Millions Of Homes Sit Vacant Amid America’s Housing Crisis — Here Are The 3 Biggest Reasons
Jing Pan – October 17, 2023
America has a housing shortage. According to Realtor.com, the gap between single-family home construction and household formation grew to 6.5 million homes from 2012 to 2022.
And despite the Federal Reserve’s substantial interest rate hikes aimed at curbing inflation, housing affordability continues to elude many areas across the country, with rent prices surging in tandem.
Yet according to a new analysis by LendingTree, millions of homes stay vacant in America.
Using the latest U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey data, LendingTree found that there are 5.5 million vacant housing units in the 50 largest metros in the U.S. This results in an average vacancy rate of 7.22%.
“In a simplified version of the housing market, vacancy rates should have a strong inverse relationship to home and rent prices,” wrote Jacob Channel, senior economist at LendingTree.
But reality can be different from theory, as home prices remain high in many parts of the country. Channel explained that there are “more nuanced factors” in play, such as location, mortgage rates, unit size and reasons homes are unoccupied.
The study revealed that New Orleans, Miami and Tampa, Florida, have the highest vacancy rates in the country, standing at 13.88%, 12.65% and 12.15%, respectively. In contrast, the lowest vacancy rates are found in Minneapolis; Austin, Texas; and Washington, D.C., with rates of 4.51%, 4.57%, and 4.98%, respectively.
Minneapolis, Austin and D.C. are the only three cities with vacancy rates below 5%.
Why Homes Are Vacant
Given the housing shortage in the U.S., you might wonder why these units remain unoccupied.
LendingTree’s analysis showed that the most prevalent reason (26.61%) for vacant housing units in the nation’s 50 largest metropolitan areas is that they are available for rent.
Meanwhile, 17.04% of housing units remain vacant because they are used only part-time.
Additionally, 7.98% of homes are unoccupied because of ongoing repair or renovation work.
LendingTree also pointed out that in cases where an area exhibits both high vacancy rates and high home prices, it may indicate the presence of distinctive features, such as being a sought-after vacation destination or a prime target for investors.
Housing Affordability In America
With rising interest rates, homebuyers find themselves contending with larger mortgage payments.
According to The State of the Nation’s Housing 2023 report from Harvard University’s Joint Center for Housing Studies, the annual income needed to afford payments on a median-priced home in the U.S. is now $117,100, up nearly $20,000 from last year.
And that means millions of households are now priced out of the market.
“The number of renter households able to afford these higher payments shrunk by 32%, from 7.5 million to 5.1 million, a loss of 2.4 million potential homebuyers,” the Harvard researchers said.
To navigate an expensive housing market, LendingTree suggests shopping around for the best possible rate, considering different loan options and getting preapproved for your mortgage before you start house hunting.
Climbing 50 stairs a day may stave off heart disease — while living near a park or lake can keep you mentally well. How to improve your health, according to new studies
Kaitlin Reilly – October 14, 2023
Climbing stairs may reduce your risk of cardiovascular disease. (Getty Images)
There’s so much health and wellness news out there. Here are some of this week’s health headlines and what you can take away from them to better impact your health.
Cycling may improve mental health
A survey of 1,200 middle school students who participated in a cycling program found improvements in their mental health and physiological well-being. The improvements appeared especially significant in students who were ethnic minorities from low-income families.
Why it matters: Cycling combines transportation, leisure and exercise — three things that can benefit young people greatly once they learn how to ride safely. For older individuals, the same reasoning can be applied to dusting off your own bike: A 2017 study found that people who commuted by bike to work had lower risk for certain cancers and cardiovascular disease.
Climbing stairs may impact heart health
A U.K.-based study published in the journal Atherosclerosis found that people who climbed 50 stairs over the course of a day reduced their risk of atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease and of cardiovascular disease in general by 20% when compared to people who did not climb any stairs daily.
Study author Dr. Lu Qi, director of Tulane University’s Obesity Research Center, told Medical News Today that stair climbing is a “vigorous exercise” which is associated with “lowering body weight, improving metabolic status and inflammation, and reducing other diseases which may increase the risk of heart disease, such as diabetes.”
Why it matters: We know that getting your heart pumping is important for your overall health, yet many people say they struggle to fit exercise into their lives. Choosing to take the stairs wherever you can, as evidenced by this study, is one potentially easy way to reap the benefits of exercise without overhauling your lifestyle.
Living near ‘green’ or ‘blue’ spaces may benefit mental health
A 10-year study out of the U.K. published in the journal Planetary Health found that greater exposure to green and blue spaces — such as living near a park or a lake, respectively — reduced your likelihood of developing a mental health condition.
Why it matters: There’s mounting evidence that suggests natural spaces may benefit mental health. A recent study suggested that fishing benefited mental health in men — but that the correlation had less to do with angling itself, and more to do with access to blue spaces. Whether you live somewhere with access to more natural environments or not, seeking them out whenever possible can allow you to reap some of these benefits.
