Health

(NEW YORK) — From “mom brain” to “mommy brain,” “momnesia,” “baby brain” and “pregnancy brain,” the terms used to describe the brain fog many moms say they experience during pregnancy and after are plentiful.

One of the terms, “baby brain,” even made it into Prince Harry’s memoir Spare as he described how the use of the term once caused a confrontation between his wife, Duchess Meghan, and his sister-in-law, Princess Kate.

Despite how common it has become for moms-to-be and moms to be subjectively thought of as scattered or forgetful, a group of scientists says the idea of “mommy brain” needs to be reexamined and rebranded.

The term, they say, has become a self-fulfilling prophecy, one that undermines the positive changes that happen to women’s brains and cognitive abilities with motherhood.

“It’s complicated because you internalize or potentially expect to experience something like ‘mommy brain’ in a negative way,” Clare McCormack, Ph.D., a research assistant professor at NYU Langone Medical Center in New York City, told ABC News. “You might expect to experience fogginess and forgetfulness, so when an everyday moment of forgetfulness happens, there’s a label for it, it’s confirming what you thought you would see, and it can really become ingrained.”

McCormack and two colleagues, Bridget Callaghan, Ph.D., of the University of California Los Angeles, and Jodi Pawluski, Ph.D., of the University of Rennes in France, are the authors of a headline-making article published this week in JAMA Neurology titled, “It’s Time to Rebrand ‘Mommy Brain.'”

“The idea that motherhood is wrought with memory deficits and is characterized by a brain that no longer functions well is scientifically just not so,” the authors write.

In addition to current research not conclusively pointing to the idea of “mommy brain,” the authors say there also has not yet been enough research done on what exactly happens to the brain with pregnancy and motherhood.

“We just don’t have enough information, unfortunately,” Pawluski, a behavioral neuroscientist and psychotherapist, told ABC News. “And this is because I think people don’t support research that’s specific to parenting or women’s health, their maternal health, and that’s a bigger issue.”

Citing studies showing that 80% of pregnant women say they experience some form of memory loss or brain fog, Pawluski added, “There are so, so many questions that need [to be] answered.”

When research does happen, according to Callaghan, it often looks only at negative performance, or cognitive impairments.

“There hasn’t really been a fair test of maternal cognitive abilities because we haven’t actually been looking for the cognitive advantages that pregnancy might pose,” said Callaghan, an assistant professor of psychology at UCLA.

Callaghan, Pawluski and McCormack led their own study that looked at the impact of pregnancy on long-term memory, and found pregnant women performed better cognitively than nonpregnant women.

“This is just one example of the ways that we can kind of think critically about how we’re assessing this phenomenon of mommy brain,” Callaghan said of the study, which was published in 2021. “And when we do, we find evidence of cognitive advantages to pregnancy, which is more consistent with what we see in the animal literature.”

Callaghan said she was inspired by her own pregnancy to start researching some of the benefits of becoming a mom.

“When I looked up any symptom I had during pregnancy, it was like, ‘Your body falls apart. Your mind falls apart when you’re pregnant,'” she said. “I knew that wasn’t the case based on my own experience of pregnancy and seeing other people.”

Callaghan continued, “It’s really important as scientists, and as female scientists, that we try and set the record straight about what the experience of pregnancy and motherhood is actually like, and if female scientists aren’t going to do it, I don’t really know who is.”

All three experts spoke of a desire to “change the narrative” around the changes that come with pregnancy and motherhood, while also acknowledging the fact that the changes are big and do exist.

More recent research has shown that some of the long-lasting brain changes that happen during pregnancy appear to be as significant as the brain changes seen in adolescence, according to McCormack.

“I think of the transition to motherhood as a really important time that is actually all about adaptation,” she said. “So when we’re saying it’s time to ‘rebrand mommy brain,’ we’re really just saying it’s time to reduce focus on what is lost with motherhood, which has been the main focus for a long time, and to start paying attention more to what is gained and how it is gained.”

For example, Pawluski said moms and moms-to-be can think of how their changing brain helps them parent.

Pawluski’s research has shown that in mice, new connections in the brain develop in the postpartum period. She and other researchers have suggested that the brain’s new connections during and after pregnancy don’t necessarily come at the loss of anything else, but are simply the brain adapting to new needs, i.e. parenthood.

