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For the first time since the early 1960s, life expectancy in the United States has declined for the second year in a row, according to a CDC report released Thursday . American men can now expect to live 76.1 years, a decrease of two-tenths of a year from 2015. American women’s life expectancy remained at 81.1 years. The change was driven largely by a rising death rate among younger Americans. The death rate of people between the ages of 25 and 34 increased by 10 percent between 2015 and...

The food justice movement is one of the most promising political developments of the last generation. It has broadened and deepened environmentalism by knitting together concerns about economic inequality, labor rights, environmental health, and sustainable agriculture. But what often goes unmentioned in our discussions of food justice is that it all begins with land—who owns it, how they own it, and how it gets passed down from one generation to the next. This is something Savi Horne never...

Throughout the morning of Sunday, August 27th, Angela Wrigglesworth kept her concerns off social media because she didn't want to worry her parents. But as the waters slowly rose into her Brays Bayou home in Houston, she discovered that emergency services were overwhelmed, dealing with more urgent crises than even the flooding in her neighborhood. Finally, a little after noon, she posted on Facebook: "There is water in our home and we need to get out at some point soon. ... If you know of...

Earlier this year, I suffered my first major panic attack. For days afterward, my heart would race and my mind would fill with doomsday visions as I worried about everything around me, including whether I’d have more panic attacks and if I’d ever be able to stop them. ' Knowing that it wasn’t just me, however, was strangely reassuring. “Anxiety disorders are the most common condition in psychiatry,” said Dr. Naomi Simon, professor of psychiatry at N.Y.U. School of Medicine and director of...

Earlier this week, Attorney General Jeff Sessions spoke in Toledo, Ohio on “eradicating violent crime in America,” addressing a room of law enforcement officials. Sessions acknowledged in his speech that crime has been on a downswing since the 1990s, but he warned that this trend has “reversed” over the past two years. After citing stats from the latest Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) report that showed violent crime and murder rates increased in 2015 and 2016, Sessions turned his...

The science is in. Singing is really, really good for you and the most recent research suggests that group singing is the most exhilarating and transformative of all. The research suggests that creating music together evolved as a tool of social living. Groups and tribes sang and danced together to build loyalty, transmit vital information and ward off enemies. What has not been understood until recently is that singing in groups triggers the communal release of serotonin and oxytocin, the...

The evidence is clear. When bad things happen to us as young children, we are at significantly increased risk for not only mental health problems, but also a wide range of physical health problems including asthma, heart disease, and even early death. These "bad things" all involve disruptions in caregiving relationships. A national movement directed at screening for ACEs in pediatric practices has emerged from this work. My suggestion that the implication of the Adverse Childhood...

Sitting quietly for extended periods of time could be hurting your heart, according to a surprising new study. It finds that the more people sit, the greater the likelihood that they will show signs of injury to their heart muscles. We all have heard by now that sitting for hours on end is unhealthy, even if we also occasionally exercise. People who sit for more than about nine or 10 hours each day — a group that includes many of us who work in offices — are prone to developing diabetes,...

Public Health – Seattle & King County posted the following article Tuesday by Lindsay Bosslet based on the King County Medical Examiner’s Office 2016 death report: Last year, 14,373 people died in King County. The King County Medical Examiner’s Office investigated those that were sudden, unexpected or unnatural – 2,494 deaths. But, the count of life lost is more than a number. By tracking and analyzing different manners of death as well as trends in homicides, traffic fatalities, and...

Despite the brilliant blue of the Autumn sky and the vibrant atmosphere of the bustling college campus outside, I found myself genuinely excited to settle down for an afternoon in a darkened lecture theatre among over 130 colleagues in Bradford one Tuesday during early October. Organised in part to mark Safeguarding Week – and falling coincidentally just two weeks after the Office for National Statistics (ONS) published a report revealing that people abused in childhood are more likely to be...

This visually-engaging short film shows what roles the Alaska Resilience Initiative plays in the trauma and resilience field and the ways in which we prioritize equity, a comprehensive understanding of trauma, and indigenous worldviews and resilience practices in our work.

"But we can't fire or imprison our way out of this - it's too big and too complex," @Jane Stevens wrote yesterday about the #MeToo moment we are in right now. I'm thinking about her post, all the headlines and what's happening now. I'm also listening to what Tarana Burke is saying. She founded the #MeToo movement over a decade ago and has experiences and insights based on that work, this work, our work. Her words are helping to anchor and guide me. Maybe they will help you as...