Your Apple Watch can now tell you how much sunlight you’re getting
A new feature in the Apple Watch series 6 or later tracks how much time in the sun you’re getting, which is made possible by the wearable’s ambient light sensor, as well as its GPS and motion sensors.
Why it matters: If you already track the amount of steps you take each day, you may benefit from also tracking your time in the sun. Morning sunlight, for example, can help improve your sleep later on, and exposure to sunlight in general can help raise vitamin D levels, which are important for boosting immunity and energy. Of course, it’s also important to be aware of the risk of sun exposure, which can lead to skin cancer — so if you’re tracking your sunlight with your watch, you might want to also use it as a reminder to keep the time limited and to reapply sunscreen.
Children may benefit greatly from practicing mindfulness
Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found that children who used a mindfulness app at home for 40 days reduced their stress levels, as well as reporting lower negative emotions like fear and loneliness overall. The study, which was conducted in 2020 and 2021 during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, allowed researchers to see how children with higher levels of mindfulness appeared less emotionally affected by the global crisis.
Why it matters: Mindfulness has long been studied for its mental health benefits — a 2023 study showed that mindfulness techniques, when practiced over time, may be as effective as taking medication.
Many parents are now teaching their children how to be mindful as well. Sarah Ezrin, author of The Yoga of Parenting, previously told Yahoo Life, “I wasn’t taught any self-regulation techniques as a kid. I had to learn them all as an adult and, while they’ve been inordinately helpful, I can only imagine what learning these right out the gate can do for our development, mood regulation and emotional regulation skills.”
Want to live to a healthy 100? Longevity doctor Peter Attia has advice.
Andrea Atkins – October 13, 2023
“If you improve your health span, so that when you’re 80, you actually function like a 65-year-old, it’s almost impossible to not also get five to 10 years of life-span extension,” says Peter Attia, author of “Outlive: The Science & Art of Longevity.” (Dia Dipasupil via Getty Images)
Do you want to live to 100? Thanks to modern medicine, you have a decent chance of doing so.
But if you want to live well to 100, physician and best-selling author Peter Attia says you may have some work to do so that your last decade of life – your “marginal decade,” as he calls it – is healthful and rewarding, not limited by disease.
If we adopt new ways of looking at our health, we can do a better job of matching our life span (how long we live) to our “health span” (how long we live free from chronic disease or other health problems), says Attia, the author of “Outlive: The Science & Art of Longevity.”
In a phone interview, Attia talked about “the Four Horsemen of Chronic Disease” – cardiovascular disease, cancer, cognitive diseases (such as Alzheimer’s) and metabolic diseases (such as Type 2 diabetes) – and new ways to plan for longevity. The following was edited for length and clarity.
Q: Many people fear living to be 100, imagining loneliness, poor health and solitude. Should living so long be our aim?
A: I don’t think it should, actually. A lot of those fears are really valid. I think a better goal is to maximize health span. When you do that, you will automatically get a longer life span. If you improve your health span, so that when you’re 80, you actually function like a 65-year-old, it’s almost impossible to not also get five to 10 years of life-span extension.
Q: One of the ways to improve health span is through something you call “the Centenarian Decathlon.” What is it, and how do we train for it?
A: It’s a mental model which says that the greater the specificity with which you train for your physical goals, the more likely you are to achieve them.
I think back to the very first goal I ever had, which was to run five five-minute miles. That’s a lot more specific than saying I want to be able to run five miles. If you want to achieve that, you have to train with far greater specificity than if you just want to able to run five miles. And this is true across the board. And it’s what’s necessary to achieve remarkable feats.
I ask patients to think specifically about what they want to be able to do when they are in their 80s or older, and to start training for that when they are in their 40s or 50s or 60s.
Q: You mean, for example, if you want to hike for two miles when you’re 80.
A: Yes.
Q: Why won’t just hiking every day in the years leading up to that prepare you to continue walking outdoors?
A: Because as you age, the degradation of strength, stamina, balance, lower leg variability is so profound that it is insufficient to just hike two miles when you’re in your 40s and 50s, and assume that’s going to get you doing the same thing when you’re 80. When you’re 80, you have to aim much higher. . . . The Centenarian Decathlon is asking, “What do you want to do in your marginal decade?” And the more specific you can make it, the better, because you’ll be able to train for it, and increase the odds that you will be ready for it.
Q: And if you want to lift your great-grandchild when you’re 80, you need to do what, exactly, when you’re 50, 60 and 70?
A: To safely pick up a 30-pound child from the floor, you need hip flexibility and abdominal and spinal stability to get into a low squat position, then you need to be able to pick up a 30-pound weight. It’s harder to do a squat with weight in front of you because it requires more core stabilization and more scapular stability [shoulder strength]. This essentially means you need to be able to do a 30-pound goblet squat at the age of 85. . . . By the time they’re 85, most can’t even do the goblet squat, without any additional weight. So just on that one metric of strength, we have something that we need to train for.
Q: You say exercise is the most important tactic for longevity, but more than 60 percent of Americans do not get enough exercise. Can sedentary people undertake the vigorous training that you recommend?
