Dr. Sanjay Gupta of CNN has offered a lot of advice over the years, and now he has some about keeping our brains healthy, even into old age.
Gupta's new book, Keep Sharp: Build A Better Brain At Any Age, explains some of the latest brain research, debunks old myths and offers practical advice on improving cognitive function.
For example, in recent years, brain research has shown that we are capable of growing new brain cells anytime -- not just as young children or after a brain injury, as previously thought.
If you want to improve your brain health, try learning a new skill. Gupta says the skill doesn’t have to be rock climbing or algebra -- it can be as simple as teaching yourself to eat with your non-dominant hand or tying your necktie in the dark. These activities can create new pathways in the brain and help you process and apply knowledge, whatever your age.
It’s also important to get seven to nine hours of sleep a night to allow your brain time to process memories and clear out waste, Gupta says.
Scary news out of the UK in recent weeks suggests that a new COVID strain is far more contagious -- and it’s spreading across the globe even as we seek to get the vaccine into everyone. A separate variant in South Africa may also be more infectious.
So how do we keep from getting sick?
Virologist Eleanor Gaunt of the University of Edinburgh says even with the usual social distancing and mask-wearing and handwashing, “these were insufficient to quell this variant." So a hard lockdown was imposed in Scotland.
There doesn’t seem to be much appetite for more lockdowns in the U.S., so Gaunt and others suggest being extra vigilant about distancing, masks, and handwashing, as well as avoiding being indoors with people outside of your family.
If you are a West Virginia health care worker, or live in a long-term care facility there, chances are that you have already received your COVID-19 vaccines -- and you’re a couple of weeks ahead of the rest of the country.
That may be because the state chose to use its network of smaller, independent pharmacies to administer the shots, while all 49 other states chose to go with major chains CVS and Walgreens.
As Gretchen Garofoli at West Virginia University, explains, the state has fewer chain pharmacies and many independent stores already have relationships with long-term care facilities for COVID testing, making the vaccine distribution easier.
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