lockdown Archives - Amazing Health Advances

Good Mental Health and Better Sleep for the Physically Active

AHA Publisher — Thu, 29 Oct 2020 07:00:26 +0000

Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) via Newswise – In the middle of the pandemic this spring, researchers at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) conducted a survey among members of Kondis, a Norwegian fitness training organization. Since this survey was sent out in the middle of the lockdown in Norway, participants were asked whether they had changed their exercise habits as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. The aim of these initial analyses was to map mental health and sleep problems, and to investigate whether changes in exercise habits had consequences for sleep. “Not surprisingly, we found that the incidence of anxiety and depression was significantly lower in this relatively fit sample than among other people. And this was the case despite the fact that we conducted the survey in the middle of the toughest part of the COVID time,” says associate professor Linda Ernstsen from NTNU’s Department of Public Health and Nursing. These findings come as little surprise to the researchers. The connection between physical and mental health has been known for a long time, not least through the 240 000 people who have participated in a series of health studies starting in 1984 called the HUNT Surveys. But the new study still offers some surprises, especially related to the fact that a lot of people changed their exercise habits this spring. Ernstsen carried out the study together with project manager and associate professor Audun Havnen from NTNU’s Department of Psychology. “It was surprising that so many people increased their amount of exercise during the coronavirus pandemic. Since people were encouraged to avoid public spaces and stay home, the fact that so many used the extra time they had to move more was a positive effect,” says Havnen. This survey is the first of three to be conducted among Kondis members. The overall goal of the questionnaires is to study the relationship between different aspects of physical activity, mental health and quality of life in a sample assumed to be fit, and how this changes over time. Although active people generally suffer less depression and anxiety than others, some of them still do get depressed and anxious. When COVID-19 struck this spring, many Kondis members modified their training habits, regardless of whether they were struggling with mental health problems or not. You would think that this change would affect their quality of sleep as well. But that didn’t happen. “We thought the connection between mental health and sleep problems would be more pronounced in people who changed how much they exercised. But we found no differences,” says Ernstsen. The two groups were thus affected in exactly the same way, regardless of changes in their exercise habits. This doesn’t mean that there is no connection between mental health and sleep, even in this active group. “We found a connection between anxiety symptoms and sleep problems and a connection between depressive symptoms and sleep problems,” Ernstsen says. People with depression and anxiety consistently sleep less well than others. This is true for the most physically fit among us as well. “Since all the participants answered the questions at the same time this spring, so far we only know that there’s a connection between physical activity, mental health and sleep. To investigate what leads to what, we’ve invited the participants to take the survey again after six and twelve months to study changes over time,” says Havnen. To read the original article click here.

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COVID-19 Lockdown Reduced Mental Health, Sleep, Exercise