A: If you’re starting from zero, just getting to 90 minutes a week of exercise will result in a 15 percent reduction in all-cause mortality [including the Four Horsemen]. That’s dramatic. I mean, we don’t have drugs that can reduce 15 percent all-cause mortality across the board. And the good news is it’s not just like this abstract thing of “we’re adding a couple of years to your life.” No, no. You’re going to feel better in three months.
Every person who saves for retirement, in my view, is doing something slightly more difficult. Because in the short term, you get nothing out of saving for retirement. . . . And I would say with these other changes that we ask people to make, at least they’re getting a benefit today.
How is anybody supposed to find time for this? I would just say, if you’re not going to make time for this, what are you making time for?
Q: Most of us succumb to one of those Four Horsemen. What do these diseases have in common?
A: Cancer, cardiovascular disease and neurogenerative diseases, Alzheimer’s being the most common, are all exacerbated dramatically by metabolic disease. So, if you have Type 2 diabetes, your risk of those other diseases goes up dramatically.
Q: You suggest getting ahead of these diseases by screening, gene testing or digging deeply into bloodwork to uncover markers that, frankly, most insurance companies won’t pay for. What do you say to patients, and your critics, about why these things are worth doing?
A: I guess the question is, what’s the alternative? The alternative is continuing to do what we’re doing. How is that working out? Not so well. So, if herculean preventive measurements are too expensive, treating them is costlier.
Is it expensive to get a $1,000 CT angiogram when you’re 40? Yes, it is. Do you know what it costs to get a stent placed? Or to get a bypass when you’re 65? Unfortunately, if you really want to take prevention seriously, you’re on the hook for the cost.
Q: Does this mean that only rich people can live healthfully to 100?
A: Screening is simply one small part of this. Far more relevant to increasing your health span is not whether or not you’re getting a CT angiogram, it’s whether you’re doing all of the other things that we talked about vis-à-vis sleep, nutrition and exercise. You don’t have to be wealthy to do those things.
Q: Isn’t it true that even if you do all of this, the Horsemen could still come for you?
A: Isn’t there a chance that if you save for retirement, your investments will sour before you need to draw the money out? Yeah, of course, there is. But if you don’t do these things, you dramatically increase the odds of things not going well.
Study reveals why residents of this major city are losing an average 12 years off their life expectancies — and it’s likely not what you think
Laurelle Stelle – October 14, 2023
Air pollution can have a dramatic effect on human health. Living somewhere with heavily polluted air leads to long-term health problems.
A recent study examining the toll taken by pollution concluded that residents of Delhi, India, were losing almost 12 years from their life expectancy due to tiny particulates in the air, The Weather Channel reported.
What’s happening?
The study used satellite data from 2021 to determine the amount of PM2.5 pollution in different areas. PM2.5 refers to particulates under 2.5 micrometers in size. Particulates this small can be inhaled deep into the lungs, causing breathing and cardiovascular issues, according to one report in the Journal of Thoracic Disease.
The recent study found that Dehli had the highest levels of PM2.5 pollution worldwide, The Weather Channel reported. Residents there were exposed to 126.5 micrograms per cubic meter of air — more than 25 times the World Health Organization’s recommended maximum of five micrograms per cubic meter.
Across India as a whole, the average was 58.7 micrograms per cubic meter, or almost 12 times the recommended level, The Weather Channel reported.
This might sound like a faraway problem, but some cities in the United States also suffer from particulate pollution. Statista reported that as of 2022, Oak Ridge, Tennessee, had a PM2.5 level of 33.5 micrograms per cubic meter, over six times WHO’s recommended level.
Why are these numbers concerning?
According to The Weather Channel, pollution numbers this high have a measurable and dramatic impact on human lifespans. The study found that Delhi residents have their life expectancies shortened by 11.9 years compared to someone living with the clean air that the WHO recommends. The average Indian loses 5.3 years of life expectancy.
To put this in perspective, the researchers compared these numbers to the reduction in life expectancy caused by cardiovascular diseases, the number one cause of death worldwide. According to the study, cardiovascular disease reduced the average lifespan of India’s residents by 4.5 years — making air quality a more severe threat to health.
What can be done about PM2.5 pollution?
According to the New York Department of Health, one of the most common sources of PM2.5 pollution is gas-powered vehicles — and Delhi is famous for its traffic.
Switching to electric vehicles, like this solar-powered seven-seat bike from Indian entrepreneur Asad Abdullah, could make a world of difference. This change becomes more possible every year as EVs become more and more cost-effective.
Unretiring: More retirees are going back to work because they want to — or need to
Kerry Hannon, Senior Columnist – October 14, 2023
Richard Eisenberg retired in 2022.
At 65, he stepped away from his job as managing editor for “Next Avenue,” the PBS website for people over 50, where he had worked for a decade.
“I had a rough idea of what my retirement would be,” Eisenberg told Yahoo Finance. “I knew I would be ‘unretiring’ since I still wanted to be doing some writing, some editing, and some teaching, but not all the time.”
