Author: IQ TIMES MEDIA
When federal health officials announced on Jan. 5, 2026, that they were taking six out of 17 vaccines off the childhood immunization schedule, they argued that the move would give parents and caregivers more choice.Instead of all U.S. children routinely receiving them, these six vaccines are now optional – available to families who request them after consulting a clinician, through a process called shared clinical decision-making, officials said. All six – hepatitis A, hepatitis B, influenza, rotavirus, meningococcal disease and COVID-19 – will still be covered by federal programs such as Medicaid and the Vaccines for Children program, and by…
Methamphetamine doesn’t just spike levels of the pleasure-inducing hormone dopamine in the reward pathways of the brain – it also provokes damaging brain inflammation through similar mechanisms.Meth is addictive because it increases dopamine levels in the brain. While researchers know that meth triggers brain inflammation, whether the immune system also affects the brain’s reward system during drug use has been unclear.Our work focuses on how dopamine is regulated in the body and the reward pathways of the brain. Dopamine shapes motivation, movement, learning and cognition, and its disruption is linked to a range of neurological and neuropsychiatric disorders, including substance…
Elon Musk’s AI company has restricted Grok’s controversial AI image-generation feature to only paying subscribers on X, after the tool invited heavy criticism from across the world for letting users generate sexualized and nude images of women and children. In replies to users on Friday, Grok said only paying subscribers on X would be able to generate and edit images on the platform. Notably, these limits do not apply to the Grok app, which, at the time of publication, was letting anyone generate pictures without having to pay for a subscription. Initially available to anyone with daily limits, Grok’s image…
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — The Minneapolis school system will offer families the option of remote learning for a month amid federal immigration enforcement in the city, the district said.The district provided the update late Thursday in an email to teachers that was obtained by The Associated Press. Under the temporary plan, teachers will simultaneously deliver lessons from their classrooms to students in the classroom and at home. The move comes as the Trump administration sends 2,000 immigration agents to the area and the community responds to the fatal shooting of a local woman earlier this week by a federal agent.Immigration enforcement…
(This is an excerpt of the Health Rounds newsletter, where we present latest medical studies on Tuesdays and Thursdays.)Jan 9 (Reuters) – Adding yoga to regular treatment can help speed recovery from opioid withdrawal, a small Indian study suggests.Combining standard buprenorphine therapy with yoga helped people recover from opioid withdrawal almost twice as fast as the drug alone, researchers found.During opioid withdrawal, the stress system of the body remains overactive while its calming system is underactive, said study leader Dr. Hemant Bhargav from the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences in India.Patients can experience diarrhea, insomnia, pain, anxiety, and…
By Jack QueenNEW YORK, Jan 9 (Reuters) – Luigi Mangione, accused of gunning down a health insurance executive, will appear in federal court on Friday in a hearing over whether he should face the possibility of the death penalty if convicted.Mangione, 27, is accused of fatally shooting UnitedHealth CEO Brian Thompson on a sidewalk in Midtown Manhattan in December 2024. Public officials condemned the assassination.Mangione previously pleaded not guilty to federal murder, stalking and weapons charges and is behind bars while he awaits trial.At a hearing before U.S. District Judge Margaret Garnett in Manhattan at 11 a.m. ET (1600 GMT),…
Elon Musk said Grok gave him a clean bill of health.Musk told podcaster Peter Diamandis that he recently underwent an MRI. Afterward, the xAI CEO said he followed his own advice by uploading the results of a medical test to his company’s AI chatbot.”I did an MRI recently and submitted it to Grok,” Musk said during a wide-ranging interview with Diamandis on “Moonshots” posted on Tuesday. “None of the doctors nor Grok found anything.”It’s unclear why Musk underwent an MRI. His discussion with Diamandis, the founder of the XPrize and a Harvard-educated doctor, underscores the ongoing discussion about longevity that…
2026 is just getting started, and layoffs are already underway.Companies, including Angi, the company formerly known as Angie’s List, and the popular web tool Tailwind, have cut staff, citing the impact of artificial intelligence among the reasons for the layoffs.More than 100 other companies, from Amazon to Nike to Verizon, have filed legally mandated WARN notices about job cuts to come in 2026, according to WARN Tracker. Some of the cuts are part of previously announced reductions.This year’s cuts follow three years of significant workforce reductions across a broad range of industries, including tech, media, finance, and retail.The moves come…
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said it’s “naive” to think the US will shift away from China.”The idea of decoupling for whatever reason, philosophical reasons or national security reasons, it’s not based on any common sense,” Huang said during an episode of the “No Priors” podcast posted on Thursday.Huang, whose company is eagerly awaiting the ability to sell advanced chips in China again, praised President Donald Trump’s approach to navigating the relationship between the world’s two largest economies.”I am optimistic that our relationship with China will improve, that President Trump and the administration has a really, really grounded and common-sense attitude…
CHARLESTON, S.C. — Janell Green Smith had attended hundreds of births as a midwife. Now, it was her turn.As she and her husband prepared to welcome their first child, Green Smith set up a pink and rose gold nursery in their Spartanburg, South Carolina, home. She labeled each dresser drawer for the tiny clothes her daughter would soon wear. She shared ultrasound images with relatives, growing more excited as her February due date drew closer.But Green Smith, 31, was also nervous, according to her sister. She had devoted much of her career to improving health outcomes for women in her…