Closer Look
How a 'good, honest, funny man' battles addiction
Rachel Wisniewski for STAT
Shaun Anderson (above) lives in Philadelphia's Kensington neighborhood, thought to be the largest heroin market on the East Coast. It's also reputed to be where xylazine, the animal sedative known as "tranq," seeped into the illegal drug supply almost a decade ago. It's definitely where Anderson struggles every day with opioid addiction. "All I ever wanted was to be a good husband and father. … Heroin mess[es] with you. I forget who I am — which is a good, honest, funny man."
STAT contributor Rachel Wisniewski followed Anderson over several months, hearing his story and photographing his world as he regained housing and learned again what it's like not to sleep out in the open, fearful of getting beaten up. He's working with a case manager, someone who's in recovery herself, someone who knows that for many like Anderson who resolve to quit, it's far easier said than done. Read more.
pandemic
Health insurer says more people over 65 are in the hospital for Covid
More older adults have been hospitalized for Covid-19 over the past several weeks, according to internal data reviewed by health insurance giant Humana. Most of the insurance coverage the company provides is for people 65 and older, the same group of people more vulnerable to Covid's most severe effects. Humana did anticipate more Covid cases, but not in the summer.
In June, Humana said it was recording higher medical claims costs because its insurance members increasingly were going to emergency rooms, getting outpatient surgeries, and seeing dentists. Its new disclosure of more Covid hospitalizations was not a major factor in that jump of health care use, but Covid cases have been on the rise in the U.S. and around the world as infectious disease experts track new subvariants of the virus, which has not yet fallen into a seasonal pattern like other respiratory diseases. STAT's Bob Herman has more.
health
There are gaps to be filled in menopause science
After 70 years of research, you'd think we might know more about menopause. But a new review in Cell of that time span calls out research gaps while urging individualized treatment for women (a term they use to reflect existing scientific literature while acknowledging others may go through it). The authors set the tone this way: "Recognition that menopause, for most women, is a natural biological event, does not exempt the use of interventions to alleviate symptoms."
Those symptoms can be temporary, like short-term memory loss, or severe, long-lasting, and silent, such as bone loss and a higher risk of diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and certain cancers. Few treatments besides hormone therapy have been well researched, and even that treatment is far from a perfect solution for all patients. The authors recommend individualized therapy that takes into account age and health risks as well as expanding research beyond high-income countries.
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