Showing posts with label USA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label USA. Show all posts

Monday, May 11, 2020

Physical Activity In Corona Virus


The COVID-19 pandemic means that many of us are staying at home and sitting down more than we usually do. It’s hard for a lot of us to do the sort of exercise we normally do. It’s even harder for people who don’t usually do a lot of physical exercises.

But at a time like this, it’s very important for people of all ages and abilities to be as active as possible. WHO’s Be Active campaign aims to help you do just that - and to have some fun at the same time.

Remember - Just taking a short break from sitting, by doing 3-4 minutes of light intensity physical movement, such as walking or stretching, will help ease your muscles and improve blood circulation and muscle activity.

Regular physical activity benefits both the body and mind. It can reduce high blood pressure, help manage weight, and reduce the risk of heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes, and various cancers - all conditions that can increase susceptibility to COVID-19.

It also improves bone and muscle strength and increases balance, flexibility, and fitness. For older people, activities that improve balance help to prevent falls and injuries.

Regular physical activity can help give our days a routine and be a way to stay in contact with family and friends. It’s also good for our mental health - reducing the risk of depression, cognitive decline and delay the onset of dementia - and improve overall feelings

How much physical activity is recommended for your age group?
WHO has recommendations on the amount of physical activity people of all ages should do to benefit their health and wellbeing.

Infants under 1 year of age

• All infants should be physically active several times a day.

• For those not yet mobile, this includes at least 30 minutes in prone position (tummy time), as floor-based play, spread throughout the day while awake.

Children under 5 years of age

• All young children should spend at least 180 minutes a day in a variety of types of physical activities at any intensity

• 3-4-year-old children should spend at least 60 minutes of this time in moderate- to vigorous-intensity physical activity

Children and adolescents aged 5-17 years

• All children and adolescents should do at least 60 minutes a day of moderate to vigorous-intensity physical activity

• This should include activities that strengthen muscle and bone, at least 3 days per week

• Doing more than 60 minutes of physical activity daily will provide additional health benefits

Adults aged over 18 years

• All adults should do at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity throughout the week, or at least 75 minutes of vigorous-intensity physical activity throughout the week.

• For additional health benefits, adults should increase their moderate-intensity physical activity to 300 minutes per week, or equivalent.

• For developing and maintaining musculoskeletal health, muscle-strengthening activities involving major muscle groups should be done on 2 or more days a week

• In addition, older adults with poor mobility should do physical activity to enhance balance and prevent falls on 3 or more days per week.




Sunday, December 9, 2018

A world war happened



PARIS — As French authorities brace for a possible second weekend of violent protests, observers say the demonstrations that have seized the country for weeks shows a society fractured by economic class and urban-rural divides.

And while the movement may appear to echo political currents in other Western countries, people here say the protests represent a distinctly French expression of public frustration: anger that focuses solely on economic issues and abandons political ideology and matters driving dissension elsewhere, such as migration.


Can Emmanuel Macron Lead Europe?

"It is in a way a French Brexit or a French tea party vote," says Dominique Moïsi, a special adviser to the Institut Montaigne, a public policy think tank. "It's part of a global crisis of democracy and capitalism, the French way."


Moïsi says the anger among many French people is especially directed at President Emmanuel Macron. "There's a sense of humiliation at the way they feel treated by the elite, and probably a sense of near hatred at the president," he says.

The Forgotten Classes

The protest movement, known as "gilets jaunes" in French, or Yellow Vests, is named after the safety jackets worn by construction workers operating near traffic. Protesters chose the jacket as a symbol of their growing economic despair.

Experts say a significant trigger for the movement was controversial changes in the Macron government's 2018-2019 finance bill, which included abolishing wealth taxes on non-real estate earnings for the wealthiest citizens and swapping a progressive tax rate of up to 45 percent on financial income for a flat tax of 30 percent.

The changes were ill-timed, preceding any help to the poor by months, Moïsi says: "The middle and working classes felt (Macron) was first helping the rich and that he didn't care about the poor."

A study by France's Institute of Public Policy found that the bill overwhelmingly benefited the top 1 percent and negatively impacted the bottom fifth of households.

