Is PTSD Contagious?

Is PTSD Contagious?

It seems counterintuitive that Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, which can be debilitating to the hundreds of thousands of people who suffer from it, is widely misunderstood and often goes without proper treatment. Many veterans return home from war with symptoms of PTSD that can make everyday life a living Hell. Things as simple as the news or the sound of a car door closing can be a trigger, causing reactions such as flashbacks and angry outbursts. PTSD can cause a person to be hypervigilant and anxious at all times, as if in imminent danger. On top of this, there is evidence that the families of people with PTSD also develop symptoms without experiencing a traumatic event. Despite this, PTSD is often undiagnosed or misdiagnosed, and there is a lack of professional research explaining why PTSD affects the brain in the specific ways it does. It can even be a struggle to get support from VA systems, which should be the one place where veterans and their families can count on getting support.

There is not only a lack of professional support for victims of this condition, but there is a social stigma against it, as well. PTSD sufferers are often told that they need to simply get over their trauma. Their pain is waved off by others because the general public is uninformed about the disease, even though many people suffer from it.

In many cases, it falls to those who experience PTSD to educate and support each other. Even though having PTSD is an immense emotional strain, its sufferers have to take matters into their own hands due to the lack of support from science and general awareness.

Ultimately, more money needs to go into PTSD research and treatment, and it’s an amount so large for each individual veteran that VA systems aren’t willing to spend it despite the havoc PTSD wreaks on a life. That leaves the situation at a stalemate, and it’s hard to say how much hope there really is for the future of treatment for PTSD.

Clean Girls Get Sicker?

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2011/02/04/133371076/how-keeping-little-girls-squeaky-clean-could-make-them-sick?sc=nl&cc=nh-20110203/

It seems counterintuitive that women are more likely to get sick than men, despite being cleaner as children. Research shows that exposure to germs and bacteria in childhood actually makes a child less likely to develop allergies, asthma, or autoimmune disorders after puberty. Gender roles dictate that young girls should be cleaner than young boys, so while little boys are playing in the dirt and getting exposed to many different kinds of germs, little girls are less likely to do so.

While our culture is changing and normalizing girls doing activities, like going outside or playing sports, that are historically “masculine”, this phenomenon is not changing. It seems that the crucial time for exposing children to bacteria is during infant or toddler years, in which most girls are still being held to “feminine” standards by their parents.

Are Multivitamins Dangerous?

Do Multivitamins Really Work?

It seems counterintuitive that multivitamins don’t actually promote health. Multiple studies have looked into whether multivitamins prevented diseases such as heart disease and various cancers and came up with negative results.

Multivitamins may be more than just ineffective, though. They could actually be harmful. Most people who take multivitamins are likely already getting the nutrients they need from their diets, and getting too much of certain vitamins and minerals can hurt a person’s health, leading to conditions such as cancer, heart disease, and birth defects.

In addition to that, supplement companies aren’t required to label vitamins as being a health risk, even if they are one. The health risks of multivitamins are kept as quiet as possible, so users don’t know the danger they could potentially be in and supplement companies continue to thrive off of their money.