AHA Publisher — Fri, 23 Oct 2020 07:00:04 +0000

Pennington Biomedical Research Center via EurekAlert – A first-of-its-kind global survey shows the initial phase of the COVID-19 lockdown dramatically altered our personal habits, largely for the worse. “The stay-at-home orders did result in one major health positive. Overall, healthy eating increased because we ate out less frequently. However, we snacked more. We got less exercise. We went to bed later and slept more poorly. Our anxiety levels doubled,” said Leanne Redman, PhD, Associate Executive Director for Scientific Education at Pennington Biomedical Research Center. The global survey evaluated the inadvertent changes in health behaviors that took place under the pandemic’s widespread restrictions. Researchers found that the lockdown’s effects were magnified among people with obesity. “Overall, people with obesity improved their diets the most. But they also experienced the sharpest declines in mental health and the highest incidence of weight gain,” Dr. Redman said. “One-third of people with obesity gained weight during the lockdown, compared to 20.5 percent of people with normal weight or overweight.” The online survey study ran during the month of April. More than 12,000 people worldwide took a look at the survey and 7,754 completed the detailed online questionnaire. The majority of the respondents were in the United States, with half from Louisiana. Residents of Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, and more than 50 other countries also responded. Those who took the survey reacted to the pandemic in largely the same way whether they live in Louisiana, elsewhere in the United States or abroad. “This study is the first to survey thousands of people across the globe on lifestyle behavior changes in response to stay-at-home orders. Groundbreaking research like this is part and parcel of Pennington Biomedical’s mission. The study demonstrates that chronic diseases like obesity affect our health beyond the physical,” said Executive Director John Kirwan, PhD. “Dr. Redman’s study is just one of many initiatives the center launched to help understand COVID-19’s impact and to slow its spread.” The research team would like physicians and scientists to modify the way they manage patients with obesity in two ways, said Emily Flanagan, PhD, lead author of the study and a postdoctoral researcher in Dr. Redman’s Reproductive Endocrinology and Women’s Health Laboratory. By increasing the number of mental health screenings during and after the pandemic. By remaining connected to patients/study participants through remote visits and telehealth to prevent irreversible health effects from the pandemic. So-called virtual visits can assuage patients’ concerns about the safety of in-person visits. To read the original article click here.

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These Doctors Urge Don’t Panic Over a Supposed Second Wave