"French people have access to a lot of social benefits. But (some) feel they aren't benefiting from politics," says Louis Maurin, director of the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies' Observatory of Inequalities. "People have a feeling of not being poor enough to receive support from the government, but also not rich enough to benefit from new tax policies."


The Yellow Vest movement boiled over in November after the Senate approved a measure to increase fuel taxes up to about 25 cents per gallon in 2019 to offset carbon emissions when a gallon of gas already costs upward of $7 in some parts of France.

Country Versus City

Before hitting Paris, the Yellow Vest movement was brewing in the countryside for weeks. A report by Jean-Jaurès Foundation found that as of mid-November, a high density of Yellow Vest gatherings was occurring in outlying rural areas. Among the 700 communities with at least one Yellow Vest assembly point, nearly half had populations of between 5,000 and 20,000 residents, with another third having fewer than 5,000. Additionally, a November survey of 1,000 French residents by Ifop-Fiducial found that rural communes were much more likely (75 percent) to support the Yellow Vests than Parisians (59 percent).

Since people living in cities have access to public transport, an increase in gas taxes can feel like a direct hit against those living in rural areas who rely on cars. Plus, there's a visible concentration of wealth in the center of Paris, increasing rural anger against city dwellers, Maurin says.


Adds Moïsi: "The movement is not only a cleavage between the rich and poor but between the provinces and Paris, the countryside and cities. There's a polarization of society based on geography and economic revenues."

Alex, a 34-year-old Paris resident who did not want to give his full name, says he sees the public anger firsthand on the weekends when he travels to the small southern town of Lansargues.

"You can clearly see how supportive people are of the Yellow Vests in Lansargues. One car out of five has a Yellow Vest displayed," he says. "There is a very clear disconnect between people living in city centers and the rest of the population."

A November opinion poll placed Macron's popularity rating at 26 percent, while a Harris Interactive poll from early December found that nearly three-quarters of French people believe Macron is "arrogant" and "disconnected from the reality of French people."

"The French react to their president as they reacted to monarchs. When they like him they love him, but when they dislike him they hate him because he's the incarnation of everything that goes wrong," Moïsi says. Highly educated, young and viewed as a relative newcomer to French national politics, Macron is "the incarnation of the technocratic elite," he adds.

Maurin says the hopes that Macron would help unify the public have faded. "We've found ourselves with someone who's very divisive. He lives in a universe that's very far from a lot of French people," he says, pointing to when Macron told an unemployed gardener that finding work just required changing careers to construction.

Aurelie Bonningue, a 47-year-old Parisian stay-at-home mom, says that while most protesters she saw last weekend were peaceful, "on social media, people are getting more violent.

"The government is mishandling the situation by discrediting it," she says. "The president needs to speak with respect to the people in the movement."

Under the threat of more violence, Macron has canceled the fuel tax for 2019. But backing down isn't a good sign for the rest his presidency, Moïsi says.

In light of the protests, Maurin foresees the rise of the National Front, the far-right party led by Marine Le Pen, who faced off against Macron in 2017. "Some journalists live in an intellectual world and don't see it coming. It's the same as what happened in the U.S. with Trump," he says. "People said Marine Le Pen failed at her debate during last year's election, but she received 34 percent of the vote."


Source

Saturday, December 8, 2018

Spike in Gun-Related Suicides Alarms Pediatricians



PEDIATRICIANS AND emergency department physicians are alarmed at the growing number of children, mostly adolescents, who are taking their lives with firearms. While mass school shootings like the attack last February that killed 17 students and staff members at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, generate headlines and public debate about the easy availability of firearms, suicides by gun claim far more children's lives.

Gunshot wounds annually kill nearly 1,300 children ages 17 and younger, according to a study published in July 2017 in the journal Pediatrics. Of this total, 38 percent – nearly 500 kids – died by suicide, according to the research, while 53 percent lost their lives in homicides. Researchers studied gunfire deaths of children ages 17 and younger from 2002 to 2014. Researchers found that child firearm suicide spiked by 60 percent between 2007 and 2014. Gunshot wounds are now the second leading cause of trauma death for juveniles in the U.S., after car accidents. Firearm injuries are now the second leading cause of death for children age 10 and older and teens (up to age 19) in the U.S. after motor vehicle fatalities, says Dr. M. Denise Dowd, a pediatric emergency physician at Children's Mercy Kansas City in Kansas City, Missouri.

