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  1. Earn Double Points (Up To 10x) For A Year With Chase’s Best ‘Everyday’ Credit Card View from the Wing
  2. Chase offers an unlimited cash-back match for new Chase Freedom Unlimited cardholders — here’s what you need to know CNBC
  3. Targeted Chase cardholders can earn up to 7,000 bonus points through Chase Travel The Points Guy
  4. Chase Freedom Unlimited: Uncapped double cashback for one year (but there may be a better offer) Frequent Miler
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What Is VEXAS Syndrome? | Everyday Health

A rare, recently discovered inflammatory disease may strike more people than previously thought, a new study suggests.

Scientists first reported the discovery of a disease they dubbed VEXAS syndrome in a paper published in 2020 in The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM). At the time, they only identified 25 men in the United States with the condition — and no women. All had similar mutations in a gene called UBA1.

Now, a new paper published in JAMA on January 24, suggests that VEXAS, while still rare, is much more common than scientists initially believed, impacting roughly 1 in 13,600 people. The researchers also found that VEXAS is even more common in older individuals and affects both men and women: Among those 50 and older, researchers estimate a VEXAS prevalence of about 1 in 4,300 men and 1 in 26,200 women.

VEXAS most often occurs in people diagnosed with other autoimmune conditions including lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, and blood cancers.

“The findings of this study are remarkable,” says Matthew Koster, MD, an assistant professor and rheumatologist at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, who has researched VEXAS but wasn’t involved in the new study. “Many academic and referral centers were wondering: Is VEXAS really more common than we think, with patients hiding in plain sight? And the answer is yes.”

What Is VEXAS Syndrome?

The emerging picture of VEXAS began to come into focus when scientists realized that some people with a complex constellation of symptoms that appear in many autoimmune disorders shared common mutations in the UBA1 gene.

“VEXAS syndrome is characterized by anemia, and inflammation in the skin, lungs, cartilage, and joints. These symptoms are frequently mistaken for other rheumatic or hematologic diseases,” says David Beck, MD, PhD, an assistant professor of at the New York University Grossman School of Medicine in New York City, and lead author of the latest VEXAS study as well as the initial NEJM paper. “However, this syndrome has a different cause, is treated differently, requires additional monitoring, and can be far more severe.”

VEXAS results from a genetic mutation that occurs in the bone marrow, but it isn’t inherited. It appears spontaneously and doesn’t appear to pass from parent to child, Dr. Koster says. “Currently, we do not know what might provoke or prompt a mutation like this to occur,” Koster adds.

What Does VEXAS Stand For?

VEXAS is an acronym for many of the disease’s features: vacuoles in blood cells, the E1 enzyme, X-linked, autoinflammatory, and somatic.

While doctors can diagnose the syndrome with genetic testing, these tests aren’t yet widely available, both Drs. Beck and Koster note.

Patients, especially males over 50, with certain symptoms that aren’t explained by other diseases should ask their doctor about whether the cause could be VEXAS, Koster advises. He says these symptoms include:

  • Low levels of hemoglobin or platelets in their blood
  • Recurring or hard to control inflammatory issues in the joints, skin, eyes, ears, or nose
  • Unexplained narrowing or blockages in the veins

“These are patients that should be checked,” Koster says. “If diagnosed with VEXAS syndrome, it’s important to get referred to an institution with a multispecialty practice in hematology and rheumatology that has experience with VEXAS.”

VEXAS Is Deadly and Affects Women as Well as Men

Beck highlights two other key findings from the most recent research on VEXAS: The condition may be more lethal than previously thought, and it may not only impact men.

To calculate the prevalence of VEXAS in the new study, researchers examined genetic data and electronic medical records for more than 163,000 patients who participated in the MyCode Community Health Initiative at Geisinger, a health system in Pennsylvania.

VEXAS killed 75 percent of the 12 patients identified in the new study, up from a death rate of 40 percent among that initial group of 25 men examined in the NEJM study. “The disease is fatal for a variety of reasons, including severe acute episodes of inflammation, blood clots, and infections,” Beck says.

In addition, the new study identified two women with VEXAS, both of whom died. “I think we may have initially underestimated how many women are impacted by this disease, and I expect we will continue to find a substantial, yet smaller, population of females impacted,” Beck says.