“We don’t want motherhood and the brain to immediately be thought of as a deficit,” she said, adding, “I mean, a pregnant person’s brain changes so that they can very quickly learn how to care for a baby because they’ve invested nine months into making it, their whole body and life has been invested into it.”

The experts also described an even more urgent reason more research is needed on brain changes during pregnancy, citing high rates of perinatal mood and anxiety disorders.

In the United States, around one in eight women who have given birth experience postpartum depression, a depression that occurs after having a baby, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“If we take for granted that there’s this just kind of magical switch that happens when someone goes from not being a parent to being a parent, and when we don’t understand what goes on in this process, in the best of cases when it goes well, then we can’t help people effectively when they struggle,” McCormack said. “That’s one reason why it’s really important that we seriously try to understand how this process happens.”

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(HOUSTON) — A 4-year-old from eastern Louisiana is on the road to recovery at Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston after receiving a bilateral lung transplant nearly three months ago. Now, her family and medical team are raising awareness of organ donation, especially since Feb. 14 is National Donor Day.

Ava has a genetic disorder called cystic fibrosis, a condition where an abnormal protein affects the body’s cells, tissues and glands that make mucus and sweat, according to the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. With cystic fibrosis, often abbreviated as CF, the body’s mucus is stickier and thicker than normal, which can lead to blockages, inflammation and infections in various organs, especially lungs.

Ava’s mom Jennifer Thomas told ABC News’ Good Morning America that she and her husband John weren’t familiar with CF until their daughter was diagnosed. It wasn’t until last April when Ava became very sick and was rushed to a hospital and was later moved to a pediatric intensive care unit and placed on a ventilator.

“She was a typical 4-year-old: spunky, sassy, full of life, full of energy,” Thomas recalled. “We had a crawfish boil for her birthday on April 3 and she was doing fine. We had friends and family over and then she had a productive cough so I took her to the doctor and 20 days after her birthday, she was admitted to the hospital.”

The Thomases, who live in Covington, Louisiana, first brought Ava to a local hospital. She was then transferred to Children’s Hospital New Orleans before she arrived at Texas Children’s Hospital, more than five hours away from their home, later that month for higher-level care.

Ava’s cystic fibrosis led to “significant end-stage lung disease,” according to Dr. Maria Carolina Gazzaneo, one of Ava’s doctors and a pediatric critical care and lung transplant physician at Texas Children’s.

“She actually had CF but she was very healthy,” Gazzaneo told GMA. “She had never been admitted before. She was at home. She never was on oxygen. So she was a very special patient and then she became really sick because she got a bacterial infection, and … since then, she developed what we call ARDS [acute respiratory distress syndrome].”

Among the treatments Ava needed was extracorporeal membrane oxygenation, or ECMO — a treatment that involves “us[ing] a pump to circulate blood through an artificial lung back into the bloodstream” according to the National Library of Health, part of the National Institutes of Health — and while she was on ECMO, she was placed on the lung transplant waiting list.

Gazzaneo said after 207 days, Ava was able to get her transplant and a new set of lungs, becoming the longest surviving patient on ECMO while waiting for a transplant at the Houston children’s hospital.

“She’s just amazing and she’s actually recovering faster than what we thought,” Gazzaneo said of Ava, post-transplant. “She’s doing so many good things. So I know she will continue to recover and she will go home. We know that.”

Since she received her transplant, Thomas said her daughter is receiving physical therapy, slowly weaning off some medications and was also able to get her tracheostomy, or breathing tube, removed last month.

“She still has an NG (nasogastric) tube, which is through her nose. It goes into her stomach where we give her medicines and liquid and fluid to keep her hydrated but now she’s able to drink some which is a big difference,” Thomas said.

Overall, Thomas said Ava is in “very good spirits” and has been making significant progress. She was even able to go outside on Jan. 22, the first time she’d been able to do so since she arrived at Texas Children’s from Louisiana about 10 months ago.

“She rode her tricycle. It’s all the way on the other side of another building — this hospital is huge. She rode her bike all the way there,” Thomas said. “It was just meant to be that we were out there. … We just enjoyed some fresh air. It was rejuvenating.”