AHA Publisher — Sun, 21 Jun 2020 07:00:18 +0000

Paul Strand via CBN News – A group of doctors who believe the lockdowns are more harmful to health than the coronavirus are backing up Vice President Mike Pence’s assertion that there won’t be a horrifying second wave of COVID-19 as the mainstream media keep insisting there will be. The news organizations speak of soaring numbers of cases in many states as if that’s proof the coronavirus is about to bludgeon the nation again. Here’s what Pence recently wrote in the Wall Street Journal: “The media has tried to scare the American people every step of the way, and these grim predictions of a second wave are no different.” Media ‘Ginning Up the Concept of a Second Wave’ Emergency physician Simone Gold said she’s watched the media get it wrong over and over again the last few months of the pandemic. “The disconnect between the media and the reality on the ground was a huge problem throughout this,” Gold commented. “And I’m very concerned that we’re about to see the same thing again, where the media is really ginning up the concept of a second wave, but yet the data doesn’t support it.” Soaring COVID case numbers can be explained by the simple fact that so many more Americans are getting tested now than were at the start of the pandemic. From 8,000 Tests to 500,000 a DayAs Pence put it in his op-ed, “At the end of February, between Centers for Disease Control and Prevention labs and state public health facilities, the U.S. had performed only about 8,000 coronavirus tests. As of this week, we are performing roughly 500,000 tests a day.” Gold stated, “There are so many people being tested every day, of course, they’re going to have more positive cases.” She added, “I need the media to understand that most of the increased numbers are because of increased testing and increased access to testing.” And the facts on the ground are showing the virus isn’t nearly as deadly as people first feared. Yes, multitudes of new positive cases are being found, but in the vast majority, the carriers don’t get sick enough to require hospitalization, or even turn out to be asymptomatic altogether. Gold pointed to the example of a family of 11 she recently had tested on a Native American reservation, saying, “All 11 came in to get tested. It turns out 10 of the 11 were positive. One of the 11 had symptoms. So those are all going to go down as positive cases. One had symptoms. Even that one person who had symptoms wasn’t nearly sick enough to require hospitalization.” Fear Can Lead to Drastic Actions that do More Harm And that’s the problem with the fear created by talk of a second wave as case numbers go up. Drastic actions that might end up doing more harm than good could be taken to combat such a wave for fear it will bring many more coronavirus deaths or severe illnesses. But, as Gold explains, “Increasing numbers of cases that don’t result in hospitalizations or ICU admissions is not a public health catastrophe.” And most of the cases now being discovered won’t need hospitalization. Family physician David Williams backed this up with numbers he’s seen in his state of Alabama. For instance, among college football teams. “Every single campus is testing every single player,” he explained. “So we’ve tested in Auburn. You’re talking 100 players plus per squad with backups and walk-ons and that sort of thing. And we’ve had a total of eight or nine positive, none of which knew they had it.” Williams added, “If you’re going to have surgery in Alabama, you have to have a test ahead of time. So you’re testing every single person who’s going to have outpatient surgery. The vast majority of course test negative. But even those who do test positive, don’t know they have it.” With Coronavirus, ‘You Almost have to be Ill to Become Ill’ Now he was quick to say this virus is real and has caused much real suffering. He points to the many elderly in nursing homes already ill with other maladies who’ve been cut down by the virus. But that led him to point out, “You almost have to be ill to become ill with this disease.” Gold chimed in that a publication in the Los Angeles area reported about coronavirus victims, “93 percent of people who died had underlying health conditions.” She quoted CDC stats on COVID-19 victims that show, “Two-thirds of patients who died – among females are age 75 and over and in males are age 65 and over.” She concluded, “We should not be scaring the general population.” Those who are aren’t elderly, who don’t have pre-existing conditions that could make them vulnerable to becoming very sick from this virus, aren’t likely to have serious trouble if they catch it. And indeed may never know they had it. Which makes it so sad that mostly unfounded fears of a deadly encounter