One limitation of the new study is that findings from Geisinger, where patients are predominantly of European ancestry, may not reflect the prevalence of VEXAS among people of other backgrounds.

How Is VEXAS Syndrome Treated?

Treatment approaches may vary, and are still being developed as scientists learn more about this new disease. Options for managing symptoms may include steroids or biologics such as tocilizumab (Actemra) and ruxolitinib (Jakafi) to control inflammation, Beck says. Some patients, particularly those with dangerously low levels of hemoglobin and platelets in their blood, might also require blood transfusions or bone marrow transplants.

But there isn’t yet a clear prevention strategy. “We don’t know of any way to prevent or minimize the risk of the disease,” Beck says.

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Using Running to Escape Everyday Stresses May Lead To Exercise Dependence Instead of Mental Well-being

Summary: Running can help some escape from their everyday stresses, however, some recreational runners show signs of exercise dependence. Exercise dependence could be the result of maladaptive escapism where one self-suppresses to avoid negative experiences. This can be detrimental to overall well-being.

Source: Frontiers

Recreational running offers a lot of physical and mental health benefits – but some people can develop exercise dependence, a form of addiction to physical activity which can cause health issues. Shockingly, signs of exercise dependence are common even in recreational runners.

A study published in Frontiers in Psychology investigated whether the concept of escapism can help us understand the relationship between running, well-being, and exercise dependence.

“Escapism is an everyday phenomenon among humans, but little is known regarding its motivational underpinnings, how it affects experiences, and the psychological outcomes from it,” said Dr Frode Stenseng of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, lead author of the paper.

Running to explore or to evade?

“Escapism is often defined as ‘an activity, a form of entertainment, etc. that helps you avoid or forget unpleasant or boring things’. In other words, many of our everyday activities may be interpreted as escapism,” said Stenseng.

“The psychological reward from escapism is reduced self-awareness, less rumination, and a relief from one’s most pressing, or stressing, thoughts and emotions.”

Escapism can restore perspective, or it can act as a distraction from problems that need to be tackled. Escapism which is adaptive, seeking out positive experiences, is referred to as self-expansion. Meanwhile, maladaptive escapism, avoiding negative experiences, is called self-suppression. Effectively, running as exploration or as evasion.

“These two forms of escapism are stemming from two different mindsets, to promote a positive mood, or prevent a negative mood,” said Stenseng.

Escapist activities used for self-expansion have more positive effects but also more long-term benefits. Self-suppression, by contrast, tends to suppress positive feelings as well as negative ones and lead to avoidance.

Self-suppression associated with exercise dependence

The team recruited 227 recreational runners, half men and half women, with widely varying running practices. They were asked to fill out questionnaires which investigated three different aspects of escapism and exercise dependence: an escapism scale which measured preference for self-expansion or self-suppression, an exercise dependence scale, and a satisfaction with life scale designed to measure the participants’ subjective wellbeing.

Meanwhile maladaptive escapism, avoiding negative experiences, is called self-suppression. Effectively, running as exploration or as evasion. Image is in the public domain

The scientists found that there was very little overlap between runners who favored self-expansion and runners who preferred self-suppression modes of escapism. Self-expansion was positively related with wellbeing, while self-suppression was negatively related to wellbeing.

Self-suppression and self-expansion were both linked to exercise dependence, but self-suppression was much more strongly linked to it. Neither escapism mode was linked to age, gender, or amount of time a person spent running, but both affected the relationship between wellbeing and exercise dependence.

Whether or not a person fulfilled criteria for exercise dependence, a preference for self-expansion would still be linked to a more positive sense of their own wellbeing.

Although exercise dependence corrodes the potential wellbeing gains from exercise, it seems that perceiving lower wellbeing may be both a cause and an outcome of exercise dependency: the dependency might be driven by lower wellbeing as well as promoting it.

Similarly, experiencing positive self-expansion might be a psychological motive that promotes exercise dependence.

“More studies using longitudinal research designs are necessary to unravel more of the motivational dynamics and outcomes in escapism,” said Stenseng. “But these findings may enlighten people in understanding their own motivation, and be used for therapeutical reasons for individuals striving with a maladaptive engagement in their activity.”

