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The Trump administration this spring tried to remove pro-breastfeeding language from a World Health Organization resolution. But here at home, breastfeeding has steadily become more accepted and accessible — culminating this year in the 49th and 50th states enacting laws to allow it in public. The World Health Organization resolution stated that breast milk is the healthiest choice for babies and encouraged countries to crack down on misleading claims from purveyors of formula. Attempts by...

One of the pages, however, prompted me to write memories of my father. I started to type out my happy memories, but they were interrupted by flashes of his outbursts. I sat there staring at the computer screen, contemplating how I am currently in the process of finishing up a book about my adverse childhood experiences, including a violent history with my dad during the first ten years of my life.

Among the many questions asked after every mass shooting : What, if anything, is the connection between mental illness and violence? It's a link that's reinforced regularly by the national news media: A 2016 John Hopkins University analysis found that more than a third of all news stories about mental-health conditions over the last two decades tied mental illness to violent crime. A new study published in JAMA Psychiatry dispels that relationship. Study authors Jeffrey Swanson and Charles...

The kidney doctor sat next to Judy Garrett’s father, looking into his face, her hand on his arm. There are things I can do for you, she told the 87-year-old man, but if I do them I’m not sure you will like me very much. The word “death” wasn’t mentioned, but the doctor’s meaning was clear: There was no hope of recovery from kidney failure. Garrett’s father listened quietly. “I want to go home,” he said. It was a turning point for the man and his family. “This doctor showed us the reality of...

In parts of the country hit hard by addiction, some public health officials are considering running sites where people can use heroin and other illegal drugs under medical supervision. Advocates say these facilities, known as supervised injection sites, save lives that would otherwise be lost to overdoses and provide a bridge to treatment. There are at least 13 efforts underway in U.S. cities and states to start an official supervised injection site — with advocates in several cities saying...

Dozens of people packed into a Philadelphia courtroom on June 6th to voice their objections to a proposed criminal justice algorithm . The algorithm, developed by the Pennsylvania Commission on Sentencing, was conceived of as a way to reduce incarceration by predicting the risk that a person would pose a threat to public safety and helping to divert those who are at low risk to alternatives to incarceration. But many of the speakers worried the tool would instead increase racial disparities...

The Trump administration said Thursday that it had complied with a judge’s order and reunited all of the eligible children under the age of 5 that it had in custody with their migrant parents. But Nazario Jacinto-Carrillo’s desperate voice and haunting questions, repeated over and over on a phone line from Guatemala, made clear that the crisis over child separations remained far from resolved. “When are they going to give them back?” Mr. Jacinto-Carrillo asked of the thousands of children...

In areas of the country disproportionately affected by the opioid crisis, treatment programs are less likely to accept patients paying through insurance of any type or accept pregnant women, a new Vanderbilt study found. While the opioid crisis has escalated across the U.S., there has been growing concern that treatment capacity has not kept pace. In 2016, more than 42,000 Americans died of an opioid-related overdose, more than any year on record. Opioid agonist therapies, like buprenorphine...

The W. Haywood Burns Institute (BI) strongly rejects the disturbing and dangerous new policy direction of the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) that insinuates that public safety is threatened by efforts to reduce racial and ethnic disparities (RED). This misunderstanding of the purpose and outcome of RED work is the culmination of months of changes at OJJDP that unmask this administration’s egregious disregard of the gravity and pervasiveness of RED and the...

California counties support vulnerable children and families. Children with Special Health Care Needs Defined as “ Those who have one or more chronic physical, developmental, behavioral, or emotional conditions and who also require health and related services of a type or amount beyond that required by children generally " More than one million children in California have a special health care need, and many of these children and families face severe challenges. Health care and other support...

Did you know that adult obesity is strongly linked with early childhood adversity? Check out the video interview Mary Giuliani gave on this topic with Anna Runkle, where she shares her story and how she has been able to maintain 160lb weight loss for 15 years. Also, on Tuesday 7-17-18 Mary is launching an all new online course: Permanent Weight Loss Formula :Guiding Women To Reach & Maintain A Healthy Weight For Life. This course is based on ACEs Science and is focused on how to reach...

In 2016, an estimated 16.2 million adults in the United States had at least one major depressive episode – 6.7 percent of all U.S. adults. But with appropriate professional andself-help strategies, recovery from depression is possible. Self-help for depression can help alleviate symptoms and put someone on the path to recovery. Here are 5 self-help strategies for depression: Exercise. Both aerobic exercise like walking or jogging and anaerobic exercise like weight lifting can help alleviate...