So far, he has. Eisenberg, who lives in Westfield, N.J., explores “unretirement” in his expert columns, podcast and teaching posts, including an online NYU master class.
“I’m seeing a lot of curiosity about the idea,” he said. “I’m still a little surprised that it seems like such a foreign concept to people.”
A growing number of retirees like Eisenberg have stepped off the sidelines and headed back to work, especially after many were forced to retire in the pandemic, according to a new report from T. Rowe Price. Around 7% of retirees are looking for work in retirement, while 20% say they’re already working part time or full time.
“In 2021, during the pandemic, that percentage was 10%,” Judith Ward, a certified financial planner and thought leadership director at T. Rowe Price, told Yahoo Finance. “They might have been forced to retire, and now we’re seeing that they are reentering the workforce.”
“Unretiree” Richard Eisenberg teaching students at the NYU Summer Publishing Institute 2023 (Photo courtesy of Eisenberg) (Richard Eisenberg)
The two main reasons for coming back into the workforce are a tale of opposites. While 45% chose to work for social and emotional benefits like Eisenberg, a slightly larger percentage — 48% — felt they needed to work for financial reasons.
Older adults, those age 65 and older, represent the fastest growing group of homeless, while poverty among older Americans has escalated. Policymakers and researchers have also been fretting that the share of older Americans with debt has risen from 38% to 63% since 1990, according to a recent report by the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College.
“Many people retired during the pandemic for a variety of reasons and the financial reality of that is now hitting home,” Chris Farrell, author of “Unretirement” and “Purpose and a Paycheck,” told Yahoo Finance. “Working even a few hours a week can help shore up household finances.”
“They’re taking advantage of the tight labor market to unretire, often by picking up part-time work, flexible gigs, starting their own business, and even encore careers,” Farrell said.
Damascus, Md.-based resident Gary Socha, 69, who retired after being laid off during the pandemic from his publishing job, stepped back in two years ago and is now working part time, four hours a day, as an advertising and event representative.
“It was too early, and my wife is five years younger and still working,” Socha told Yahoo Finance. “And financially… it just seems to make sense to make some more money and make yourself a little bit more secure and more comfortable for when you do retire. I could see doing this for quite a while.”
For other retirees, the lack of retirement planning or saving is coming back to haunt them.
“It’s not uncommon for people to retire without having actually made a retirement plan, and then find some financial surprises along the way,” Mark Miller, a retirement expert and author of “Retirement Reboot,” told Yahoo Finance. “That can prompt some people to go back to work. And the faster pace of inflation we’ve been experiencing also is motivating some people to go back to work, just to help cover their living expenses.”
Source: T. Rowe Price (T. Rowe Price)
How much wealth you have to tap, of course, is the lynchpin. There’s a huge difference by household assets when it comes to retirees who say they “don’t need to work,” according tothe T. Rowe Price report, which surveyed 2,895 401(k) retirement plan participants and 1,136 retirees with a Rollover IRA or a left-in-plan balance.
The report found 37% of retirees with household assets under $50,000 said they don’t need to work versus 55% of those in the $50,000-to-$250,000 category and 72% with assets of $750,000 and above.
Women are particularly vulnerable. In the report, 49% of retired women who were working or looking for work said they need the money compared to 41% of men.
One reason is that many women have less savings to depend on in retirement and lower Social Security benefits because of time out of the workplace for caregiving.
“Typically, lower incomes, higher debt loads — especially student loans — and shorter job tenures are some of the factors contributing to the gender savings gap,” Sudipto Banerjee, T. Rowe Price’s vice president, retirement, and author of the report, told Yahoo Finance at the WISER Annual Women’s Retirement Symposium.
The biggest financial payoffs of additional years of paid work are pushing back retirement account withdrawals, continuing to save, and delaying claiming Social Security benefits.
“Additional income can give you more time to contribute to your savings and it can also help you pay down debt and increase your cash reserves ahead of full retirement,” Ward said. And for those unretirees who haven’t started taking their Social Security benefit, delaying to claim means more money down the road.
“You’ll get a higher benefit, and it’s inflation-adjusted, so that’s a good deal for many people,” Ward said.
Many retirees are looking to continue working in some form, a T. Rowe Price report finds. (Getty Creative) (10’000 Hours via Getty Images)
The feel good part of staying on the job
There’s also the emotional draw of working, which is the second most-cited reason retirees choose to return to work.
Many retirees see part-time work as a good transition strategy with 57% of retirees wanting to continue working in some form, the T. Rowe Price report found. Men, in particular, were more likely to cite social connections as motivation to work.
“A lot of us want to work part-time in retirement,” Eisenberg said. “We want to stay active, have social connections, bring in some income and to stay mentally engaged, but we also want to have time to do other things.”
Plus, there’s the freedom to do what you want to do this time around, Eisenberg said. That means choosing a working route that isn’t stuffed with meetings, administrative duties — all “the parts of our former job that we didn’t like so much.”
