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Government unemployment data today are what Nielsen TV ratings were decades ago - a flawed metric only believed if you like what they show. Government unemployment data take too long, like the CDC for the last 15 years needs six weeks to tell the public if lettuce has E. coli, and it only measures people getting paid through unemployment insurance. Once that runs out, to the government they are suddenly employed again.

Gestational diabetes, a form of glucose intolerance during pregnancy, occurs primarily in women who already had obesity and added more weight. It not only carries immediate pregnancy risks but increases the chance of future heart disease for both the mother and the child. And it has gone up every year since 2016, according a new analysis of more than 12 million U.S. births from the National Center for Health Statistics; up 36 percent during the study period. Pregnancy is simply a trigger for something likely to happen eventually, due to poor energy balance among more women. They eat far more than they burn with exercise, which leads to weight gain and risks of many lifestyle diseases only exceeded by alcohol and cigarettes.

Researchers recently studied the relationship between numerical information in our vision, and how it affects our perception of space - and discovered subtle asymmetries that color our view on the world. They wanted to see if numbers in our vision create “attentional biases” so volunteers were asked to identify the center of lines and squares filled with numbers. It showed how our perception of space is a complex interplay between “object-based” processing and our processing of numerical information.

Bees have the reputation of being incredibly organized and spending their days making sure our food ecosystem is functioning. Neither is accurate. Unless you are an almond farmer in California and rented bees that were delivered in giant trucks, they have no impact on your food, and they are also not working non-stop for the hive.Instead, they may be genetically wired to beg for food.Male bees -“drones” - actually cannot digest pollen, the most important source of protein for bees. To avoid starvation, they depend on worker bees feeding them a pre-processed paste that workers make from pollen. It's not a communist love-fest, though, drones instead must convince workers to provide the food. Over time, they evolved to be able to beg.

Bleeding hosts and stigmatizations are the best-known medieval miracles but less known ones, like a scorched cherry twig miraculously sprouting, a diseased swamp becoming fertile land, and healing the broken leg of an ox, are getting a new look. 

The inexpensive medication pantoprazole prevents potentially serious stomach bleeding in critically ill patients and can save consumers and the government thousands of dollars. The results of a new study show that when prescribed in hospital for mechanically ventilated patients in the intensive care unit, where patients are on life support and at high risk of upper gastrointestinal bleeding due to ulcers, the benefits are dramatic. So are the resulting savings, at a time when governments are struggling to contain costs during times of rising public criticism.Image: Storyblocks

Adults with atrial fibrillation (AFib) who are not diabetic but are overweight and took the diabetes medication metformin after a rhythm-correction procedure had decreased risk of AFib episodes for a year. Weight loss would usually be a confounder, since lifestyle changes such as that are often a big help, but in the data sample the weight changes were low.

In the various 'Predator' films, the alien hunter can see across various spectra while enabling camouflage from our vision.That happens in nature. Octopuses, squids, and the scariest of them all, cuttlefish, in the cephalopod family have evolved the ablity to modify their skin to blend in with the environment. That is due to the presence of xanthommatin, a natural pigment with color-shifting capabilities.

The older you get, the more frail you become. The more frail you become, the greater the risk of falling, hospitalization, and shorter life expectancy.Doctors talk about physical activity to reduce frailty but less attention is paid to biology. A new paper suggests that the hypothalamic–pituitary–gonadal (HPG) axis, the body’s system of regulating production of the hormone testosterone, can impact frailty."Suggests" means this is only EXPLORATORY, not human science, but a relationship between 

Actors, artists, and musicians are rightly worried about the impact of AI on their incomes but doctors and scientists welcome the help. They know typewriters didn't make literature worse than writing in longhand and "AI" - LLMs - likewise removes the 'how' of information access so thinkers can get to the 'why.'In modern government-controlled healthcare, doctors are more pressed for time per patient than ever. Often while relying on incomplete information. Electronic health records contain vast amounts of patient data but much of it remains difficult to interpret quickly, and that is even more challenging for patients with rare diseases or unusual symptoms.

When you picture a black hole, you probably picture in the center of a galaxy with matter swirling toward it. You're not wrong but that is why the exception proves the rule.A recent study detected a surprising tidal disruption event where a black hole outside the center of a galaxy is tearing apart a star. Even stranger and defiance of black hole lore, the delayed and powerful radio outbursts suggest previously unknown processes in how black holes eject material over time. Designated AT 2024tvd, it is to-date the fastest-evolving radio emission ever observed from a black-hole-driven stellar disruption.

The process by which the nervous system continuously receives and interprets the body’s physiological signals to keep vital functions running smoothly, a "sixth sense" called
interoception
that tells your brain when you need to breathe, when your blood pressure declines or when you have an infection, is getting some star power; a Nobel laureate neuroscientist.And an NIH grant.