"Suicides (by juveniles) are at epidemic proportions," Dowd says. "It's an emergency. If this was an infectious disease, it would be on the news constantly until we got a handle on it." On any given day, between two and eight patients are in her hospital's emergency department being treated for "suicidal ideation," meaning they have attempted suicide or are contemplating it, Dowd says.

The number of children who took their lives with a gun has continued to rise in recent years; 633 children killed themselves with a firearm in 2016, according to the CDC. Accidental firearm deaths trail far behind homicides and suicides as a cause of death for children. In 2016, 53 youngsters died in connection with a firearm accident, according to the CDC.


Using a firearm is far more lethal than other methods of suicide. About 90 percent of people who attempt suicide using a firearm succeed, according to the Center for Injury Research and Prevention at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia Research Institute. By contrast, people who attempt to jump to their deaths or who use poison die 34 percent and 2 percent of the time, respectively, according to the institute. "These deaths are preventable. If a kid comes into the ER after trying to commit suicide by almost any other way, I can usually save (him or her). Not so with gunfire injuries," says Dr. Megan Ranney, an associate professor of emergency medicine at the Alpert Medical School at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. She is also the chief research officer for the American Foundation for Firearm Injury Reduction in Medicine, a group funded by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development to research and reduce firearm injuries.

The widespread availability of firearms, the natural curiosity, and impulsivity of young children and adolescents and the widespread lack of supervision of kids in homes where adults keep unsecured firearms create "a perfect storm for tragedy," Dowd says. A raft of research supports her analysis:

There are more firearms in the civilian U.S. population than there are people, according to the 2017 iteration of the Small Arms Survey, a report put together by the Graduate Institute of International Development Studies in Geneva. There are more than 393 million firearms in the U.S., which has a population of about 326 million people. This number includes handguns, shotguns, and rifles, including high-powered military-grade firearms capable of shooting large numbers of rounds at high velocities. In a 2018 Gallup poll, 43 percent of U.S. households reported owning at least one gun. Only about one-third of handguns in U.S. homes are kept locked and loaded, according to the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia Research Institute. Many parents who keep firearms in their homes mistakenly believe their kids don't know where they keep their guns, research suggests. Given the ubiquity of guns in the civilian U.S. population, and the fact young kids often visit homes of playmates, "the chances of a child being in a home (even if he or she lives in a household without a firearm) are almost 100 percent," Dowd says.
Whatever their level of intelligence, adolescents are prone to make bad, impulsive choices because the brains of young people aren't developed the way those of adults are, research suggests. The rational part of a teenager's brain isn't fully developed until he or she is 25 years old, according to Stanford Children's Health. Adults think with their prefrontal cortex, the brain's rational section, but teenagers process information with the amygdala, the emotional part. Many teenagers who try to commit suicide hadn't necessarily been suffering from depression, but try to take their lives in a moment of impulsiveness, Ranney says. When youngsters have easy access to a firearm, the consequences of their impulsive choices can be deadly. A temporary setback like a breakup can cause an adolescent to feel he or she wants to die, Ranney says. She recalls breaking the news to the parents of a teenager who fatally shot himself after a breakup about a decade ago. "I will never forget it," she says.

