Author: healthadmin

Washington state faces open water challenges. Tools to reduce air pollution from ships can cause water pollution. And this winter, for the second year in a row, proposals to untangle that contradiction ran into a deadlock in the Washington Congress.Semi-retired KUOW reporter Tom Vance recently wrote a piece for Salish Current about this issue. He spoke to KUOW’s Paige Browning about his reporting. This interview has been edited for clarity. Paige Browning: This problem involves something called an exhaust scrubber. This is basically used to pressure wash the chimneys and exhausts of large ships, reducing nuisance air pollution. However, you…

In some non-small cell lung cancers (NSCLC), RET gene (also known as) RET fusion) can promote tumor growth. Researchers at Massachusetts General Brigham Cancer Institute evaluated the long-term efficacy and safety of pralsetinib, an FDA-approved drug that targets RET, in a phase 1/2 clinical study with 42 months of follow-up. The researchers found that the treatment produced durable responses with a manageable safety profile in 281 patients with advanced or metastatic RET fusion-positive NSCLC. Results are posted below Journal of Clinical Oncology. “Prior to the development of selective RET inhibitors, the expected overall survival of patients with advanced disease was…

People often fail to practice what they preach – patterns of behavior that are due to specific biological processes rather than just bad personality. According to a new study published in the journal cell reportpeople who behave dishonestly while criticizing the same behavior in others have reduced activity in certain areas of the brain. This research shows that aligning one’s behavior with one’s personal moral standards requires active mental integration. Social harmony is highly dependent on people maintaining consistent ethical standards. When people act contrary to the very rules they use to judge others, they risk damaging their own reputations…

EEvery year, the world produces more than 400 million tons of plastic, enough to fill more than 1 million garbage trucks, but less than 10 percent of these products are recycled. The rest ends up in landfills. They litter our lands, oceans, and waterways. Alternatively, it can be burned in incinerators, which produce dioxins, a powerful carcinogenic chemical. Initially, environmental research focused on the negative effects of plastic debris on aquatic animals and other wildlife. “But we now realize that we are all suffering the same effects,” says epidemiologist Leonardo Trasande, MD, professor of pediatrics at New York University’s Grossman…

With cascading climate shocks unfolding faster than scientists can track them, the United Nations scientific agency that assesses global warming risks and response options is stuck in a procedural logjam and facing a potential budget shortfall. The latest plenary session of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in Bangkok concluded last week without members approving a final schedule for completing the Seventh Assessment Report, even though the cycle officially began nearly two years ago. And experts warned that the reduction in funding could affect future work. The IPCC was established by global consensus in 1988 and has published comprehensive climate…

Artificial intelligence programs can persuade people to moderate their political views, but highly customized messages and deep conversations with bots are unlikely to work any better than a single basic argument. These results challenge long-held academic theories about what makes political messages effective and suggest that targeted data and interactive discussions may not provide the benefits politicians expect. The findings were recently published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Changing the minds of voters is an essential feature of democratic societies. Advocacy groups, public health officials, and political candidates spend billions of dollars trying to sway public…

Cyril Traore Ndembi, a father of four living in the Republic of Congo, thought help would come for his youngest son, Sylphani. More than a year ago, in December 2024, the country’s environment minister shut down a battery recycling facility near Ndembi’s home, which spewed lead into the air, contaminated the soil and poisoned Shilfani and other neighbors. The minister ordered the factory’s operator, Messa Congo, to pay approximately $18,000 in cleaning and medical costs to the community.The World Health Organization, which classifies lead as one of the top 10 chemicals of public health concern, also offered to help. The…

Recent research published in journals pro swan This suggests that watching videos that evoke certain emotions may reduce racial prejudice and increase tolerance toward Black Americans. The findings provide evidence that media designed to capture the brain’s attention may provide a practical way to combat large-scale prejudice. Scientists Yilong Wang and Paul J. Zak wanted to find a widely available method to reduce outgroup bias. Outgroup bias refers to the human tendency to prefer people in one’s own social circle while avoiding or judging people seen as outsiders. This tendency has evolutionary origins, with early humans prioritizing their own group…

As digital communications accelerate and cyber threats continue to grow, researchers are working to develop more secure ways to transmit information. One of the most promising approaches is quantum cryptography, which uses individual photons to generate encryption keys. A research team from the University of Warsaw’s Faculty of Physics has created and tested a new quantum key distribution (QKD) system within an existing urban fiber network. Their approach uses high-dimensional encoding and is based on a well-known optical phenomenon called the Talbot effect. The survey results are quantum optics, opticaland Physical review applied. “Our research focuses on quantum key distribution…

Eli Lilly’s Orforglipron passed the FDA green light on Wednesday, ending Novo Nordisk’s Wigovy tablet’s short reign as the only oral GLP-1 approved to treat obesity. Now named Foundayo, the FDA has approved Lilly’s GLP-1 receptor agonist tablets as the first novel molecular entity approved under the regulator’s controversial National Priority Voucher (CNPV) program, according to an April 1 FDA announcement. Lilly plans to offer the pill through LillyDirect, a cash-pay consumer drug purchasing platform, with an agreement to provide Foundayo to obese adults and adults who are overweight with weight-related medical problems in conjunction with a reduced-calorie diet and…