Publisher Health

The world is likely to see millions more malaria infections and 200,000 cases of paralytic polio each year, according to an agency whistle-blower.The Trump administration’s decision to withdraw foreign aid and dismantle the U.S. Agency for International Development is likely to cause enormous human suffering, according to estimates by the agency itself. Among them:up to 18 million additional cases of malaria per year, and as many as 166,000 additional deaths;200,000 children paralyzed with polio annually, and hundreds of millions of infections;one million children not treated for severe acute malnutrition, which is often fatal, each year;more than 28,000 new cases of such infectious diseases as Ebola and Marburg every year.Those stark projections were laid out in a series of memos by Nicholas Enrich, acting assistant administrator for global health at U.S.A.I.D., which were obtained by The New York Times. Mr. Enrich was placed on administrative leave on Sunday.In one memo, he placed the blame for these potential health crises on “political leadership at U.S.A.I.D., the Department of State, and D.O.G.E., who have created and continue to create intentional and/or unintentional obstacles that have wholly prevented implementation” of aid programs. Those leaders have blocked payment systems, created new and ineffective processes for payments, and constantly shifted guidance regarding which activities qualify as “lifesaving,” Mr. Enrich wrote. Another memo describes the slashing of the agency’s global health work force from 783 on Jan. 20 to fewer than 70 on Sunday.In an interview, Mr. Enrich said he released the memos on Sunday afternoon, after an email arrived placing him on leave, to set the record straight on the gutting of U.S.A.I.D. staff and the termination of thousands of lifesaving grants. By detailing the series of events behind the scenes, he hoped “it’ll be clear that we were never actually given the opportunity to implement lifesaving humanitarian assistance.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe.

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Robert F. Kennedy Jr. described the outbreak in West Texas last week as a “top priority.” But he did not explicitly encourage Americans to get vaccinated.In a first test of the Trump administration’s ability to respond to an infectious disease emergency, its top health official has shied away from one of the government’s most important tools, experts said on Sunday: loudly and directly encouraging parents to get their children vaccinated.Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the health secretary, was widely criticized as minimizing the measles outbreak in West Texas at a cabinet meeting on Wednesday. In a social media post on Friday, he took a new tact, saying that the outbreak was a “top priority” for his department, Health and Human Services.He noted various ways in which the department is aiding Texas, among them by funding the state’s immunization program and updating advice that doctors give children vitamin A. But on neither occasion did Mr. Kennedy himself advise Americans to make sure their children got the shots.The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, part of H.H.S., did not send its first substantive notice about the outbreak until Thursday, almost a month after the first cases in Texas were reported.“They’ve been shouting with a whisper,” said Dr. Michael Osterholm, who is an epidemiologist at the University of Minnesota and a former health department official.“I fear that their hands have been tied,” he added.C.D.C. officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment. We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe.

Heat from the eruption in A.D. 79 was so intense that it vitrified the brain tissue of one unfortunate Herculaneum resident, a new study confirms.Five years ago Italian researchers published a study on the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in A.D. 79. that detailed how one victim of the blast, a male presumed to be in his mid 20s, had been found nearby in the seaside settlement of Herculaneum. He was lying facedown and buried by ash on a wooden bed in the College of the Augustales, a public building dedicated to the worship of Emperor Augustus. Some scholars believe that the man was the center’s caretaker and was asleep at the time of the disaster.In 2018, one researcher discovered black, glossy shards embedded inside the caretaker’s skull. The paper, published in 2020, speculated that the heat of the explosion was so immense that it had fused the victim’s brain tissue into glass.Forensic analysis of the obsidian-like chips revealed proteins common in brain tissue and fatty acids found in human hair, while a chunk of charred wood unearthed near the skeleton indicated a thermal reading as high as 968 degrees Fahrenheit, roughly the dome temperature of a wood-fired Neapolitan pizza oven. It was the only known instance of soft tissue — much less any organic material — being naturally preserved as glass.On Thursday, a paper published in Nature verified that the fragments are indeed glassified brain. Using techniques such as electron microscopy, energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy and differential scanning calorimetry, scientists examined the physical properties of samples taken from the glassy fragments and demonstrated how they were formed and preserved. “The unique finding implies unique processes,” said Guido Giordano, a volcanologist at the Roma Tre University and lead author of the new study.The archaeological site of Herculaneum with Mount Vesuvius looming in the background.Pier Paolo PetroneForemost among those processes is vitrification, by which material is burned at a high heat until it liquefies. To harden into glass, the substance requires rapid cooling, solidifying at a temperature higher than its surroundings. This makes organic glass formation challenging, Dr. Giordano said, as vitrification entails very specific temperature conditions and the liquid form must cool fast enough to avoid being crystallized as it congeals.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe.

Sam Runyon navigated to the house by memory as she reviewed her patient’s file, a “problem list” of medications and chronic diseases that went on for several pages. Sam, a 45-year-old nurse, had already seen Cora Perkins survive two types of cancer. During previous appointments, she had found Cora’s arms turning blue from diabetes, or her ankles swollen from congestive heart failure, or her stomach cramping from hunger with no fresh food left in the house. It had been a week since Sam’s last visit, and she wondered if anyone had come or gone through the front door since.Listen to this article with reporter commentaryShe knocked, but nobody answered. She walked across the porch to a hole in the window and called into the house. “Cora, honey? Are you OK?” A light flickered inside. A dog began to bark. Sam pushed open the door and walked into the living room, where she found Cora wrapped under a blanket.“Sam. Thank God you’re here,” said Cora, 64. She tried to stand, but she lost her balance and sat back down in a recliner.“It looks like you’re wobbly this morning,” Sam said. “Are you feeling really bad or just normal bad?”It was the same question she asked her patients dozens of times each week as she made home visits across West Virginia, traveling from one impending emergency to the next in a country where feeling bad had become the new normal. All 31 patients in her caseload for the Williamson Health and Wellness Center were under 65 years old, and yet each had at least one of the chronic diseases that had become endemic in the United States over the last two decades: death rates up 25 percent nationally from diabetes, 40 percent from liver disease, 60 percent from kidney disease, 80 percent from hypertension and more than 95 percent from obesity, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe.

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In the stretch of rural Kentucky that borders West Virginia, voters reliably send Republicans to Congress. Representative Hal Rogers, who […]

Researchers found that compounds in black and green tea leaves acted like “little Velcro” hooks on lead molecules.Tea leaves pull heavy metals from water, significantly lowering the amount of lead and other dangerous compounds that people may be unknowingly drinking, a new study found.Recent research has highlighted potential applications for used tea leaves, from biofuels to gluten-free cookies. But the new study shows a public health benefit from something that countless people are already doing. About five billion cups of tea are consumed each day around the world, according to one estimate.“You can see the implications,” said Vinayak Dravid, a materials scientist at Northwestern and an author of the study, which was published this week. “How often do we touch billions of people?”In many countries, the water used to steep tea is contaminated with lead from aging pipes. In the United States, nine million homes get their water through pipes that contain lead, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Lead is especially dangerous to children. Exposure can lead to developmental delays and behavioral issues.Dr. Dravid and his team tested how different types of tea — black, white, oolong, green, rooibos, herbal, loose leaf and plain old Lipton — behaved in water with varying amounts of lead.The tea was then allowed to steep for variable periods of time. Afterward, the scientists measured how much lead remained in the water.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe.