Latest news with #UniversityofConnecticutSchoolofMedicine
Yahoo
8 hours ago
- Climate
- Yahoo
Canadian wildfire smoke spreads into US Midwest
By Erica Dischino, Patrick Wingrove and Amanda Stephenson DULUTH, Minnesota (Reuters) -Smoke from wildfires burning in three Canadian provinces is spreading into the U.S. Upper Midwest, stirring memories of the severe pollution that drifted south from Canada two years ago during that country's worst fire season on record. The particulate matter pollution caused by the smoke is already drifting into Minnesota and neighboring states. It is expected to make its way to New York and other East Coast cities in coming days, posing a health risk to the tens of millions who live in those regions. "Airborne particulate matter is the most serious environmental health risk we know of," said Doug Brugge, a public health researcher at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine. "It causes cardiovascular, respiratory and neurological harm, and these plumes of smoke are at very high levels compared to what we're usually exposed to in the U.S." Scores of wildfires have swept across Canada since the start of May, forcing thousands of evacuations and disrupting crude oil production in the country. There were more than 200 active fires as of Monday, 106 of which were out of control, according to the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre. So far, 1.9 million hectares (4.7 million acres) have burned, mostly in the provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. Still, the current crisis does not yet come close to rivaling 2023, when 17 million hectares burned. One of the worst spots in the U.S. for air quality on Tuesday morning as a result of the fires was Ely, Minnesota, near the Manitoba border. It registered a "hazardous" air quality index reading of 336, according to IQAir, a website that monitors air quality around the world. An air quality rating of below 50 is considered to be "good," and readings between 100 and 300 are deemed "unhealthy" to "very unhealthy," while higher than that is considered "hazardous," according to the website. In Duluth, Minnesota, the rating stood at 309 at midmorning Tuesday, while in Flin Flon, Manitoba, about 800 miles (1,300 km) to the north and in one of the areas where the Canadian wildfires are concentrated, the AQI was at 359. In IQAir's list of the world's major cities, Minneapolis ranked as second worst air quality, with a 210 reading, trailing only Kuwait City, which led the list with a 318 reading. VULNERABLE PEOPLE Children, the elderly and people with chronic cardiac, respiratory and other illnesses are most vulnerable to the effects of the smoke, especially those with cardiovascular problems, according to Brugge. "The risk of hospitalization and death is low in people who are healthy and at a young age," he said, adding that there is still evidence that air pollution exposure increases blood pressure and inflammation for those people. Experts have said that particulates from wildfire smoke enter most buildings in high concentrations, although the problem is greater in older structures. The concentration of wildfire pollutants indoors is on average about half of what it is outdoors, but if a building is not well sealed, the concentration may be up to 70% of what it is outside, experts have said. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency advises that during wildfire smoke events, people avoid indoor activities that put more fine particles into the air, such as smoking cigarettes, frying or broiling food, burning candles or incense, and vacuuming without a HEPA filter. Exposure to wildfire smoke may also increase lung cancer patients' risk of dying from their disease, particularly among non-smokers, although the effect may be mitigated by certain cancer treatments, according to a large California study presented last month. Nonetheless, some farmers believe the effects of the fires are not all negative. In online forums like Facebook, some farmers have said some of their best yields ever came from years with a heavy pall of wildfire smoke from Canada. The smoke can protect vulnerable crops from scorching sunlight, they think.