Ava’s doctor said she hopes the 4-year-old’s story can raise awareness for organ donation.

“Lung transplant in pediatric [patients] is completely different than adults,” Gazzaneo said. “Adults, they have more donors, they do a lot more lung transplants. But in the pediatric world, it’s very hard. And Ava had to wait a long time because of [the] scarcity of donors. So I really want to raise awareness … we really need people to donate because that really makes a difference in so many families.”

Ava’s mom added that their family will always be grateful for the lifesaving gift she received.

“We’re very thankful for the organ donation forever. It’s indescribable. It’s a wonderful feeling, but it’s also — we understand that someone else’s life was lost in order to save our child, so we’re thankful all the way around,” Thomas said.

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(NEW YORK) — Teenage girls in the United States are experiencing record-high levels of feelings of sadness and acts of violence, according to new federal data.

A report published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that nearly 3 in 5 — or 57% — of girls reported feeling persistently sad or hopeless in 2021, up from 36% in 2011 and the highest levels seen in the past decade.

By comparison, teen boys also saw an increase, but from 21% in 2011 to 29% in 2021.

“Young people are experiencing a level of distress that calls on us to act with urgency and compassion,” Kathleen Ethier, CDC division of adolescent and school health director, said in a statement. “With the right programs and services in place, schools have the unique ability to help our youth flourish.”

The report includes an analysis of data and trends from the annual Youth Risk Behavior Survey, which looks at the health and behaviors of U.S. high school students.

While several areas of adolescent health improved, including a decrease of risky sexual behavior, misuse of prescription opioids and current alcohol use, it found the state of youth mental health has worsened.

In particular, the crisis is affecting teen girls who report a rise in harmful experiences.

According to the report, 41% of teenage girls surveyed said they had experienced poor mental health over the last 30 days compared to 18% of teenage boys.

What’s more, about one-third of teen girls, or 30%, said they had seriously considered attempting suicide.

Not only is this figure higher than the 14% of teen boys who reported the same thoughts in 2021, but it’s a dramatic increase from the 19% of teen girls who reported considering suicide in 2011.

The percentage of female youth who made a suicide plan also rose from 15% to 24% over the course of a decade.

The report also found that nearly one in five — or 18% — of teen girls said they had experienced sexual violence in the past year. This is an increase of 20% since 2017, the first year the CDC started monitoring this measure.

In addition, more than one in 10 female students, about 14%, said they had been forced to have sex, up 27% from 2019, marking an increase for the first time since the CDC has been tracking this statistic.

The report also found that LGBTQ youth are also facing mental health challenges and reporting high levels of violence.

Nearly 70% of LGBTQ students reported either persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness during the past year in 2021 and more than half said they had poor mental health during the past 30 days.

LGBTQ students and students who had any same-sex partners were more likely to seriously consider attempting suicide at 45% and 58%, respectively.

Trend data from 2011 to 2021 was not available for LGBTQ youth because of changes in survey methods, the authors said.

When it came to breakdowns by race and ethnicity, students of all groups saw an increase in feelings of persistent sadness and loneliness over the last decade and white, Black and Hispanic saw increased poor mental health over the last 30 days.

Additionally, despite Black students being less likely to report poor mental health and persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness than some other groups, they were much more likely than Asian, Hispanic, and White students to have attempted suicide.

The report did not go into reasons for the increase in poor mental health, but it did note this data is the first collected since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Although most schools had returned to in-person instruction by that time, the time spent out of school for many students may have impacted the school-related [survey] variables,” the report read. “Disruptions in daily life also remained common during the time of collection.”

The authors said the report shows the importance of offering health-quality education in school as well as school-based activities to teens to help improve their mental health and reduce the negative impacts of violence and other types of trauma.

“High school should be a time for trailblazing, not trauma. These data show our kids need far more support to cope, hope, and thrive,” Dr. Debra Houry, the CDC’s chief medical officer and deputy director for program and science, said in a statement. “Proven school prevention programs can offer teens a vital lifeline in these growing waves of trauma.”

If you are struggling with thoughts of suicide or worried about a friend or loved one, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 [TALK] for free, confidential emotional support 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

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(NEW YORK) — During the earlier stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, limiting social interactions and wearing masks kept pesky viruses away. But now, stuffed sinuses and miserable post nasal drip are back — and for some people, feel worse than ever before.