And then there are the psychological benefits that work can offer, Robert Laura, a retirement coach, told Yahoo Finance. Several studies have indicated the positive mental effects of working. In fact, among older adults, retirees are more likely to experience depression compared to those who are still working, according to one recent paper.
“Work provides routine, structure, connection, mental stimulus, purpose, and relevance,” Laura said. “These are all things that many people don’t realize they are losing when they leave work and that aren’t easily replaced with golf, grandkids, and crossword puzzles.”
Kerry Hannon is a Senior Reporter and Columnist at Yahoo Finance. She is a workplace futurist, a career and retirement strategist, and the author of 14 books, including “In Control at 50+: How to Succeed in The New World of Work” and “Never Too Old To Get Rich.”
Toxic PFAS from US military bases polluting drinking water, report finds
Tom Perkins – October 13, 2023
Photograph: Frederic J Brown/AFP/Getty Images
Plumes of toxic PFAS “forever chemicals” flowing from at least 245 US military bases are contaminating or threatening to pollute drinking water for nearby communities, and hundreds more are likely at risk across America, a new Department of Defense report finds.
The number of communities threatened by the military’s pollution is likely to increase as further more investigations are carried out. The defense department has only looked at about one-third of more than 700 facilities suspected of having contaminated the ground with PFAS.
While the report acknowledges the pollution, it does not clarify which drinking water sources are polluted, how high PFAS levels are in the polluted water systems, or provide information about the plumes’ locations.
The sheer number of bases and the lack of clarity is “shocking”, said Scott Faber, the vice-president of government affairs at the Environmental Working Group non-profit, which tracks military PFAS pollution.
“A good neighbor would let you know that their use of PFAS was the reason your water was contaminated, and a bad neighbor would only tell you: ‘Hey, a plume is heading in your direction,’” Faber said.
The defense department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
PFAS, or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, are a class of about 15,000 compounds most frequently used to make products water-, stain- and grease-resistant. They have been linked to cancer, birth defects, decreased immunity, high cholesterol, kidney disease and a range of other serious health problems.
They are dubbed “forever chemicals” because most do not degrade in the environment.
The military is considered one of the largest PFAS polluters in the world, largely due to its use of firefighting foam laced with the chemicals discharged during emergencies or training exercises. Some of the highest levels of PFAS in groundwater ever detected have been found around bases. The Environmental Protection Agency’s advisory health guidelines state that less than one part per trillion (ppt) in drinking water is safe, while levels found around military bases have exceeded 2.25m ppt.
Congress in recent years has included in Defense Authorization Acts requirements for the military to begin investigating PFAS pollution in and around its facilities. The defense department has so far confirmed PFAS contamination at 455 bases, it wrote in the new report, and of that group it has confirmed that 275 out of 295 checked, or about 90%, have plumes “in the proximity” of drinking water supplies.
The report does not clarify what “in the proximity” means and does not specify which types of drinking water supplies are threatened. Though it provides a list of bases, public drinking water systems can draw from surface water or community wells, and it is unclear how the plumes may be impacting those pulling water from private wells.
“That is what we know so far because that’s all the DoD told us, and it took an act of Congress to get that much information,” Faber said.
Though the report does not provide clarity on which communities are drinking contaminated water, the defense department in August issued a separate report revealing that it is now providing clean drinking water to 53 communities.
The military currently only provides clean drinking water for communities with levels of PFOA and PFOS, two kinds of PFAS compounds, above 70 ppt. The EPA is proposing lowering the legal limit to 4 ppt. If it does, as expected, the defense department will likely be forced to provide drinking water to most, if not all, communities around facilities where there is PFAS contamination.
Even as the military uncovers more PFAS pollution in and around its sites, the amount of spending on remediation of all pollution at its bases is dropping.
“Communities around the facilities must be really frustrated because they in all likelihood are drinking from wells that are contaminated by the military, but the DoD is coming up short,” Faber said. “Inevitably we will get answers for these questions as we move through the process.”
New study reveals alarming factor linked to 400,000 deaths annually: ‘A severe public health crisis’
Rick Kazmer – October 13, 2023
Europe is proving a miserable World Health Organization statistic to be accurate.
The Guardian reported that about 98% of the continent’s populace is breathing polluted air. That aligns with WHO experts who estimate that 99% of people globally inhale crummy breaths.
What’s worse for Europeans, monitoring shows about two-thirds of residents are sucking in air that’s more than double the pollution of WHO quality standards, and the pollution is linked to 400,000 deaths annually, per the Guardian.
“This is a severe public health crisis,” Utrecht University environmental Professor Roel Vermeulen, who led the research, told the newspaper.
What was studied?
Experts used satellites and 1,400 ground monitors to learn about Europe’s air quality. The findings are troubling because the air pollution includes particulates, tiny particles of solids or liquids in the air that are inhaled, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) description.
Forest fires and wood stoves can cause particulate pollution. But, burning dirty energy for industry and transportation also releases dirty air, which the Guardian reported is churning out most of Europe’s poor atmosphere.
What’s the impact?