Yahoo
05-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Eating a handful of walnuts every day 'reduces risk of bowel cancer'
Eating a handful of walnuts every day can 'reduce the risk of bowel cancer', according to new research. The edible seeds of walnut trees are said to provide 'long-term' health benefits, and can also curb inflammation, say American scientists. The findings come from a University of Connecticut School of Medicine clinical trial, published in the journal Cancer Prevention Research. Study leader Professor Daniel Rosenberg explained that ellagitannins, plant-derived polyphenol compounds found in walnuts, are shown to be metabolised exclusively by the gut microbiome into a range of anti-inflammatory molecules called urolithins. READ MORE: Reducing intake of one beverage can lower dementia risk - and it's not coffee READ MORE: Sunbed addict, 21, was told he could have 'a year to live' Prof Rosenberg says those urolithins are associated with "very potent" anti-inflammatory properties and may even prevent cancer. 'Ellagitannins in the walnut are importantly providing the anti-inflammatory and anti-cancer properties that we're seeing in patients in our clinical trial research, particularly the gut's conversion of ellagitannins to a potent anti-inflammatory agent, urolithin A," the scientist explained. Prof Rosenberg has studied walnuts for more than a decade and has researched the connection between walnut consumption and its anti-inflammatory purposes. The findings of the clinical trial show that high levels of urolithin A formation by the gut microbiome from walnut consumption has a "positive" impact on reducing inflammatory markers across blood, urine, and faecal samples, and may even positively affect the immune cells within colon polyps. The clinical trial involved patients between the ages of 40 and 65 and those at an elevated risk of bowel cancer, also known as colon cancer. Each of the 39 participants were asked to avoid all ellagitannin-containing foods and drinks for a week to set their urolithin levels at or close to zero before they began consuming ellagitannin-rich walnuts as part of their closely monitored diet. At the end of the three-week study, all participants underwent a high-definition colonoscopy . The research team found that elevated urolithin A levels in the urine of patients correlated with the serum levels of peptide YY, an interesting protein that has been associated with inhibition of bowel cancer. Reduced levels of several inflammation markers present in the blood were also found, especially in obese patients that had the greatest capacity to form urolithins by their gut microbiome. Prof Rosenberg also used high-dimensional spatial imaging technology that allowed the research team to develop a detailed view of the direct cellular interactions present inside colon polyps that were removed during colonoscopy at the end of the walnut study. The cutting-edge advanced imaging technology revealed that patients with high levels of urolithin A formation following walnut consumption was "directly associated" with reduced levels of several important proteins that are often present in polyps, showing for the first time how eating walnuts may directly improve bowel health. The research team also discovered that the protein vimentin - often associated with more advanced forms of colon cancer - was greatly reduced inside polyp tissues obtained from patients who had also formed the highest levels of urolithin A by their gut microbiome. The findings build on earlier work by Dr Masako Nakanishi, an Assistant Professor in Prof Rosenberg's lab, who showed in several earlier publications that walnuts had beneficial and anti-cancer effects in the colons of cancer-prone mice.
Scientific American
29-04-2025
- Health
- Scientific American
HPV Infection May Increase the Risk of Heart Disease. Could Vaccination Lower It?
Human papillomavirus (HPV) causes nearly 38,000 cancers a year, including most cervical and throat cancers. Now recent research suggests HPV infection also increases the risk of heart disease. An analysis of seven studies with a total of nearly 250,000 participants found that those who tested positive for HPV were 33 percent more likely than those who tested negative to develop cardiovascular disease. Now Stephen Akinfenwa, an internal medicine resident at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine and one of the lead authors of the analysis, says he would like to study whether the HPV vaccine, which can prevent 90 percent of cervical cancers, also reduces the risk of heart disease. The vaccine, which has been recommended for adolescents since 2006, protects against infection with nine strains of HPV, including high-risk types that are the most likely to cause cervical cancer, as well as strains that cause genital warts. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that boys and girls receive a series of two HPV shots at ages 11 or 12 as part of their routine childhood vaccinations—and that people receive three shots if their first dose is instead administered between the ages of 15 and 26. The vaccine is most protective when given before people become sexually active. On supporting science journalism If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today. The HPV vaccine has been strikingly effective. Cervical cancer deaths in women under age 25—the first generation eligible to receive the vaccine— fell by 65 percent from 2012 to 2019. Learning that heart disease may be related to HPV is exciting because HPV infection is preventable, Akinfenwa explains. 'It feels like good news,' he says. 'We're hoping that [the vaccine] will be a powerful tool for prevention.' Akinfenwa and his colleagues presented a condensed version of their analysis in March at the annual meeting of the American College of Cardiology. It has not yet been published as a peer-reviewed study. The analysis included studies published between 2011 and 2024 that followed women for three to 17 years. The largest study included in the analysis was published by researchers in South Korea in 2024 and followed apparently healthy women who were tested for 13 strains of high-risk HPV as part of a routine screening for cervical cancer. The women returned for health checks every year or two for an average of 8.6 years. Although heart disease and death were rare among these women, who had an average age of 40, those who tested positive for high-risk HPV were nearly four times as likely as those who tested negative to develop blocked arteries or die from heart disease, the study found. Women aren't the only ones at risk, Akinfenwa says. In one paper included in the analysis, a 2017 study of people undergoing radiation therapy for head and neck cancer, 75 