Cold viruses aren’t any more virulent than they were before the pandemic, experts say. But that doesn’t make the experience of having one any better. ABC News spoke to experts about why they might seem harder to bear.

Why do cold symptoms feel worse?

Experts say there is currently no evidence to suggest the viruses that cause cold symptoms are any more severe than they were pre-COVID. However, there are some reasons they may feel more severe.

One reason is because people may have forgotten how miserable cold symptoms can feel after a few years without them.

Cold symptoms can include things like sneezing, coughing and runny nose, but in more severe cases can cause body aches, chest discomfort or even fever, according to the CDC. They also usually last up to 10 days.

“All of us have forgotten about what common colds used to be like, and we’re getting them now again,” said Dr. William Schaffner, infectious disease specialist at Vanderbilt University.

Lack of exposure to viruses that cause cold symptoms may also be playing a role. People who haven’t had a cold in a while won’t have as much immunity to viruses, said Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, professor of medicine and infectious disease specialist at UCSF.

“Lack of exposure to viruses over time might make a cold seem much worse than before, because you haven’t been exposed a little bit along the way,” he said.

However, having some immunity isn’t always protective when it comes to colds, as there are over 200 known viruses that can cause symptoms of the common cold, according to the National Institute of Health.

“Being exposed to one doesn’t mean that you’re going to be protected by another one that comes along,” said Chin-Hong.

Are you more likely to catch a cold now than during the height of COVID?

People are socializing more than they did during the height of the pandemic and are in more public spaces without masks. That might make catching a cold more likely, experts said.

“We may have been a little spoiled over the last few seasons, because we’ve been spared this experience of getting one or two or even three common colds during the winter,” said Schaffner.

Socializing also means interacting with other people who also didn’t have much exposure to cold viruses in the past few years.

“There’s less of a forcefield in the population, so the chances of you encountering a cold is higher,” Chin-Hong said.

He added, “When more people are ill, and more people don’t have immunity, they’re more likely to get ill and that leads to a cycle of encounters.”

There were similar trends with RSV and the flu this year.

“We saw a lot more RSV in the beginning of this year, because a lot of kids were not born when there was RSV circulating so of course, they’re going to get it and probably feel it a little bit more,” said Chin-Hong.

What are the best ways to fight the common cold?

Washing your hands.

“We haven’t emphasized washing hands and surfaces for COVID because there’s less evidence for that. But for colds, there’s tons of evidence.” said Chin-Hong.

If you do find yourself getting sick, there are things you can do to help relieve symptoms.

It is important to keep your fluid intake up, according to Schaffner, and taking a steamy shower can help with a runny or stuffy nose.

For a sore throat, Schaffner said, “a little bit of gargling with warm salt water will help. And if you have any pains or perhaps a degree of fever as people do with the cold, then take some acetaminophen, and that’ll help you get through the day and get a little more sleep.”

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(ATLANTA) — The number of suicides increased in 2021 to the highest levels seen in four years, according to new federal data.

The report, published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Thursday, looked at how many people died by suicide between 2018 and 2021 as well as breaking down the chart by race and ethnicity.

Results showed that 48,183 Americans died by suicide in 2021 with a rate of 14.1 suicides per 100,000 people.

These are the highest numbers recorded since 2018 when 48,344 Americans died by suicide with a rate of 14.2 per 100,000, and comes after two consecutive years of decreases in 2019 and 2020.

When researchers looked at 2021 suicide rates by race/ethnicity, they found American Indians/Alaska Natives had the highest rate at 28.1 per 100,000. In addition, this group had the highest percent change from 2018, with the rate increasing 26% from 22.3 per 100,000.

Rates also increased among Black Americans at 19.2% from 2018 to 2021 and among Hispanic Americans at 6.8% over the same four-year period.

White Americans were the only group to see a decrease in suicides rates between 2018 and 2021 at 3.9%.

The report also found that suicide rates significantly increased among Black Americans between ages 10 and 24 over the four-year period from 8.2 per 100,000 to 11.2 per 100,000 — a 36.6% increase.

Rates also increased for people between ages 25 and 44 for American Indian/Alaskan Native, Black, Hispanic and multiracial populations.

