Holiday Season Brings Presents, Colorful Lights And A Sharp Spike In Heart Attacks
Researchers have found that on Christmas Eve the risk of a heart attack is 37 percent higher than normal. Although they didn't draw conclusions on why the increase occurs, experts say the stress of the holidays combined with excessive drinking and eating could be the likely culprit.
Los Angeles Times:
On Christmas Eve, Santa Delivers Presents ... And A Few Extra Heart Attacks
On Dec. 24, the risk of a heart attack is 37% higher than normal, the researchers found. On Christmas itself, the increase in risk dips to 29%. Even on Boxing Day, it’s still 21% above normal levels. For the sake of comparison, Mondays are known to be a time of increased heart attack risk. But in Sweden, the risk was only about 10% higher on the first day of the workweek. The BMJ study isn’t the first to report an association between the holiday season and myocardial mayhem. A 2004 paper in the journal Circulation, for example, found that deaths due to all kinds of heart disease were higher in the U.S. on both Christmas and New Year’s Day. (Kaplan, 12/13)
In other public health news —
The California Health Report:
Report Warns Climate Change Will Affect Health, Especially For Most Vulnerable Populations
Californians are likely to experience more physical and mental health problems, injuries and death in the coming decades as a result climate change, according to a recent state report. More extreme weather patterns, wildfires, air and water pollution, sea-level rise, food and water shortages, and vector-borne diseases are projected in the coming decades as the climate warms, states the report prepared by the California Senate Office of Research at the request of senator Ricardo Lara. The severity of those consequences will depend on how much action is taken to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and on how prepared the state is to mitigate the health consequences of climate change, according to the findings. (Boyd-Barrett, 12/12)