The particulate pollution can end up in our bloodstreams, according to the Guardian, and the CDC reports that eye irritation, trouble breathing, and cancer are possible repercussions. Air pollution, as part of planet-wide overheating, has even been linked to poor classroom performance.
Experts said the reality in Europe is even worse, with hundreds of thousands of deaths each year. In Germany, France, and Spain, no less than 37% of the population live with air at double WHO standards — in Germany, it’s 75%, the Guardian reported.
Eastern Europe, however, is the worst region, appearing to be darkened with coal dust on a map shared by the newspaper that blotches the areas with the most smog.
“What we see quite clearly is that nearly everyone in Europe is breathing unhealthy air,” Vermeulen said.
What can help?
Air filters provide an immediate way to take control of your indoor atmosphere. Surprisingly, outdoor versions are in operation in India to clean city air.
For lasting change, education and smart, planet-friendly lifestyle choices can help to prevent more pollution from dirtying our air. Recycling, using renewable energy, and simply planting a tree are some of the suggestions from Just Energy. Even cutting back on beef in the weekly menu can promote a more sustainable food chain.
These are just some ways to help reverse the smoggy disaster hovering in Europe.
“These deaths are preventable,” Dr. Hanna Boogaard of the U.S. Health Effects Institute, told the Guardian.
If you were offered a potentially life-saving drug, free on the NHS, is there any doubt you would refuse it? With experts increasingly realising that statins are the magic bullets to help halt the alarming rise in heart deaths, new draft guidance issued earlier this year said people as young as 25 should be taking the cholesterol-busting drugs to ward off heart attacks and strokes.
In January 2023, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice) watchdog which provides guidelines for the NHS, released a set of new recommendations suggesting that statins should be rolled out on a far wider scale for those at risk of cardiovascular disease.
Around 10 million people in England are currently eligible for the cholesterol-lowering drugs but Nice has recommended widening the window of eligibility to encompass those between 25 and 84 who are deemed to have a 10 per cent or higher risk of a cardiovascular event in the next decade. It would mean that up to 25 million people could receive statins, with the aim of preventing the onset of cardiovascular disease, a set of chronic illnesses that are responsible for one in four deaths.
Sir Nilesh Samani, medical director of the British Heart Foundation and a cardiology professor, says it is without question that statins are life-saving drugs for patients with existing heart disease.
“If you had a heart attack or a stroke, or you suffer with coronary heart disease or angina, then the evidence basis is not controversial at all,” he says. “Everyone would recommend those patients to take them. In terms of people who haven’t got an established disease, the statin recommendation is based on an assessment of their risk over the next ten years.”
One group of patients who could particularly stand to benefit from preventative statins is the estimated 250,000 people in the UK who have a condition known as familial hypercholesterolemia, which means they have high cholesterol from birth. A 2019 study that followed 214 patients with the condition for 20 years, after they began receiving statin therapy as children, found that it reduced their cholesterol by an average of 32 per cent and reduced their risk of cardiovascular disease in adulthood.
However, not everyone is able to tolerate the drugs and scientists are still learning more about some rare statin-induced side effects. The UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) recently revealed that between 1995 and 2023, there have been 10 cases of a neuromuscular disorder known as myasthenia gravis, which may have been triggered by statins.
But Samani points out that given the many millions of people who take statins – 9.5 million people were prescribed them in 2022 – it is hard to draw conclusive links between the drugs and such rare isolated events.
“With very rare things, it’s very difficult to attribute them to the drug because so many people are on statins,” he says.
So what are statins, and how exactly do they work?
Statins are a class of drugs that include atorvastatin, fluvastatin, pravastatin, rosuvastatin and simvastatin. In general, they act to lower the levels of a type of cholesterol known as low-density lipoprotein or LDL cholesterol.
Dr Unnati Desai, national lead for GP services at Nuffield Health, says: “LDL is often referred to as bad cholesterol because elevated levels of LDL are associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease.”
Statins reduce LDL cholesterol through two main mechanisms of action. The first is to block the activity of an enzyme called HMG-CoA reductase, which plays an essential role in how cholesterol is produced in the liver. They also increase the number of LDL receptors on the surface of liver cells, enabling the liver to remove LDL cholesterol from the bloodstream more efficiently.
But while they might work in similar ways, no two statins are the same. They each have distinct chemical structures and vary in potency, dosage and how they are metabolised in the body. High potency statins tend to be offered to patients who have already experienced a serious event such as a stroke or heart attack. “Some are more effective at lowering cholesterol levels than others,” says Dr Desai. “For example, rosuvastatin and atorvastatin are considered high-potency statins and can lower cholesterol more effectively at lower doses compared with moderate-potency statins like simvastatin and lovastatin.”
Statins can be classified as being either fat-soluble or water-soluble which affects how well they are absorbed within the body and their side effect profile. “Fat-soluble statins like atorvastatin and simvastatin, are better absorbed and may have a more substantial effect on cholesterol,” says Dr Desai. “Water-soluble statins, like pravastatin, are less likely to penetrate cells but may be associated with fewer muscle-related side effects.”