Meanwhile decreases were reported for those between ages 45 and 64 overall as well as for Asian Americans, Hispanic Americans and white Americans in this age range.

No significant increases or decreases were seen for Americans aged 65 and older.

“These analyses demonstrate disparities in suicide rates among populations based on race and ethnicity and age group in the context of overall suicide rates nearly returning to their 2018 peak after [two] years of declines,” the team wrote.

“Suicide is a complex problem related to multiple risk factors such as relationship, job or school, and financial problems, as well as mental illness, substance use, social isolation, historical trauma, barriers to health care, and easy access to lethal means of suicide among persons at risk,” they continued.

The authors added that suicide rates might initially decrease during a disaster — in this case, the COVID-19 pandemic — only to rise as people begin experiencing the long-term aftereffects.

The report did not investigate why the number of suicides rose, but research has suggested that the COVID-19 pandemic had a negative impact on mental health.

According to the KFF, four in 10 adults in the U.S. reported having symptoms of an anxiety or depressive disorder during the pandemic, an increase from one in 10 adults who reported the same thing from January 2019 to June 2019.

The impact on young adults was particularly severe. According to a 2021 study from Boston College, rates of depression and anxiety rose 61% and 65%, respectively, among those aged 18 to 29 during the first year of the pandemic. Both disorders increase suicide risk.

What’s more, despite the need for help regarding mental, behavioral or emotional disorders, there was a lack of services due to the lockdowns and business closures, as well as staffing shortages, according to the American Hospital Association.

Researchers are also studying if there is a link between people with long COVID and higher rates of depression and suicidal thoughts.

“As the nation continues to respond to the short- and long-term impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, remaining vigilant in prevention efforts is critical, especially among disproportionately affected populations where longer-term impacts might compound preexisting inequities in suicide risk,” the authors wrote.

If you are struggling with thoughts of suicide or worried about a friend or loved one, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 [TALK] for free, confidential emotional support 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — A dangerous and contagious bird flu continues to spread through poultry farms, wild birds, and now mammal populations.There’s still no sign the virus is capable of spreading between humans, but experts are watching the outbreak closely.

“The recent spillover to mammals needs to be monitored closely,” World Health Organization director-general Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said during a press briefing. “For the moment, WHO assesses the risk to humans as low.”

What is causing this bird flu outbreak?

This particular outbreak is caused by the H5N1 bird flu virus, which was first discovered in China in 1996. In 2021, a new variant of that virus emerged and started spreading around the world. The virus started infecting chickens on poultry farms in the United States in February 2022.

What is different about this outbreak?

The size, range, and number of species affected by this outbreak is unprecedented, says Nichola Hill, a virologist at the University of Massachusetts Boston.

This is the deadliest bird flu outbreak in U.S. history — nearly 60 million poultry have been affected. Wild birds in all 50 states have the virus. “It’s never really been seen in this number of different wild species before,” Hill says. It’s also infecting mammals: skunks, bears, seals, foxes, dolphins, and animals of other species are showing up with the virus. “That’s not really how bird flu should behave,” she says.

Most troubling is that the virus appeared on a mink farm where it seems to have spread between minks — not just from birds to individual minks. That type of mammal-to-mammal spread is new. “We hadn’t seen that before,” Hill says.

Is there a risk to people?

Mammal-to-mammal spread is concerning, but it doesn’t automatically mean that the virus is going to significantly affect human populations.

People can get sick from bird flu, but cases are still rare. They’re usually seen in people who work closely with birds. One person in the United States has been infected with the virus during this current outbreak, and that person was responsible for culling sick poultry.

Right now, even though the virus may be evolving to infect more mammals, it hasn’t mutated in a way that would help it infect humans easier.

“It still isn’t hitting on that magic combination of mutations that are necessary to unlock efficient human transmission,” Hill says.

But it’s still important to watch and try to contain H5N1 spread in other animal species, because every time it adapts to a new host, there’s a chance those mutations could happen. “We’re rolling the dice every time,” she says.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says people should avoid contact with wild birds, and that people who work with poultry should take precautions like wearing gloves and masks.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(ATLANTA) — The number of suicides increased in 2021 to the highest levels seen in four years, according to new federal data.