Nearly 40 percent of parents erroneously believe their kids aren't aware of where in their household they store their guns, according to a research review article published in Hospital Pediatrics in June 2017. In addition, 22 percent of parents wrongly believe their kids have never handled guns kept in the house, says Dr. Monika K. Goyal, the senior author of the review article. She's an assistant division chief and director of academic affairs and research in the Division of Emergency Medicine at Children's National Health System in the District of Columbia. Teaching young children who are naturally curious to stay away from a firearm in the house shouldn't be counted on to keep kids safe, Dowd says. She dismissed the National Rifle Association's Eddie Eagle GunSafe Program, which aims to educate kids to stay away from guns, as ineffective. She compared trying to teach a young child to stay away from firearms to teaching him or her to stay out of the street. "You can train a 4-year-old to cross the street safely," Dowd says. "If you put that child in a park with no fence by a busy street, would you be OK not keeping your eye on that child? Kids don't apply what they learn at the time of risk, whether it's from excitement or curiosity," she says. Eric Lipp, national manager of the community outreach department at the NRA, says the organization hears regularly from parents, educators and law enforcement officers who report that a child who was educated about gun safety by the Eddie Eagle program, which is geared toward kids in the pre-kindergarten to fourth grade age range, alerted an adult after seeing a firearm. The governors of 26 states and 25 state legislatures have signed proclamations or resolutions recommending that the education program is used in their respective school systems, Lipp says.
An increase in firepower is also contributing to the uptick in suicides, says Dr. Michael P. Hirsh, chief of the division of pediatric surgery at UMass Memorial Children's Medical Center in Worcester, Massachusetts. In the 1980s, many firearm injuries sustained by juveniles were caused by revolvers that their parents kept in their homes, he says. "Now the ordinance is much more impressive," Hirsh says. "Almost all the injuries now are caused by (more powerful) semiautomatic weapons." Such weapons cause greater damage in the body, he says. "If you have an unsecured weapon in the home and an inquisitive toddler or depressed teen and they shoot themselves or someone else, that's not an accident or fate," he says. "It's a predictable injury."

The best way to shield kids from gunfire injuries and deaths is to not keep a firearm in the home, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics. The association cites research which suggests that keeping a gun in the home increases one's risk of being a victim of suicide and homicide. If parents keep a firearm at home, they should lock it somewhere that's secure, with ammunition stored separately. Parents should also ask the parents of their child's playmates if they have an unsecured gun in their home, according to the academy. "Just as you'd ask about pets, allergies, supervision and other safety issues before your child visits another home, add one more important question: Is there an unlocked gun in your house?" the academy advises.


The NRA disagrees with the assessments of many pediatricians regarding the dangers of firearms in the house pose to children. In November, the NRA issued a tweet advising physicians to stay away from the issue of guns: "Someone should tell self-important anti-gun doctors to stay in their lane." Many physicians responded with tweets, using the hashtag #ThisIsMyLane, describing deaths and injuries caused by gunfire and saying gun policy is their lane. "We spend a lot of our time talking about accident prevention, the importance of using bike helmets, car seats and seat belts, water safety measures to avoid accidental drownings," says Dr. Jennifer C. Ho, a pediatrician at CHOC Children's Hospital in Orange, California. "Talking about gun safety is just as important."


