More than 100,000 cases have been reported in the Caribbean. About 53,000 have cropped up in the Dominican Republic. And South Floridians traveling to those two places might be responsible for bringing an epidemic home. Chikungunya, the oddly named disease that’s spread through mosquitoes, has infected 18 people in Florida…
Although Belize is best-known as the birthplace of chewing gum, it’s really similar to Jamaica in a lot of ways. Both are English-speaking Caribbean countries that used to be British colonies. And even though Great Britain legalized homosexuality in 1967, both have anachronistically retained their former oppressor’s anti-sodomy laws. According…
Belinda Slaughter’s doctor set her chances at around 1 percent. The 46-year-old Orlando woman still harvested her eggs and fertilized them with her husband’s sperm. Miraculously, one of the embryos is now a baby boy. Jackson Slaughter was born last September. But an article just published in a journal for…
We all have at least one Facebook friend who is all about CrossFit. They post sweaty pictures of themselves lifting heavy shit and hitting tires with a giant hammer and making strained faces that, if they’re not popping veins in their foreheads, they are — at the very least –…
At a kava symposium held in Fiji last week, a main concern was Vanuatu’s export of a specific variation of the intoxicating pepper root called tudei (or as commonly spelled, “two-day”) kava. Experts said they fear countries could ban all kava and destroy the industry because some exporters were selling…
Audrey Winkelsas is a junior at the University of Miami. She was just 7 months old when she was diagnosed with spinal muscular atrophy, a form of muscular dystrophy. She studies biochemistry and helps conduct research for the Miami Project to Cure Paralysis. She hopes one day to find a…
Sure, running across the country is the kind of thing everyone hopes to do at some point in his or her life, like cleaning the leaves out of the gutter and crossing off some of those New Year’s resolutions. But on July 26, 2010, Milton Miller was lounging on his…
On August 9, 2011, Benjamin and Madeline Rodriquez sat in the waiting room of a West Palm Beach dental office. The couple’s 5-year-old daughter, Briana, was inside for a cleaning. When the little girl appeared, her eyes were streaming tears. Blood ringed her lips. Instead of a simple brushing, three…
There’s a literal shitstorm spreading through Broward County, apparently. The Florida Department of Health in Broward County has sent out a warning about a crazy diarrhea bug that’s apparently spreading throughout schools and daycare centers lately. Officials say that Broward County has been showing an increase in cases where the…
There’s a miracle worker in Delray Beach, a wizard in a white robe who can make make appendages grow back like an amphibian. His name is Eugenio Rodriguez, a surgeon schooled at the University of Puerto Rico, who just made a jockey’s finger grow back…
A Tampa woman wants to get medical marijuana to save her 2-year-old daughter’s life. Although she’s still getting her cancer-stricken daughter conventional treatment, such as radiation therapy, Moriah Barnhart says that’s not enough. And she wants options other than just chemotherapy. Medical marijuana, Barnhart says, would work better than chemotherapy,…
Killer pythons, Herpes Monkeys, kittens with rabies. What else ya got, Florida? Dengue-fever-carrying mosquitoes, you say? Fantastic! As we wrote about last month, the Florida Department of Health confirmed three cases of dengue fever contracted in Florida. And now, it’s apparently spreading, with the number ballooning to 15 in a…
Yesterday, the American Lung Association warned that middle and high school children are smoking electronic cigarettes at a “troubling” rate. Data released from the Centers for Disease Control shows that between 2011-2012, the number of 6-12th graders reporting having ever used an e-cigarette more than doubled — from 3.3 percent…
Florida is the 12th least fattest state in the nation. That according to a report by the Trust for America’s health and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. *HIGH FIVE* *EAT SOME FROSTING STRAIGHT OUT OF THE CAN*…
The Florida Department of Health issued a warning this week of a rare brain-eating amoeba that feeds off brain cells. The warning comes off the news of a 12-year-old boy affected with the parasite, currently fighting for his life in the intensive care unit at the Miami Children’s Hospital. Health…
Students may return to school in the fall, but that doesn’t mean much in South Florida. It’s very much summer almost year round here, a state of affairs which should make protection from the sun an important part of our daily health regimen. But many school districts treat sunscreen as…
Lighthouse Point resident David Duresky is a breastfeeding champion. No, really, there’s a a breastfeeding awareness month: August, and a “Breastfeeding Hall of Excellence,” into which Duresky has been inducted. Duresky was awarded $5,000 to “fund research, sponsor continuing education, purchase equipment” and/or “donate to the breastfeeding charity of [his]…
The Boy Scouts of America is currently holding its 2013 National Jamboree, where scouts from all over the country converge in West Virginia to whitewater raft, climb mountains, zip lines, mountain bike, and participate in other Boy Scouty things. But, apparently the scouts’ body mass index criteria to take part…
After years of studying all the studies about circumcision, the American Academy of Pediatrics last year updated its policy about circumcision of infant boys. Whereas it had previously been neutral on the matter, the organization started recommending the procedure, advising that the benefits outweigh the risks.This put the AAP at…
Bring out your pills! Leave no injectable behind! Think that two-year old bottle of codeine isn’t safe to mix with Sprite? Ditch it! Fort Lauderdale is hosting a no-questions-asked medication take back on Jan. 27 at 301 N. Andrews Ave. from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. The city and much…
Valyn Calhoun posted a photo of himself, looking pale and weighing 95 pounds. “I put up a picture of my body,” the 29-year-old wrote. “It may scare some, but this is something I see everyday.”Calhoun, a photographer who runs in Fort Lauderdale’s music and art scenes, contracted HIV and hepatitis…
It’s been a marquee week for boner pills. First, a University of Florida professor and colleagues published a study showing that Cialis, the blockbuster erectile dysfunction drug, can help treat Becker muscular dystrophy, a rare and debilitating disease that often cripples people by age 30 and for which there’s no…