The report, published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Thursday, looked at how many people died by suicide between 2018 and 2021 as well as breaking down the chart by race and ethnicity.

Results showed that 48,183 Americans died by suicide in 2021 with a rate of 14.1 suicides per 100,000 people.

These are the highest numbers recorded since 2018 when 48,344 Americans died by suicide with a rate of 14.2 per 100,000, and comes after two consecutive years of decreases in 2019 and 2020.

When researchers looked at 2021 suicide rates by race/ethnicity, they found American Indians/Alaska Natives had the highest rate at 28.1 per 100,000. In addition, this group had the highest percent change from 2018, with the rate increasing 26% from 22.3 per 100,000.

Rates also increased among Black Americans at 19.2% from 2018 to 2021 and among Hispanic Americans at 6.8% over the same four-year period.

White Americans were the only group to see a decrease in suicides rates between 2018 and 2021 at 3.9%.

The report also found that suicide rates significantly increased among Black Americans between ages 10 and 24 over the four-year period from 8.2 per 100,000 to 11.2 per 100,000 — a 36.6% increase.

Rates also increased for people between ages 25 and 44 for American Indian/Alaskan Native, Black, Hispanic and multiracial populations.

Meanwhile decreases were reported for those between ages 45 and 64 overall as well as for Asian Americans, Hispanic Americans and white Americans in this age range.

No significant increases or decreases were seen for Americans aged 65 and older.

“These analyses demonstrate disparities in suicide rates among populations based on race and ethnicity and age group in the context of overall suicide rates nearly returning to their 2018 peak after [two] years of declines,” the team wrote.

“Suicide is a complex problem related to multiple risk factors such as relationship, job or school, and financial problems, as well as mental illness, substance use, social isolation, historical trauma, barriers to health care, and easy access to lethal means of suicide among persons at risk,” they continued.

The authors added that suicide rates might initially decrease during a disaster — in this case, the COVID-19 pandemic — only to rise as people begin experiencing the long-term aftereffects.

The report did not investigate why the number of suicides rose, but research has suggested that the COVID-19 pandemic had a negative impact on mental health.

According to the KFF, four in 10 adults in the U.S. reported having symptoms of an anxiety or depressive disorder during the pandemic, an increase from one in 10 adults who reported the same thing from January 2019 to June 2019.

The impact on young adults was particularly severe. According to a 2021 study from Boston College, rates of depression and anxiety rose 61% and 65%, respectively, among those aged 18 to 29 during the first year of the pandemic. Both disorders increase suicide risk.

What’s more, despite the need for help regarding mental, behavioral or emotional disorders, there was a lack of services due to the lockdowns and business closures, as well as staffing shortages, according to the American Hospital Association.

Researchers are also studying if there is a link between people with long COVID and higher rates of depression and suicidal thoughts.

“As the nation continues to respond to the short- and long-term impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, remaining vigilant in prevention efforts is critical, especially among disproportionately affected populations where longer-term impacts might compound preexisting inequities in suicide risk,” the authors wrote.

If you are struggling with thoughts of suicide or worried about a friend or loved one, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 [TALK] for free, confidential emotional support 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — The toxins that burned in the wreckage of the train derailment in Ohio had the potential to be deadly if officials did not order evacuations in the region, experts told ABC News.

An air quality disaster resulted on Friday night after about 50 cars on a Norfolk Southern Railroad train traveling from Illinois to Pennsylvania derailed in East Palestine, Ohio. Ten of those cars contained hazardous materials, five of which contained vinyl chloride, a highly volatile colorless gas produced for commercial uses.

For days, large plumes of smoke containing vinyl chloride, phosgene, hydrogen chloride and other gases were emitted during a controlled release and burn, prompting officials to issue mandatory evacuation orders in a one-mile radius of the crash site.

Although the controlled releases were considered “low-level,” the inhalation of fumes of vinyl chloride could cause dizziness, nausea, headache, visual disturbances, respiratory problems and other health-related issues, Ashok Kumar, a professor in the University of Toledo’s department of civil and environmental engineering, told ABC News.

In addition, hydrogen chloride fumes could irritate the throat and cause skin problems, while phosgene fumes may lead to chest constriction and chocking, Kumar said.