Source 

Tuesday, September 25, 2018

California Urges Trump to Drop Plan for Weaker Fuel Standard


FRESNO, Calif. (AP) — California officials demanded Monday that the Trump administration back off a plan to weaken national fuel economy standards aimed at reducing car emissions and saving people money at the pump, saying the proposed rollback would damage people's health and exacerbate climate change.
Looming over the administration's proposal is the possibility that the state, which has become a key leader on climate change as Trump has moved to dismantle Obama-era environmental rules, could set its own separate fuel standard that could roil the auto industry. That's a change the federal government is trying to block.
"California will take whatever actions are needed to protect our people and follow the law," Mary Nichols, chairwoman of the California Air Resources Board, testified at a hearing with federal officials in a region of central California that has some of the nation's worst air pollution.
State Attorney General Xavier Becerra said California could not afford to retreat in the fight against climate change, citing wildfires and high asthma rates among children in the state's San Joaquin Valley, where residents, environmentalists and state officials testified at the first of three nationwide hearings on the mileage plan.
"Stopping us from protecting our people, our jobs and economy or our planet is like trying to stop a mother from protecting her child," he said.
The proposal announced in August by President Donald Trump's administration would freeze U.S. mileage standards at levels mandated by former President Barack Obama for 2020. The standards regulate how far vehicles must travel on a gallon of fuel.
Under the deal finalized under Obama, the standard would rise to 36 miles per gallon (15 kilometers per liter) by 2025, 10 miles per gallon (4 kilometers per liter) higher than the current requirement.
Trump administration officials say waiving the tougher fuel efficiency requirements would make vehicles more affordable, which would get safer cars into consumers' hands more quickly. A major auto industry trade group says it supports annual increases in fuel efficiency but won't say by how much.
Customers aren't buying more efficient vehicles, Steve Douglas, senior director of energy and environment for the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, said in testimony prepared for the hearing. The group represents General Motors, Ford, Fiat Chrysler, Volkswagen, BMW and other automakers.
"No one wins if our customers are not buying the new highly efficient products offered in our showrooms," the written testimony said. "The standards must account for consumer willingness and ability to pay for newer technologies in order for all the benefits of new vehicles to be realized."
Automakers are unanimous in favoring one standard for the whole country so they don't have to design two vehicles, one for California and the states that follow its requirements and another for the rest of the nation.
Scores of people opposed to the Trump plan testified before representatives from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, including local residents who said it would worsen their asthma.
More than 130 people, including doctors and electric vehicle advocates, had signed up to speak before the hearing ended.
It was held in California's San Joaquin Valley, the country's most productive agricultural region but an area plagued by sooty air in part because of its bowl-shaped geography. The Sierra Nevada and two other mountain ranges wall in the 250-mile (400-kilometer) valley. Air pollution there is blamed for hundreds of deaths each year.
"We are asking the EPA to represent those of us who have asthma and respiratory disease," said Janet DietzKamei, 73, a member of the Central Valley Clean Air Coalition.
DietzKamei said she is unable to leave her Fresno home on some days because the air is so polluted.
Environmentalists protested outside, hoisting signs reading, "Clean cars = Clean air" and chanting, "Clean cars now."
Paul Gipe, 67, and his wife, Nancy Nies, 69, drove from the city of Bakersfield to join the demonstration.

"It's a step backward, and it's a statement that air pollution is acceptable. Damn the people, full speed ahead," said Gipe, who writes about renewable energy on his website.
An avid bicyclist, Gipe said there are days he can't ride because the air quality is so bad in his hometown.
California and other states have sued to block any changes to Trump's proposal. The administration also wants to revoke California's authority to set its own mileage standards.
Ford CEO Jim Hackett said in a speech last week that his company is against any freeze of the standards and favors "keeping the standard, not a rollback."
"We have plans to meet it," he said.
The Obama administration had planned to keep toughening fuel requirements through 2026, saying the stricter standards would save lives.
Trump administration officials argued they would raise the price of vehicles by an average of more than $2,000. Transportation experts have challenged those arguments.


Sourch:- US NEWS

Saturday, January 7, 2017

Attack streamed on Facebook have been denied bail.




Four people accused of kidnapping and torturing a mentally disabled man in a "racially motivated" attack streamed on Facebook have been denied bail.
Jordan Hill, Brittany Covington, and Tesfaye Cooper, all 18, and Tanisha Covington, 24, appeared in a Chicago court on Friday.
The four have been charged with hate crimes and aggravated kidnapping and battery, among other things.
An online fundraiser for their victim has collected $51,000 (£42,500) so far.
Denying the four suspects' bail, Judge Maria Kuriakos Ciesil asked: "Where was your sense of decency?"
Prosecutors told the court that the beating started in a van and continued at a house. The suspects allegedly forced the 18-year-old white victim, who suffers from schizophrenia and attention deficit disorder, to drink toilet water and kiss the floor.

Police allege the van was earlier stolen by Mr. Hill, who is also accused of demanding $300 from the victim's mother while they held him captive.
The court was also told the suspects stuffed a sock into his mouth, taped his mouth shut, and bound his hands with a belt.
In a video made for Facebook Live which was watched millions of times, the assailants can be heard making derogatory statements against white people and Donald Trump.

The victim had been dropped off at a Mcdonald's to meet Mr. Hill - who was one of his friends - on 31 December.
He was found by a police officer on Tuesday, 3 January, a day after he was reported missing by his parents.
Prosecutors say the suspects each face two hate crimes counts, one because of the victim's race and the other because of his disabilities.