with the virus have caused so much other real suffering. Stroke & Heart Attack Victims Risking Their Lives All Over Again Gold quoted staggering numbers of people with other dangerous conditions being so afraid of catching the virus, they won’t go to hospitals or even their doctor’s office. She mentioned, “The New England Journal of Medicine commented in May that about 40 percent of stroke patients went missing. Another comment in the Journal of Cardiology said about 40 percent of heart attack victims went missing.” These doctors blame the media for much of this fear that’s keeping people from getting desperately needed medical attention or even keeping doctors from opening their offices. Blindness & Amputations that Didn’t Have to Happen A group allied with these doctors is Tea Party Patriots. Its honorary chair Jenny Beth Martin said, “In the last week, I’ve seen this talk of a second wave. And I’m concerned that people across the country will begin to be afraid again. And it may cause them to have other non-COVID related medical issues.” Meanwhile, Martin has been furious over, “The very real-life consequences that the lockdowns were creating that the media was not reporting, such as permanent blindness because people were afraid to go get treatment when they had sudden vision loss or because their doctor’s office was not open. And a larger number than usual of amputations because people with diabetic wounds were not getting those treated.” The constant fear plus the loneliness from lockdown-caused isolation and the economic despair from so many businesses shuttered or destroyed has sent suicidal impulses soaring. Calls Soar from 80 to 1,800 at a Suicide Hotline Child and adolescent psychiatrist Mark McDonald spoke of what he’d heard from the director of a suicide hotline located about a mile from his Los Angeles practice. He said, “In the month of February, she had received 80 phone calls to her center. In the month of March, she had received 1,800. That scared me because I knew that the people that I treat are the people who make those phone calls.” McDonald added, “I’ve been incredibly concerned, particularly on the impact to children, by the fear that is still here with us, and that continues as long as we don’t fully reopen our society.” ‘They are Scared. They are So Afraid of Dying’ The psychiatrist gave an example involving a dad he knows who recently proposed to his children they all go to the beach. He said the man’s eight-year-old daughter began crying and gripped on to him, saying, “‘Daddy, we can’t go to the beach.’ And he said, ‘Why?’ She said, ‘Because, Daddy, there are people at the beach.’ That really struck me, and it struck me not because it was an outlier. It struck me because I hear this from my children in my practice and their parents every single day. They are scared. They are so afraid of dying.” All that fear is so ironic when stacked up against the actual facts. McDonald said statistics from the CDC show, “Not a single child in the state of California has died from coronavirus. Zero. We also know that children are essentially immune from this with very, very rare exceptions. And they also don’t transmit it to other people, particularly to adults.” Coming for Kids: Huge Increase in Mental Illness The real harm that’s coming to children is caused by the lockdowns, according to McDonald. He said of the nation’s children, “We are keeping them locked down or under a very short leash, which is leading to terrible, terrible emotional disorders, panic disorders, social anxiety disorders, social phobia, obsessive-compulsive disorders. And we are going to pay the price the longer that we do not reopen in a huge increase in mental illness in children.” Jenny Beth Martin returned to the harm fear is causing in this pandemic. She spoke of a 48-year-old father of three who refused to go early in this pandemic to the hospital after he got a nasty cut on his hand. Fear Turns a Cut on a Hand Into a Death She recounted, “Eventually the cut became so infected that he did seek medical treatment in the hospital. He was admitted into the ICU, and 12 hours after being admitted into the ICU, he died from an infection from that cut on his hand. And the doctor who wrote about this said he would never forget the look on this patient’s wife’s face and what she said: ‘I don’t understand. It was just a cut on his hand. I don’t understand. How can this be happening?’ And the doctor said, ‘It should not be happening. Fear is what prevented him from initially seeking medical treatment when he needed it.’” She concluded, “I don’t think that most of the mainstream media understands the problems that the fear is creating.” To read the original article click here. For more articles from CBN News click here.