Long-term carcinogens like vinyl chloride can also cause cancer in organs like the liver, Kevin Crist, professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering and director of Ohio University’s Air Quality Center, told ABC News.

“Breathe those in under heavy concentrations, and it’s really bad for you,” Crist said. “It’s like an acid mist. It’s not something that you want to be around in high concentrations.”

Crist, who worked with the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency while serving on the Ohio State Emergency Response Commission under former Gov. John Kasich, said the state prepares tremendously for these types of accidents, even training local fire departments to handle issues like chemical spills.

Health officials were able to use dispersion modeling to see which way the winds are blowing and estimate what he concentrations will be downwind, Crist said, adding that the biggest risk is inhalation.

However, there is also risk of coming in contact with the toxins that get embedded in the soil. Health officials will then take soil samples and dig out any of the affected soil, a feat complicated by the fact that much of the toxins were spilled into a ditch, Crist said.

Some of the toxins spilled into the Ohio River near the northern panhandle of West Virginia, prompting officials to shut down water production in the area and transfer to an alternate source of water supply, West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice told reporters during a news conference on Wednesday.

Justice emphasized that “everything is fine here” due to the immediate action from agencies like the state’s Department of Environmental Protection and the National Guard.

The controlled release and burn went “as planned,” Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro announced on Monday, advising those who live within two miles of East Palestine to shelter in place and keep windows and doors closed.

But as of Tuesday, the residents were not permitted to return home.

It is “absolutely critical” for people to follow evacuation orders of any kind, but especially when having to do with “highly toxic” chemicals that could be deadly with high elevations of exposure, Karen Dannemiller, professor in the college of engineering and college of public health at the Ohio State University, told ABC News.

“It is a matter of life and death,” Dannemiller said, “People have to evacuate as ordered by authorities.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — In the early months of 2020, doctors were left responsible to treat a little-known virus that prompted the worst pandemic the world had seen in a century – risking their lives in the process. During the study timeframe, from March 2020 to December 2021, 622 more physicians died than expected, according to a recently released study.

Physicians had much lower excess mortality than the general population, perhaps indicative that protective equipment and workplace measures were effective, the researchers wrote.

Despite a potentially higher risk of being exposed to COVID-19, active physicians had a lower risk of being infected than non-active physicians.

“Non-active physicians are those that are retired, semi-retired, or just not actively practicing medicine. Further research is necessary, but that active physicians had lower excess deaths suggests workplace interventions could have protected them,” Mathew Kiang, ScD, assistant professor of epidemiology and population health at Stanford University and author of the study, told ABC News.

Yet, health care workers were left with limited protective equipment in the very early days of the pandemic.

“We felt powerless because there were a lot of unknowns … that powerlessness was felt in the fact that we couldn’t adequately protect ourselves,” Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious disease specialist at the University of California, San Francisco, told ABC News. He then recounted discussions on disinfecting previously used masks with UV light and how mask drives were organized to obtain more supplies.

At the time, the hospital environment was filled with uncertainty and fear.

“In the beginning, as I like to say, we all opened up our textbooks to COVID and we only had blank pages, because there had not been any experience with COVID,” Dr. William Schaffner, a professor of infectious diseases at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, told ABC News.

“It was a very scary time. I remember seeing the first patient who had COVID and even though I’m not in the highest risk category I was really scared,” Chin-Hong said.

He said many of his colleagues left their hospital scrubs in the trunk of the car, showered before entering their homes, or even lived away from their families during that period.

There were no excess deaths in the physician population after April 2021, the same time vaccines became widely available, according to the study. The study doesn’t prove cause-and-effect between the two, but the vaccine’s presence was undoubtedly appreciated.

“Vaccines certainly added a lot of comfort with health care in general and delivering it. They provided that bonus of protection. We obviously saw immediate benefit in our patient populations when vaccines were rolled out, it was like night and day,” said Dr. Darien Sutton, an emergency medicine physician, and ABC News contributor.

Throughout the pandemic, nearly half of U.S. health care workers say they had suffered from burnout – with women being disproportionately affected than men.

“The pandemic has exacerbated all parameters that define burnout. When you look at providers from physicians to nurses at the bedside, many feel overworked, underpaid, and under-appreciated in these positions,” Sutton said.