percent of patients were men. (Head and neck cancers are more than twice as common in men as they are in women, according to the National Cancer Institute.) The 2017 study found that people who tested positive for HPV were more likely to have strokes compared with those who tested negative. HPV is ubiquitous and the most common sexually transmitted infection in the U.S. Among sexually active people, more than 90 percent of men and more than 80 percent of women are infected with HPV during their lifetime. About half of HPV infections involve high-risk strains that cause the bulk of cancers of the cervix, throat, vagina, vulva, anus and penis. Vaccine hesitancy and lack of awareness about HPV has kept many parents from vaccinating their children against the infection, research shows. Some parents are reluctant to vaccinate their kids against HPV because they don't think their children will have sex as teenagers. Only 61 percent of adolescents are up to date on all HPV vaccines. Even without a study that has specifically analyzed the effect of HPV vaccination on heart disease, the link between HPV and heart disease suggests that 'vaccination is a good idea, and our study definitely supports that,' Akinfenwa says. Given what scientists know about HPV, it's likely that the vaccine could prevent cases of heart disease related to the virus or at least the nine strains of the virus that are included in the shot, says Amesh Adalja, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, who studies emerging infectious diseases and was not involved in the new analysis. Other experts aren't so sure about the link between HPV and heart disease. Mark Einstein, chair of obstetrics and gynecology and women's health at Montefiore Einstein, who also was not involved in the analysis, says researchers have a long way to go before they can confidently say that the virus causes heart disease. 'This sort of association has come up a number of times over the years,' Einstein says. 'When you have a common disease—heart disease—and a common infection—HPV—it's easy to use statistical nuance to show a correlation,' he says. But 'association is different than causality.' A Source of Chronic Inflammation Scientists don't know exactly how HPV may increase the risk of heart disease, but it's unlikely that the virus directly infects the heart or blood vessels, says C. Noel Bairey Merz, director of the Barbra Streisand Women's Heart Center at the Cedars-Sinai Smidt Heart Institute in Los Angeles, who was not involved in the new research. HPV causes cancer in parts of the body that come into direct contact with the virus through sexual activity, says Kevin Ault, a professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the Western Michigan University Homer Stryker M.D. School of Medicine. The virus is not thought to travel to distant organs and cause lung or liver cancer, for example. 'We usually don't think of human papillomavirus as going all around the body,' Ault says. 'It's going to infect mostly skin' or mucous membranes. Instead, Merz says, HPV probably increases the risk of heart disease by causing inflammation, which occurs as the immune system attempts to control the virus. Chronic inflammation has been shown to irritate blood vessels and can lead to the hardening of fatty plaques in the lining of the arteries, which reduces blood flow to the heart. Inflammation can also cause those plaques to burst and form blood clots, which can lead to a heart attack or stroke. Although the immune system naturally controls most HPV infections within a year or two, a small number of infections become chronic, a problem that increases the risk of cervical cancer, says Rebecca Perkins, obstetrician and gynecologist at the Woman, Mother and Baby Research Institute at Tufts Medical Center. Even after HPV is controlled, the virus doesn't disappear from the body. Like the virus that causes chicken pox (varicella-zoster), HPV can lie dormant in the body for decades. And just as the varicella-zoster virus can reactivate decades after a childhood infection and cause shingles, HPV can wake up and cause women to test positive during cervical cancer screenings, Perkins says. The studies included in the new analysis typically cited the result of a single test for HPV, Akinfenwa says. HPV tests are now included in most routine cervical cancer screenings, either alone or in combination with a Pap smear. So a positive test result cannot distinguish among a recent exposure, a reactivation of the virus and a chronic infection, Akinfenwa says. How Infections Can Damage the Heart Many pathogens can cause heart disease, Adalja says. A wide variety of viruses, bacteria, parasites and fungi can trigger myocarditis, an inflammation of the heart muscle, which can make the heart too weak to pump blood efficiently. Those include the viruses that cause influenza and COVID. And untreated strep throat and scarlet fever, caused by Streptococcus bacteria, can lead to rheumatic fever, which can damage heart valves and cause heart failure. 'Many infectious diseases set off inflammatory cascades that can prompt cardiovascular and neurological events like heart attacks, blood clots and strokes,' Adalja says. 'By staving off infection, [vaccinating] against these agents—such as influenza, varicella-zoster virus and, presumably, HPV—these events will be prevented or become less likely.' Doctors have frequently been surprised by unexpected or off-target benefits from vaccines, Adalja says. A growing number of studies suggest that the shingles vaccine also reduces the risk of dementia —possibly by preventing the inflammation that contributes to the disease, Adalja says. The bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccine against tuberculosis also has been found to reduce risk of other diseases in which the immune system goes awry, including type 1 diabetes, cancer, multiple sclerosis and Alzheimer's disease. And an analysis published in 2024 found that meningitis vaccines reduced the incidence of gonorrhea by 30 to 59 percent. Such cross-protective immunity can occur when two bacteria are from similar families. The bacterium that causes gonorrhea is related to the meningococcus bacterium, which causes most cases of meningitis, an inflammation of the protective membranes around the brain, Adalja says. To better understand how HPV damages the heart and whether the HPV vaccine might offer protection, Merz says, researchers could compare rates of chronic inflammation in adolescents who were vaccinated with rates in those who weren't vaccinated. 'It's logical to think preventing the HPV infection itself via vaccination will reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease,' Akinfenwa says. 'Having said that, it needs to be tested.'