But we are still learning more about the other benefits statins can bring to cardiovascular health. For example, earlier this year, a study from Stanford Medicine discovered that simvastatin can improve blood vessel health, which could be why heart failure patients who take statins are less likely to suffer a second heart attack.
The pros and cons of statins
Pros
Cons
Proven to reduce risk of heart attack and stroke, especially if you’ve had one before
May not be suitable for those with liver disease
Anti-inflammatory properties can benefit heart and blood vessels
Can worsen muscle inflammation in people who have muscle conditions
Cheap and easy to access from your GP or over the counter at low doses
Interact with other medications so may worsen side effects
Should I be taking statins for my cholesterol?
Based on the new Nice recommendations, NHS doctors will compute a cardiovascular disease risk score for all patients, before offering them the choice of going on statin therapy.
The latest tools used to compute these risk scores are based on AI analysis of the patient’s electronic health records and consider a whole variety of factors, not just cholesterol levels.
“Factors considered also include age, family history of heart disease, smoking status, blood pressure level, and whether they have diabetes or not,” says Dr Gosia Wamil, a cardiologist at Mayo Clinic Healthcare in London. “These newer calculators can improve prediction of who needs to be treated or not.”
How long do statins take to work?
Statins will start to reduce LDL cholesterol within weeks, but it can take several months before their full benefits are apparent. According to Dr Wamil, long-term data indicate that the efficacy of statins remains largely stable over time. “There have been no indications of waning effectiveness observed even after prolonged use over many years, provided that they are consistently and appropriately administered,” she says. “LDL should be monitored, and the statin dose may need to be adjusted occasionally to achieve a good effect.”
However, he believes that the degree of media coverage surrounding statin-induced muscle aches has contributed to a medical phenomenon known as the nocebo effect (the opposite of the placebo effect), where the belief that a drug will cause harm ends up triggering negative symptoms.
In one British Heart Foundation study, participants were given a dummy pill or a placebo, which they believed was a statin, and yet they still complained of muscle aches. Last year, a large analysis published in The Lancet estimated that 90 per cent of the time, muscle aches were not related to statins.
“There’s evidence that people have now been conditioned in some way to expect muscle aches with statins,” says Samani. “So anytime they get aches, they think it’s the medicine.”
Are there any other side effects?
In some very rare cases, statins can cause a condition called rhabdomyolysis in which muscle cells break down, releasing a protein called myoglobin into the bloodstream which can clog up the kidneys, resulting in acute kidney failure and other complications.
The early signs of rhabdomyolysis tend to be muscle inflammation, and so people experiencing particularly severe muscle pain after starting on a course of statins should consult their doctor. However, rhabdomyolysis affects only 1.5 in every 100,000 people who take statins.
“Long-term statin use is considered safe and associated with significant benefits in reducing cardiovascular events,” says Dr Wamil. “Regular monitoring and reporting of any unusual symptoms to a healthcare provider are essential but the benefits of long-term statin use in preventing heart attacks, strokes, and mortality often outweighs potential risks, especially for individuals at high risk of cardiovascular disease.”
How much alcohol can I drink with statins?
There are no guidelines against drinking alcohol while taking statins, but Dr Desai suggests discussing your typical weekly alcohol consumption with a health professional before starting on the drugs.
“There’s no absolute contraindication to drinking alcohol when taking a statin, however it is important to drink within the recommended limit of 14 units per week, ensuring alcohol-free days by spreading the drinks over three or more days during the week,” she says.
However, you do have to be slightly careful about grapefruit juice or eating these fruits. This may seem unusual but grapefruit can actually react with certain statins, inducing severe muscle or joint pain. You should avoid them completely if taking simvastatin, while consumption should be minimised when on atorvastatin. Other statins are not known to react with grapefruit.
Is there an alternative to statins?
For those concerned about whether they will be able to tolerate statins, there is a far wider range of cholesterol-lowering alternatives than ever before.
The most widely used are PCSK9 inhibitors, a class of drugs which includes medications like inclisiran, alirocumab and evolocumab, and have been shown to be capable of reducing LDL cholesterol by around 50 to 60 per cent or more.
PCSK9 inhibitors reduce the activity of a protein called PCSK9 that normally blocks the liver’s cholesterol receptors. By inhibiting this protein, the receptors are able to keep extracting cholesterol from the blood.
“These drugs are usually used as an additive treatment for people whose cholesterol doesn’t come down sufficiently with statins or are statin-intolerant,” says Sir Nilesh.
Dr Wamil says that while they tend to be well-tolerated by patients, the disadvantages are that not everyone likes having to receive regular injections and they come at a higher cost for healthcare providers. “Whether they are better than statins depends on an individual’s specific health circumstances,” she says.
Should I take statins?
Ultimately the question of whether someone should begin taking statins, depends very much on their individual health circumstances.
“For anyone, their risk is a third lower with a statin,” says Dr Iqbal Malik, a consultant cardiologist and medical director of One Welbeck Heart Health in London. “If your risk is near zero, it is not worth it, but if your risk is very high, it is definitely worth it.”