The U.S. continues to average around 500 COVID deaths per day, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“If you’re admitted with COVID, [physicians] are very assertive in treating you and have every expectation that even the most fragile patients will be able to get out of the intensive care unit and will be able to be discharged,” Schaffner said.

“The main takeaway is that frontline health care providers like physicians are crucial in our response to the pandemic and we need to do a better job protecting them in future epidemics,” Kiang said.

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(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden delivered his second State of the Union address Tuesday night, during which he addressed the administration’s accomplishments and set his agenda heading into the new year.

In front of Vice President Kamala Harris and Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy, Biden spoke about issues he wished to take on including gun reform, a billionaire minimum tax and restoring abortion rights across the United States.

Included in his agenda were several key health proposals such as funding for new COVID vaccines and variant-tracking; addressing the fentanyl crisis; lowering insulin costs for Americans; and tackling mental health among youth.

Here’s are some of the health plans Biden said he wants to undertake in 2023:

Capping insulin costs

During his speech, Biden addressed his desire to lower the costs of medication, specifically insulin, for all Americans.

Currently, insulin is capped at $35 per month for seniors on Medicare, but the president wants that extended to those under age 65 who either pay for their own health insurance or receive it through their employer.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 37.3 million people are living with type 1 or type 2 diabetes in the U.S. Recently, a study found more than 1 million diabetics in the U.S. are rationing their insulin doses to save money.

“Every day, millions need insulin to control their diabetes so they can stay alive. Insulin has been around for 100 years. It costs drug companies just $10 a vial to make,” Biden said. “But Big Pharma has been unfairly charging people hundreds of dollars — and making record profits.”

A report from the RAND Corporation found that the average American spent more than $98 per unit of insulin in 2018, almost more than any other nation.

“There are millions of other Americans who are not on Medicare, including 200,000 young people with type 1 diabetes who need insulin to save their lives,” Biden said. “Let’s finish the job this time. Let’s cap the cost of insulin at $35 a month for every American who needs it.”

Funding for COVID vaccines and tracking new variants

Biden acknowledged during his speech that the COVID-19 pandemic is not over yet, although he intends to let the public health emergency declaration expire in May.

More than 400 Americans are still dying from the virus every day, according to CDC data, although this is down from more than 2,400 per day during the height of the omicron wave in winter 2021-22.

The president said it’s important to remember the more than 1 million Americans who’ve died already and “remain vigilant.”

Since passing the American Rescue Plan in March 2021, Congress has refused to provide additional funding for the development of new vaccines and therapeutics, free testing programs and replenishing the national stockpile.

“We still need to monitor dozens of variants and support new vaccines and treatments,” Biden said. “So, Congress needs to fund these efforts and keep America safe.”

Addressing the fentanyl crisis

The U.S. is in the throes of a devastating opioid epidemic, driven by synthetic opioids like fentanyl, and Biden did not shy away from talking about it during his State of the Union address.

Fentanyl is between 50 times and 100 times stronger than morphine, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration.

In 2021, a record 107,622 Americans died from drug poisoning or overdose, with 66% linked to synthetic opioids like fentanyl, the Department of Justice said in a press release last year.

Biden addressed a series of steps to squash the smuggling of fentanyl into the U.S., particularly along the southern border.

“Let’s launch a major surge to stop fentanyl production, sale, and trafficking, with more drug detection machines to inspect cargo and stop pills and powder at the border,” Biden said. “Working with couriers like Fed Ex to inspect more packages for drugs. Strong penalties to crack down on fentanyl trafficking.”

Helping youth tackle mental health

Biden also said he will take steps to address mental health among the nation’s youth.

According to an advisory from the U.S. Surgeon General, rates of mental health disorders including anxiety, depression and suicidal ideation are increasing, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. Not addressing mental health can lead to disability and poor outcomes among youth.

Biden said this includes increasing mental health services at school and protecting children on social media.

“When millions of young people are struggling with bullying, violence, trauma, we owe them greater access to mental health care at school,” he said. “We must finally hold social media companies accountable for the experiment they are running on our children for profit.”

“And it’s time to pass bipartisan legislation to stop Big Tech from collecting personal data on kids and teenagers online, ban targeted advertising to children, and impose stricter limits on the personal data these companies collect on all of us,” Biden continued.

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