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‘No Lockdown’: Doctors Warn Shutdowns Unleashing Massive Health Crises and Upheaval

AHA Publisher — Fri, 12 Jun 2020 07:00:53 +0000

Paul Strand via CBN News – A growing number of doctors are trying to show why they believe lockdowns and shutdowns are doing more harm than the coronavirus itself. More than 1,200 have banded together in the group A Doctor A Day, and at SecondOpinionProject.com, they are presenting their case for why the lockdowns have been a medical disaster. “We’re looking at an increase in tens or hundreds of thousands of just suicides alone from the increased unemployment,” explained Dr. Paul Fronapfel, a pediatric anesthesiologist. ‘Every Town, Every City’ Dr. Simone Gold, who helped found A Doctor A Day, said, “Cases of depression or of drug abuse that were in check have gotten worse. We’re seeing that all over the country – every town, every city.” Addiction specialist Dr. Molly Rutherford added, “The morbidity and mortality from joblessness and from mental health crises and relapse and suicides, homicides, shootings – all these things – are just going to continue to get worse.” The doctors in this Second Opinion Project warn the coronavirus has been overhyped. 99.7 Percent Survive “The message has been disseminated that this is some terrible infection that’s a killer; that everybody is at risk of dying,” said cardiologist Dr. Daniel Wohlgelernter. But he pointed out, “We know that 99.7 percent of people that get infected with COVID survive.” Fronapfel added, “Ten times as many people die from other things on any given day.” Dr. Mark McDonald, an adolescent and adult psychiatrist, brought up children, saying, “The risk of death to children from flu, seasonal flu, is 20 to 30 times higher than that of the coronavirus. And yet we have never closed schools. We have never asked children or teachers to wear masks, to play separately, to eat separately, to arrive and leave separately from schools because of the flu. And now we’re doing that for the coronavirus.” ‘This Is Child Abuse’ “In my opinion, this is child abuse,” he said of the fear being infused in kids. “I am absolutely appalled and I think it makes no scientific or rational sense whatsoever.” Gynecologist Dr. Olga Swanson suggested, “We cannot lock up our young generation in the house for the next 12 or 18 months while we’re waiting for a vaccine.” That could be a vain hope, according to plastic surgeon Dr. Joel Singer, who pointed out, “There has never been a successful coronavirus vaccine. The last one they tried was the original SARS epidemic. They tried a vaccine. It killed all the (trial) monkeys.” ‘Nothing That Can Replace a Childhood for a Child’ So instead of waiting around for a vaccine, Swanson insisted, “The kids need to go back to school. They need to go back to school for the main reason that they need social interaction. And there’s nothing that can replace a childhood for a child.” “We’re talking about not only social isolation, depression, boredom, but we’re also talking about a strategic loss in education,” said ophthalmologist Dr. Jane Hughes. “If you take a look at Boston and some of the other places where they had online schooling, 20, 30, 40 percent of students didn’t ever log in.” Swanson added, “There are plenty of children in poverty who rely on schools for meals, who rely on the schools for safety.” Hughes concluded, “So I think we’re going to see the ripple effects, psychologically, socially, emotionally for a long time to come.” ‘Pure & Unadulterated Hysteria’ “What is driving the current response to this coronavirus is pure and unadulterated hysteria,” McDonald said. “This is actually a full-on societal anomaly that has infected virtually everyone in the country to some degree.” He said of this COVID obsession and terror, “We have to understand that it’s nonsense. Otherwise, we’re going to be locked into that in perpetuity.” “It seems that people think it’s more contagious than it is,” addiction specialist Rutherford said, adding it takes more than a casual passing by of an infected individual. “People who catch this virus are in close proximity for several minutes, possibly even an hour or two with the infected person.” Sunlight Kills It in a Second The best place to be is not inside, but in the great outdoors, according to plastic surgeon Dr. Joel Singer, who said, “When you’re outside, the sun is shining, the chances of spreading this disease are practically zero. If this virus gets hit by sunlight, it dies in a second.” So after all the guff people have taken for being outside, Rutherford commented, “This virus is very unlikely to spread outside, so it doesn’t make any sense that parks and beaches are closed at this point.” People Afraid of Dying from COVID-19 Are Dying From Other Things Many of doctors involved in the Second Opinion project tell of people who’ve died because they were too scared of COVID-19 to go to the hospital. Cardiologist Dr. Steven Hearne said of one man suffering heart pain who refused to go, “He declined because he was afraid he’d catch the virus. He basically waited till the last minute. 9-1-1 was called. EMS showed up and he arrested right there, had CPR, and didn’t make it.” Dr. Lionel Lee, a specialist in emergency medicine, spoke of another man and his family. “As he got weaker and weaker, they didn’t know what to do because they were getting constant bombardment from the news, saying ‘stay home, don’t go to the hospital: you’re going to get COVID,'” Lee noted. When his family realized he was dying, they got him to Dr. Lee, who reported, “We coded him for about 30 minutes and he passed away.” “I have had several colleagues who have told me that they have had patients die on them,” Lee added. ‘They’re Afraid They’re Going to Catch It on the Street’ Rutherford said of her own recent experiences, “I’ve had several patients who were worried about going to the Emergency Department when they clearly needed to go.” And cardiologist Hearne added, “I still have several patients who are afraid to come to my office. They’re afraid they’re going to catch it on the street walking down the road. And that’s just not the case.” For anesthesiologist Dr. Andrew Zak, this is personal. He said on SecondOpinionProject.com, “The example that really hits home the most is my own mother. She became ill, and she’s also very debilitated and has dementia. Her caregiver was very concerned. However, my relatives, they were very afraid to bring her into the hospital. And now it turns out, two weeks later, she indeed did have a stroke, which went undiagnosed and untreated. And at this point, she is now in much worse condition, and it’s just been devastating.” ‘Patients Are Getting Tossed Aside Right Now by Bureaucrats’ But there have also been people kept from getting absolutely necessary medical care because that care was labeled non-essential. That led plastic surgeon, Dr. Alina Sholar, to say, “Patients are getting tossed aside right now by bureaucrats focused on the virus with a total lack of consideration for the future care and the future health of everyone else.” Even Dr. Anthony Fauci recently warned on CNBC that the lockdowns could cause “irreparable damage.” Rutherford explained, “The consequences in terms of mental health for many of my patients and many people throughout this country are devastating. And it’s going to get worse the longer we keep our economy locked down.” ‘This Is a Lives-for-Lives Situation’ Sholar declared, “This is not a money-for-lives situation. This is a lives-for-lives situation.” Dr. Alfonso Di Carlo said of the government figures clamping down on citizens, patients, and physicians, “We need to start rising up and telling these officials, ‘look, we respect you, but you’re not a doctor.” He went on, “In this country we have rights. All our people in this country, we’re endowed by our Creator; we have rights and civil liberties. And we get to choose what we want to do, not have government dictate medical health care issues on us.” The doctors involved in the project represent more than 21,000 years of medical practice have even written to the White House, warning, “The millions of casualties of a continued shutdown will be hiding in plain sight, but they will be called alcoholism, homelessness, suicide, heart attack, stroke or kidney failure. In youths, it will be called financial instability, unemployment, despair, drug addiction, unplanned pregnancies, poverty, and abuse.” To read the original article click here. For more articles from CBN News click here.

