CNN – Health

By Tasnim Ahmed, CNN Pandemic hospitalization rates are at new lows, the vast majority of US counties have low community levels of the coronavirus, and as of March 25, all 50 states have lifted mask requirements. But is there a cost to lifting restrictions and trying to return to a pre-pandemic normal? In a new

By Deidre McPhillips, CNN Interest in using wastewater surveillance to monitor Covid-19 continues to grow in the United States, as the values of the early detection tool come into clearer focus. In September 2020, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention launched the National Wastewater Surveillance System, investing millions of dollars in an effort

By Kristen Rogers, CNN For some people, coffee jump-starts their bowel movements in addition to their energy. Despite the drink’s popularity, there isn’t a lot of research on why coffee sends many people running to the bathroom within minutes of consuming it. “In some cases, as with coffee and bowel movements, there likely just hasn’t

By Sandee LaMotte, CNN Pregnant women who were exposed to cannabis products that contained THC and CBD were more likely to have children with increased fat mass and blood sugar levels at age 5, a new pilot study found. “There’s this misconception that cannabis is safe,” said study author Brianna Moore, an assistant professor at

By Sandee LaMotte, CNN The stories of sleeping pills gone wrong are legendary. Ask any flight attendant, and you’ll hear amusing tales of people sleepwalking, taking off their clothes or even standing up and peeing into the neighboring airline seat. The use of sleeping pills can also be deadly. Up to a half a million

By Deidre McPhillips, CNN Fewer people are hospitalized with Covid-19 in the United States now than at any other point in the pandemic, but hospitals and staff continue to feel the strain. As of Friday, there are 16,138 people in the hospital with Covid-19 — fewer than there have ever been since the US Department

By Michael Nedelman, CNN Stopping the next major coronavirus variant involves knowing where it might come from. With Omicron, those answers are still a mystery: How did a variant that looked so different from all its older cousins appear so suddenly? How to explain its jumble of mutations, many of which had rarely been seen

By Kathleen Toner, CNN As Covid-19 infection rates and restrictions are waning in some places and a variant is surging in others, it’s difficult to understand where we are in the pandemic. But two years ago, the situation was clear: for many people, coronavirus had brought the world to a stop. That’s when pediatric surgeon

By Tasnim Ahmed, CNN In 2003, the Human Genome Project made history when it sequenced 92% of the human genome. But for nearly two decades since, scientists have struggled to decipher the remaining 8%. Now, a team of nearly 100 scientists from the Telomere-to-Telomere (T2T) Consortium has unveiled the complete human genome — the first

By Deidre McPhillips, CNN Mental health concerns among high school students in the United States were exacerbated during the Covid-19 pandemic, according to survey results published Thursday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. There have been significant increases in high school students reporting persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness, considering suicide or

By Katia Hetter, CNN On Tuesday, the US Food and Drug Administration expanded its authorization of the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna Covid-19 vaccines. Now, adults ages 50 and older are able to get a second booster if at least four months have passed since their first one. Within hours, the US Centers for Disease Control and

By Jen Christensen, CNN The Omicron coronavirus variant may be reaching around the world, but different places are seeing significantly different effects. In the United States, Covid-19 case numbers have been falling since January. They may have hit a plateau as a subvariant of Omicron, BA.2, becomes the main cause of infections. But in China,