Adult Seat Belt Use in the US
Motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death for people age 5 – 34. Adult seat belt use is the single most effective way to save lives and reduce injuries in crashes. The percentage of adults...
View ArticleHigh Blood Pressure and Cholesterol
Heart disease, stroke, and other cardiovascular (blood vessel) diseases are among the leading cause of death and now kill more than 800,000 adults in the US each year. Of these, 150,000 are younger...
View ArticleMaking Health Care Safer – Reducing bloodstream infections
A central line is a tube that a doctor usually places in a large vein of a patient's neck or chest to give important medical treatment. When not put in correctly or kept clean, central lines can become...
View ArticlePreventing Teen Pregnancy in the US
More than 400,000 teen girls, aged 15-19 years, give birth each year in the US. The media often glamorize teens having sexual intercourse and teen parenting, but the reality is starkly different....
View ArticleAsthma in the US
Asthma is a lifelong disease that causes wheezing, breathlessness, chest tightness, and coughing. It can limit a person's quality of life. While we don't know why asthma rates are rising, we do know...
View ArticleMaking Food Safer to Eat
Each year, roughly 1 in 6 people in the US gets sick from eating contaminated food. The 1,000 or more reported outbreaks that happen each year reveal familiar culprits—Salmonella and other common...
View ArticleColorectal Cancer
Colorectal cancer is the #2 cancer killer in the US among cancers that affect both men and women. But it doesn't have to be. Screening can find precancerous polyps (abnormal growths) so they can be...
View ArticleHospital Support for Breastfeeding
Childhood obesity is an epidemic. In the US, 1 preschooler in 5 is at least overweight, and half of these are obese. Breastfeeding helps protect against childhood obesity. A baby's risk of becoming an...
View ArticleAdult Smoking in the US
Tobacco use remains the single largest preventable cause of disease, disability, and death in the US. Some people who smoke every day are smoking fewer cigarettes; however, even occasional smoking...
View ArticleDrinking and Driving: A Threat to Everyone
US adults drank too much and got behind the wheel about 112 million times in 2010. Though episodes of driving after drinking too much ("drinking and driving") have gone down by 30% during the past 5...
View ArticlePrescription Painkiller Overdoses in the US
Deaths from prescription painkillers* have reached epidemic levels in the past decade. The number of overdose deaths is now greater than those of deaths from heroin and cocaine combined. A big part of...
View ArticleNew Hope for Stopping HIV
Too many people don't know they have HIV (human immunodeficiency virus). About 1.2 million people are living with HIV in the US but about 240,000 don't know they are infected. Each year, about 50,000...
View ArticleBinge Drinking
New estimates show that binge drinking* is a bigger problem than previously thought. More than 38 million US adults binge drink, about 4 times a month, and the largest number of drinks per binge is on...
View ArticleWhere's the sodium?
About 90% of Americans eat more sodium than is recommended for a healthy diet. Too much sodium increases a person's risk for high blood pressure. High blood pressure often leads to heart disease and...
View ArticleMaking Health Care Safer – Stopping C. difficile Infections
People getting medical care can catch serious infections called health care-associated infections (HAIs). While most types of HAIs are declining, one – caused by the germ C. difficile* – remains at...
View ArticleChild Injury
Child injuries are preventable, yet more than 9,000 children died from injuries in the US in 2009. Car crashes, suffocation, drowning, poisoning, fires, and falls are some of the most common ways...
View ArticlePrescription Painkiller Overdoses
Prescription painkiller overdoses* were responsible for more than 15,500 deaths in 2009. While all prescription painkillers have contributed to an increase in overdose deaths over the last decade,...
View ArticleMore People Walk to Better Health
More than 145 million adults now include walking as part of a physically active lifestyle. More than 6 in 10 people walk for transportation or for fun, relaxation, or exercise, or for activities such...
View ArticleGetting Blood Pressure Under Control
High blood pressure is a major risk factor for heart disease and stroke, both of which are leading causes of death in the US. Nearly one-third of all American adults have high blood pressure and more...
View ArticleTeen Drinking and Driving
The percentage of teens in high school who drink and drive has decreased by more than half since 1991,* but more can be done. Nearly one million high school teens drank alcohol and got behind the wheel...
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