Healthy Communities Online

As many Americans start the summer stressed about their physiques and health, there are important developments. Drug-makers report successful mid-stage trials for oral compounds that could soon join the injectable prescription medication to treat obesity that’s already on the market. Dr. Jamy Ard, president-elect of The Obesity Society, says he believes oral obesity medications offer new options for those not comfortable with an injectable drug and for those who suffer adverse side effects from current offerings. He also believes more…

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Dr. Vivian Lee, an author and senior lecturer at Harvard Medical School, is impressed by a study that found a large majority of patients responded in a favorable way when a pediatrician shared climate change details during well-child visits. She joins hosts Mark Masselli and Margaret Flinter to explain why we need health care providers and health systems to step up to do more about the undeniable risks from climate change. Listen in as they discuss her perspective and her…

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The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention just updated its ventilation guidance on helping prevent indoor transmission of the virus that causes COVID. It includes a recommendation to get at least five air changes per hour of clean air in occupied spaces. Dr. Joseph G. Allen and other experts have been advocating for this guidance even before the pandemic. He’s the associate professor and director of the Healthy Buildings Program at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Dr….

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Today, as the United States officially ends the COVID public health emergency, we know too many Americans continue to deal with the aftereffects of the pandemic, including mental health and substance abuse challenges. Miriam Delphin-Rittmon, Ph.D., serves as Assistant Secretary for Mental Health and Substance Use for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. She joins hosts Mark Masselli and Margaret Flinter to explain plans for dealing with the fact there are more Americans dying of drug overdoses now…

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Philip Zelikow, co-author of the new book “Lessons from the COVID War,” has an important finding as the U.S. still grapples with the tough questions from the pandemic: “We point out in the report that community health workers can play this extraordinary role…where we had them [during the pandemic], they were really effective and that’s like a huge innovation that should punch out to us as a lesson from this war and can have a dramatic effect in America,” says…

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Republicans in the U.S. House passed a deal that lifts the debt ceiling along with spending cuts aimed at the nation’s health care safety net. Romina Boccia, Director of Budget and Entitlement Policy at the Cato Institute, supports the move. She says, “I do think there’s quite a bit of improper spending, waste for certain and things the federal government shouldn’t be involved with anymore, where members of Congress could cut.” Jennifer Wagner, Director of Medicaid Eligibility and Enrollment with…

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