Cambridge researchers urge public health bodies like the NHS to provide trustworthy, research-driven alternatives to platforms driven by profit.

Researchers, led by UC San Francisco, tested the effectiveness of a weeklong, web-based wellbeing intervention, known as the Big Joy Project. This consisted of daily micro-acts, which included asking someone to share a fun, inspiring, or proud moment, making a gratitude list, and performing a kind act to brighten someone’s day. Approximately 17,600 people from around the world participated: most were from the United States, Canada and Great Britain (71%), female (84%), white (74%), with at least some college education (94%).

There’s an urgent need to quantify the role of fungal toxins (aflatoxins), found on agricultural crops, such as maize and peanuts (groundnuts), in the escalating rates of liver cancer in Ghana, as well as elsewhere in Africa and Asia, concludes a commentary published in the open access journal BMJ Global Health. Maize and peanuts are dietary staples in many Asian and African countries. And with one of the highest rates of liver cancer in Africa, at 16/100,000 of the population. Ghana represents a critical case study in furthering international understanding of the link between aflatoxins and the rising global toll taken by liver cancer, say the authors.

A new study published in the journal Annals of Epidemiology used a novel modeling method to link electronic health records containing data on in-home environmental exposures to housing and neighborhood location data for children with asthma living in low-income households. It found that children living in homes with greater chances of having cockroaches and rodents had worse lung function. As the majority of the children in the study were Black and lived in historically segregated neighborhoods, these findings highlight the consequences of longstanding racial inequities in housing characteristics and quality, borne by structural racism. 

A new study from Emory University addresses the growing global crisis of antibiotic-resistant infections. Many of these drug-resistant bacteria are spread through hospitals, and there are few antibiotics available for treatment.

Infants who survive serious health problems in the first few weeks of life have a higher risk of dying during childhood and adolescence compared to children who were healthy as newborns. This is according to a new study from Karolinska Institutet published in the journal JAMA Pediatrics.