—it could also give new ammunition to … Read more
UNITED NATIONS — The U.N. children’s agency says one-third of children worldwide under age 5 — about 200 million youngsters — are either undernourished or overweight, undermining their full potential to grow and develop. UNICEF also says almost two-thirds of children aged 6 months to 2 years are not fed food that supports their rapidly … Read more
When Amy and Steve Unruh decided to adopt a four-year-old child from the Philippines, they anticipated challenges. They understood it would take time, as well as a great deal of love and care, for their family and its newest member to adjust. But they were committed to helping a child in need. The Unruh’s were … Read more