Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Baby Monitor Study Finds Link Between Seizures And Toddler Deaths
Stat: Baby Monitor Videos Yield Evidence For Long-Suspected Link Between Seizures And Unexplained Toddler Deaths
The baby monitor didn’t go off. Any sound or motion in the twins’ room was supposed to set off an alarm — but in the wee hours of Nov. 27, 2022, Katie Czajkowski-Fell and Justin Fell weren’t woken up. They’d gotten it because of Hayden’s febrile seizures. These are common, generally nothing to worry about, the doctors said. Toddlers’ immune responses can be more assertive than adults’, burning into action against a world they’re still getting used to, routinely sparking high fevers, potentially irritating the brain. Hayden would likely grow out of them. (Boodman, 1/4)
On plastics in food and water —
Reuters: Consumer Reports Finds 'Widespread' Presence Of Plastics In Food
Consumer Reports has found that plastics retain a "widespread" presence in food despite the health risks, and called on regulators to reassess the safety of plastics that come into contact with food during production. The non-profit consumer group said on Thursday that 84 out of 85 supermarket foods and fast foods it recently tested contained "plasticizers" known as phthalates, a chemical used to make plastic more durable. (Stempel, 1/4)
WBUR: Glitter's Microplastic Problem: The Environmental Case For Breaking Up With Glitter In Makeup
Glitter — a microplastic — washes off into landfills and waterways where it lives for a thousand or more years, impacting water and wildlife. Beauty journalist Jessica DeFino is calling for people to give up glitter in makeup. ... “Over hundreds of years, [glitter] breaks up into smaller and smaller microplastic particles, which go on to infiltrate the water supply, the air, soil, animals, and even human bodies, causing negative health effects to people, on the planet,” DeFino says. (Young, Healy, and Hagan, 1/4)
In other health and wellness news —
CBS News: Study: Disrupted Sleep In Early Middle Age Linked To Cognitive Decline
People who have more interrupted sleep in their 30s and 40s are more than twice as likely to have memory and thinking problems a decade later, according to a new study. ... The research was published Wednesday in Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. ... People with the most disrupted sleep were found to be more than twice as likely to score worse than average on the set of cognitive tests compared with those who had the least disrupted sleep. (McPhilips, 1/4)
Stat: A Non-Hormonal Male Birth Control Gel Shows Early Promise
Between condoms and vasectomies lies a vast, undeveloped chasm of male birth control. Contraline, a device startup that released early, positive clinical data in a press release on Thursday, hopes to fill it. (Lawrence, 1/4)
The Washington Post: Kentucky Woman Loses Arms, Legs After Kidney Stone Infection
Lucinda Mullins lay on her Kentucky home’s bathroom floor last month in excruciating pain from a kidney stone. She was vomiting and had developed a fever and back pain, so she yelled for her husband, DJ, to help. Mullins went to a hospital. Weeks later, she would be a quadruple amputee. Her kidney stone had become infected and caused sepsis, the immune system’s extreme attempt to fight an infection, which can cause organ failure and death. Doctors gave Mullins medication that sent all her blood flowing to her organs — and restricted it from her less vital arteries in her legs and arms. (Melnick, 1/5)
