Columbus
Real Health
Watch HIV Researchers at CROI 2024 Discuss Prevention Options Among Black Americans and More
At the 2024 Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI), HIV.gov caught up again with Dr. LaRon Nelson to discuss community-engaged research, HIV prevention at CROI, and a new study (HPTN 096) he is leading to reduce HIV rates among Black men who have sex with men (inclusive of cisgender and transgender men) in the southern United States. Dr. Nelson is a Professor and Associate Dean at the Yale School of Nursing. He spoke with Louis Shackelford of the HIV Vaccine Trials Network for this HIV.gov interview. Watch their conversation (it’s also posted at the top of this article).
First Tissue Bank May Help Solve Mystery of Long COVID Misery
The University of California San Francisco (UCSF) will launch the world’s first tissue bank with samples donated by patients with long COVID. The move follows research indicating that the virus can continue to linger throughout the body and may hold the key to understanding the cause of the debilitating disorder and lead to effective treatments.
Wave of New Commitments Marks Historic Step Towards the Elimination of Cervical Cancer
Governments, donors, multilateral institutions, and partners today announced major new policy, programmatic and financial commitments, including nearly US$ 600 million in new funding, to eliminate cervical cancer. If these ambitions to expand vaccine coverage and strengthen screening and treatment programs are fully realized, the world could eliminate a cancer for the first time.
‘Behind the Times’: Washington Tries to Catch Up With AI’s Use in Health Care
Lawmakers and regulators in Washington are starting to puzzle over how to regulate artificial intelligence in health care — and the AI industry thinks there’s a good chance they’ll mess it up. “It’s an incredibly daunting problem,” said Bob Wachter, the chair of the Department of Medicine...
A Leukemia Diary: 24 Years With CLL and Still Playing Golf
My job as IT manager for Long Beach, California, allowed me a physical every year. My doctor asked me if I had been sick, because my white blood cell count had gone up the last three years. It was still in the normal range, but he sent me to a hematologist. The hematologist ran blood tests and, in a follow-up in June, told me I had chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) [a cancer that affects white blood cells]. I was shocked. I felt fine. He tells me I have cancer, and it’s incurable, but we’re not going to do anything about it right now. I was confused. I went home and told my wife, then my four kids. The youngest was 18. The internet told me I have a five-to-10-year life span. I was 52.
America Worries About Health Costs — and Voters Want to Hear From Biden and Republicans
President Joe Biden is counting on outrage over abortion restrictions to help drive turnout for his reelection. Former President Donald Trump is promising to take another swing at repealing Obamacare. But around America’s kitchen tables, those are hardly the only health topics voters want to hear about in the 2024...
Vaginal Ring and Oral PrEP Found Safe for HIV Prevention Throughout Pregnancy
The monthly dapivirine vaginal ring and daily oral pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) with tenofovir disoproxil fumarate and emtricitabine [Truvada and generic equivalents] were each found to be safe for HIV prevention among cisgender women who started using one of them in their second trimester of pregnancy, according to findings presented today at the 2024 Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI) in Denver. Pregnant people are estimated to be three times more likely to acquire HIV through sexual intercourse than similarly aged people who are not pregnant.
California Takes Up White House Call to Toughen Gun Storage Rules
California lawmakers are weighing a pitch from the White House for states to toughen gun storage rules as legislation languishes in Congress. Even though many states, including California, have laws in place for safely storing guns when children are present, the Biden administration wants them to go further by requiring gun owners to secure firearms most of the time.
DoxyPEP Rollout Leads to Drop in STIs in San Francisco
Taking doxycycline after sex helped reduce the incidence of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) in San Francisco, according to real-world studies presented this week at the Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI 2024) in Denver. Doxycycline post-exposure prophylaxis—better known as doxyPEP—involves taking a single 200 milligram dose of the antibiotic...
Robert Guimento Is the New Interim CEO of HIV Service Provider GMHC
New York City HIV and AIDS service provider GMHC announced that Robert Guimento is its new interim CEO. Guimento recently served as president of the New York Presbyterian (NYP) Brooklyn Methodist Hospital and has led several other hospitals, outpatient clinics, medical staff and related health care teams. “GMHC’s board of...