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COVID-19 Has Become Less Deadly in Italy, Health Expert Says

AHA Publisher — Mon, 08 Jun 2020 07:00:58 +0000

Angela Betsaida B. Laguipo, BSN via News-Medical Net – Italy was one of the hardest-hit countries amid the coronavirus pandemic. Now, health experts say that the novel coronavirus is losing its potency and has become less deadly. An Italian health expert and the head of the San Rafaelle Hospital in Milan, Alberto Zangrillo, said that the virus, which causes the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), clinically no longer exists in Italy. “The swabs that were performed over the last ten days showed a viral load in quantitative terms that was absolutely infinitesimal compared to the ones carried out a month or two months ago,” he added. He also urged the government to continue easing quarantine and lockdown measures, saying that the warnings that the country will have a second wave is sparking panic among residents. Further, he added that the country is now returning to normal. Matteo Bassetti, the head of San Martino Hospital’s infectious diseases clinic in Genoa, Italy, agreed that the novel coronavirus, called severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) was not as fatal as it used to be. “The strength the virus had two months ago is not the same strength it has today. It is clear that today the COVID-19 disease is different, ” Bassetti explained. Italy’s Case Toll Italy experienced the wrath of COVID-19 in February to March, wherein the cases skyrocketed, making it one of the hardest-hit nations early in the pandemic. Now, the country has recorded a staggering 233,197confirmed cases and 33,475 deaths. Over the past week, the country’s coronavirus infection continued to decline, with 355 new cases on May 31, compared with 416 the previous day. The death toll was 75, down from 111 on May 30. The coronavirus outbreak in Italy started in February in Lombardy, the wealthy northern Italian province where Milan is located. The government locked down the region to contain the spread of the novel coronavirus and extended it throughout the country two days after. Three weeks into the lockdown, the effects started to appear. Italy has reported declines in new cases and deaths each day. Though the healthcare system was initially overwhelmed, the country has seen a steady decline in the intensive care unit occupancy. Now, the government confirmed plans to allow travel between regions starting June 3. Meanwhile, some local governors opposed the plan of letting Italians from Lombardy move freely since it is still the area with the highest ratio of new cases. Visitors from other European Union member states are no longer required to self-isolate for two weeks. The government has also gradually reopened the country’s economy after weeks of strict physical distancing measures. A month ago, the country opened the hospitality industry, with bars, restaurants, and cafes opening for customers for the first time in weeks. Also, fitness gyms, swimming pools, and sports centers are now open. Meanwhile, cinemas and theaters are set to open later this month. Cautious The government said that despite the decreasing number of infections, it was too soon to say that the fight is over. Sandra Zampa, an undersecretary at the health ministry in Italy, said that it is still unsure that the virus is disappearing. She urged that there is a need for evidence to support the theory and that all Italians should maintain the maximum caution. She emphasized on the importance of social distancing, avoiding large groups, and to frequently wash their hands and wear masks to prevent infection and contain the virus spread. To read the original article click here.

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