Sir Nilesh Samani says that statin therapy should always be the result of a shared decision-making process between the cardiologist and the patient, and a two-way conversation about their risk of disease and the relative benefits which the drug might be able to offer them.
“There’s always the balance between trying to reduce the total number of heart attacks and strokes, and the issue of medicalising more of the population,” he says. “So it is very much an individual, shared decision-making process. If the patient is a frail 85 year old with multiple other health problems, then a statin might not be the right thing. But if they have a family history of disease, and a 10 per cent risk of having a stroke in the next decade, most doctors would feel that the benefits are probably there.”
Returning to the office is costing you $51 per day, study finds
Chris Morris, Jane Thier – October 11, 2023
Getty Images
Returning to the office won’t just cost you more time. It could add another $51 (or more) per day to your expenses, according to a new survey.
The annual State of Work report from videoconferencing company Owl Labs, first provided to Fortune, finds the average spend of returning workers is $51 per day when they work in person. And workers with pets, the company says, average $71 per day in spending.
The total, says Owl Labs, breaks down as follows:
$16 – Lunch
$14 – Commuting costs
$13 – Breakfast/coffee
$8 – Parking
($20 – pet care)
Employees who work a hybrid schedule, the company says, spend just $36 per day.
Last year’s Owl Labs data looked mostly identical—hybrid workers spent the same additional amount, $51, on in-person days in 2022, showing that a full year of new norms have done little to make an office return more convincing for most workers. “Companies that want to bring workers back to the office this fall might try providing a stipend, free lunch, or pre-tax commuter benefits to help offset these in-office costs,” Frank Weishaupt, Owl Labs’ CEO, told Fortune last year.
The new data can be shocking, but it might not be a bad idea to take these numbers with a grain of salt. Owl Labs, given its focus, has a likely bias towards workers embracing the hybrid or telecommuting lifestyle. Workers can save a considerable amount off those totals by bringing lunch from home or bypassing Starbucks on the way to work. And many office workers do not have to pay to park at work.
Still, the survey does underscore the additional costs of returning to the office in a time where the economy is uncertain and fears of a recession loom. The survey of 2,000 workers found that 94% of workers are willing to come back to the office if their bosses shore up the financial difference. They’d mainly expect support covering commuting costs and subsidized meals, snacks, and coffee—all of which, clearly, adds up fast.
While return-to-office mandates have been announced by several companies, worker compliance has been mixed. And a growing number of U.S. executives believe remote work and hybrid options will continue to grow over the next five years, according to a separate study from researchers at Stanford University.
That study found executives expect 72.6% of full-time employees will be fully in-person/on-site in 2028, compared to nearly 92% in 2018.
By Michelle Llamas, Bd Cert. Patient Adv, October 11, 2023
Michelle Llamas has been writing articles and producing podcasts about drugs, medical devices and the FDA for nearly a decade. She focuses on various medical conditions, health policy, COVID-19, LGBTQ health, mental health and women’s health issues. Michelle collaborates with experts, including board-certified doctors, patients and advocates, to provide trusted health information to the public. Some of her qualifications include:
Member of American Medical Writers Association (AMWA) and former Engage Committee and Membership Committee member
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Health Literacy certificates
Original works published or cited in The Lancet, British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology and the Journal for Palliative Medicine
Board Certified Patient Advocate, Patient Advocacy Certificate from University of Miami.
“Glyphosate, the active component found in popular herbicides such as Roundup, sees extensive application in agriculture to combat unwanted weeds that compete with crops. Nevertheless, apprehensions have surfaced concerning its safety and potential impacts on health. Legal disputes have arisen, asserting that exposure to glyphosate through products like Roundup might be connected to specific types of cancer, notably non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Glyphosate operates by inhibiting the enzyme EPSP synthase, causing disruptions in plant growth that ultimately result in the plant’s demise. While some regulatory authorities consider the levels of glyphosate in food as safe, concerns regarding its long-term consequences continue to grow. Typical repercussions of exposure include skin and respiratory irritations, and research indicates potential associations between glyphosate and both cancer and neurological disorders. Certain countries within the European Union have imposed bans on glyphosate, and Bayer, the manufacturer of Roundup, has encountered significant settlements in legal actions in the United States lawsuits linked to glyphosate exposure.”
Tips for Reducing Glyphosate Exposure
People can avoid glyphosate use with several Roundup alternatives. These include manual or mechanical methods of weed pulling, such as small and large hand tools, tillers and other mechanical methods.
Natural or organic herbicides whose active ingredients are vinegar or essential oils are also an option. Ask your local home and garden center for organic or natural herbicides that do not contain glyphosate.
Drugwatch.com writers follow rigorous sourcing guidelines and cite only trustworthy sources of information, including peer-reviewed journals, court records, academic organizations, highly regarded nonprofit organizations, government reports and interviews with qualified experts. Review our editorial policy to learn more about our process for producing accurate, current and balanced content.
