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The Santa Ana winds, wildfires and health
Wildfires in and around Los Angeles have killed five people, displaced thousands, leveled entire neighborhoods and blanketed the region in toxic smoke. And as of Thursday afternoon, there were warnings of more “fire brigade coming.”
The health effects of forest fires are variedworrying and perhaps even more frightening, still somewhat unknown. Here are two examples. A recent study linked more than 52,000 early deaths to chronic exposure to the dangerous particles of wildfire smoke. Another report found that asthma exacerbations occur in children shot up 76% in the aftermath of a 2018 California wildfire. Further complications? The adverse health consequences are often greater for communities of color.
I usually wait until fall to read Joan Didion’s nerve-wracking essayfirst published in 1967, about wildfires and the Santa Ana winds. But thanks to climate change caused by fossil fuelsI reread it the same day I wished someone a happy new year.
Stay safe, everyone in LA
A medical school readout on enrollment, post-SCOTUS race in admissions decision
Data on the first medical school class selected since the Supreme Court banned the consideration of race in admissions in June 2023 shows a marked decline in enrollment for students of color, STAT’s Usha Lee McFarling reports.
Many people who advocate for equality in medicine said they were saddened to see the numbers, but not surprised. The facts affirmed the concerns of those who feared the decision would lead to less diverse medical classes and ultimately a less diverse medical workforce, harming efforts to end the country’s entrenched racial health disparities.
“The troubling issue here is that medical schools have had the opportunity to adopt holistic admissions processes with multiple successful examples to emulate that have retained and not used the banned tactics… and yet they have not updated their approach,” says Kameron Leigh Matthews, a general practitioner, posted on BlueSky.
Read more in Usha’s story.
Initial Opinion: The Trump administration should continue monitoring emerging disease threats
The emergence of H5N1 bird flu in the United States is an acute reminder of the risks we face from emerging biological threats, according to former Food and Drug Administration commissioners Scott Gottlieb and Mark B. McClellan.
Funding for health surveillance initiatives launched in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic is at risk of lapse, and investments could be scrapped altogether in response to broader political backlash against public health measures. But funding these programs should be a top priority of the new Trump administration, Gottlieb and McClellan write in STAT.
Basic public health protections enhance our national security protections, while rogue states maintain formidable biological weapons programs. The best bulwark against these risks is a robust system to detect such threats before they take hold among our population. Read more about this issue from the former FDA heads.
Gender-based racism and blood pressure may be linked, according to a new study on hypertension. Researchers monitored deliveries to see whether microaggressions or subtle unintentional slights, such as the command to calm down, led to an increase in postpartum hypertension. They found that the correlation was most robust 10 or more days after delivery, when blood pressure is less likely to be monitored.
“Black, Latinx, and South Asian women are known to experience microaggressions during healthcare settings. It is not well known whether these microaggressions may be linked to higher blood pressure,” said the study’s lead author, an associate professor of epidemiology at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health in New York.
Although the study is promising, the researchers did not track participants’ blood pressure trends or other health information before pregnancy, meaning they did not know how pre-pregnancy trends might have affected the data.
There are more orphans in the US
Opioids and the coronavirus pandemic are increasing the number of orphans in the United States. according to a new Nature Medicine study. Researchers from Imperial College London found that the number of children who have experienced the death of at least one primary caregiver has increased by 50% since 2000, or almost 3 million children.
The percentage of orphans was highest in Southern and Midwestern states such as Louisiana, Mississippi and Kentucky. The authors suggest they may be underestimating the true number of orphans as there may be uncertainty about deaths from drug overdoses and Covid. They also write that while society recognizes that the loss of a parent or caregiver can be extremely difficult, public health officials should treat the issue as a public health crisis.
What we read
- A look at Trump’s search for a health threat to justify his immigration policies: New York Times
- Climate change threatens the mental well-being of young people. Here’s how to cope, KFF Health News
- Why everyone has a gnarly stomach flu right now, explained in one graph: Vox
- This is why poor sleep and toxic thoughts go hand in hand Scientific American