“Get a Pulse on PAD” Campaign Encourages Conversations About Peripheral Artery Disease
Approximately 70% of Americans do not know about peripheral artery disease (PAD), the most common vascular disease that contributes to 400 amputations performed each day in the country, according to a new national survey by the PAD Pulse Alliance. To educate patients and provide resources to start the conversation, the...
Tools Underestimate Cardiovascular Event Risk in People with HIV
The elevated cardiovascular disease risk among people with HIV is even greater than predicted by a standard risk calculator in several groups, including Black people and cisgender women, according to analyses from a large international clinical trial primarily funded by the National institutes of Health and presented at the 2024 Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI) in Denver. The risk of having a first major cardiovascular event was also higher than previously predicted for people from high-income regions and those whose HIV replication was not suppressed below detectable levels.
With Medical Debt Burdening Millions, a Financial Regulator Steps In to Help
When President Barack Obama signed legislation in 2010 to create the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, he said the new agency had one priority: “looking out for people, not big banks, not lenders, not investment houses.”. Since then, the CFPB has done its share of policing mortgage brokers, student loan...
Hepatitis C Treatment Can Improve Liver Function in People With Decompensated Cirrhosis
Free and easy access to direct-acting antiviral therapy for chronic hepatitis C led to a high cure rate for people with decompensated liver cirrhosis in the Punjab region of India, researchers reported at the AASLD Liver Meeting. What’s more, a quarter of those who received treatment had restored liver function.
Antibody Reduces Allergic Reactions to Multiple Foods in NIH Clinical Trial
A 16-week course of a monoclonal antibody, omalizumab, increased the amount of peanut, tree nuts, egg, milk and wheat that multi-food allergic children as young as 1 year could consume without an allergic reaction in a late-stage clinical trial. Nearly 67% of participants who completed the antibody treatment could consume...
One in Eight People Are Now Living With Obesity
New study released by the Lancet shows that, in 2022, more than 1 billion people in the world are now living with obesity. Worldwide, obesity among adults has more than doubled since 1990, and has quadrupled among children and adolescents (5 to 19 years of age). The data also show that 43% of adults were overweight in 2022.
Toward a Deeper Understanding of Effective Oral HIV Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis Use in Cisgender Women
What do we know about oral pre-exposure prophylaxis in cisgender women?. Pivotal studies supported by NIAID demonstrated that oral pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) reduces an individual’s likelihood of acquiring HIV through sex by up to 99% when taken as prescribed. Since the release of those findings, 69 countries have approved HIV PrEP products, and an estimated 5.6 million people have initiated PrEP worldwide.
CDC Updates and Simplifies Respiratory Virus Recommendations
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released today updated recommendations for how people can protect themselves and their communities from respiratory viruses, including COVID-19. The new guidance brings a unified approach to addressing risks from a range of common respiratory viral illnesses, such as COVID-19, flu, and RSV, which can cause significant health impacts and strain on hospitals and health care workers. CDC is making updates to the recommendations now because the U.S. is seeing far fewer hospitalizations and deaths associated with COVID-19 and because we have more tools than ever to combat flu, COVID, and RSV.
Governments Can Erase Your Medical Debt for Pennies on the Dollar — And Some Are
Medical debt is the leading cause of bankruptcies in the United States, and more than 2 in 5 American adults have some. In many cases, the money people owe to health care providers forces them to cut spending on food or utilities, forgo other medical care or take on even more debt. Medical debt can make it impossible to buy a home, pay for college or save for retirement.
Real Health
3K+
Posts
12M+
Views
Real Health is the leading health magazine for African Americans in the United States. Launched in 2004, the goal of Real Health is to help African Americans of all ages achieve optimum health and wellness—physically, mentally and emotionally—by offering readers current, accurate information based on the latest science through well-researched stories that educate, entertain, uplift and motivate members of the community at large to be their best selves.
Welcome to NewsBreak, an open platform where diverse perspectives converge. Most of our content comes from established publications and journalists, as well as from our extensive network of tens of thousands of creators who contribute to our platform. We empower individuals to share insightful viewpoints through short posts and comments. It’s essential to note our commitment to transparency: our Terms of Use acknowledge that our services may not always be error-free, and our Community Standards emphasize our discretion in enforcing policies. We strive to foster a dynamic environment for free expression and robust discourse through safety guardrails of human and AI moderation. Join us in shaping the news narrative together.