About this exercise addiction and psychology research news

Author: Angharad Brewer Gillham
Source: Frontiers
Contact: Angharad Brewer Gillham – Frontiers
Image: The image is in the public domain

See also

Original Research: Open access.
“Running to Get “Lost”? Two Types of Escapism in Recreational Running and Their Relations to Exercise Dependence and Subjective Well-Being” by Frode Stenseng et al. Frontiers in Psychology


Abstract

Running to Get “Lost”? Two Types of Escapism in Recreational Running and Their Relations to Exercise Dependence and Subjective Well-Being

Escapism is a fundamental motivation in many forms of activity engagements. At its core, escapism is “a habitual diversion of the mind … as an escape from reality or routine”.

Accordingly, escapism may entail many adaptive and maladaptive psychological antecedents, covariates, and outcomes. However, few studies have been conducted on escapism as a motivational mindset in running.

Here, in a sample of recreational runners (N = 227), we applied a two-dimensional model of escapism, comprising self-expansion (adaptive escapism) and self-suppression (maladaptive escapism), and examined how they were related to exercise dependence and subjective well-being.

First, confirmatory factor analyses showed that the escapism dimensions were highly diversifiable in the sample. Then, correlational analyses showed that self-expansion was positively correlated to subjective well-being, whereas self-suppression was negatively related to well-being.

Self-suppression was more strongly related to exercise dependence compared to self-expansion.

Finally, path analyses evidenced an explanatory role of self-expansion and self-suppression in the inverse relationship between exercise dependence and well-being. In conclusion, the present findings support escapism as a relevant framework for understanding the relationship between exercise dependence in running and subjective well-being.

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6 Everyday Activities That Naturally Release Dopamine In Your Brain

Dopamine is a feel-good chemical that’s produced in your brain. Essentially, it makes you happy. And your brain releases it with certain activities and behaviors ― many of which you already do every single day.

“Whenever we participate in activities that are considered essential from our body’s point of view, our brain releases a large amount of dopamine,” which is meant to encourage you to do this activity more, according to Dr. Kiran F. Rajneesh, the director of the neurological pain division and associate professor of neurology at the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center.

Throughout evolution, dopamine’s task was to “sense reward, learn the place and activity that leads to reward and also motivate you to go to those places to obtain [a] reward,” said Dr. Hitoshi Morikawa, an associate professor in the departments of neuroscience and psychiatry at the University of Texas at Austin. And that is still the case today. In essence, “dopamine is a reward sensor,” Morikawa said.

While this reward sensor was and is essential to human survival, evolution has made it so maladaptive behaviors also result in the release of dopamine in humans, both experts said.

“Generally, when neuroscientists talk about dopamine, we think about addiction because it is an addiction driver,” Morikawa explained.

The hormone makes you want to repeat certain behaviors, turning them into habits ― whether they are healthy or not. (Like substance misuse or smoking, for example.)

However, that’s not always the case. The release of this hormone is also part of your body’s daily function. While this is not a cure for any disease or condition, it can be helpful to know when dopamine is released — and when you can expect to feel a little mood boost as a result. Here are a few times when your body releases dopamine:

Eating

Our prehistoric ancestors knew that food was necessary for survival, in part because of the reward sensor that dopamine activated. This is still true today.

In fact, Rajneesh said that any activity that is “evolutionarily protective and essential for our well-being and survival” releases dopamine. Being able to find food and eat that food certainly falls into this category.

Some studies even say that eating results in a dopamine release twice: first when the food is eaten and again when the food is in the stomach.

Drinking Water

Think about it: When you’re parched, a glass of water certainly feels like a reward, so it’s no wonder it also triggers the release of dopamine in your brain.

But not all sips of water will release dopamine, Morikawa noted. Instead, you have to really want or need the water — like after a tough workout or on a hot day.

“In the middle of summer in Austin, and you’re really thirsty, then drinking water should increase dopamine levels in the brain — that should be one of the most effective ways to increase them,” he said.

The Good Brigade via Getty Images

A glass of water on a hot day can release dopamine in your body.

Receiving Praise

One really common way that dopamine is released is when praising children for good behaviors, Rajneesh said. Praise triggers a release of dopamine in kids’ brains — and the same goes for praising pets. In these situations, their good behaviors are reinforced by the feel-good nature of that dopamine release, he said.

The same is true when adults receive praise, Rajneesh added. So sending a congratulatory email to your colleague or a celebratory text to a friend is actually doing more good than you think.

This is especially important for people with certain conditions that are a result of low dopamine levels, like ADHD, according to ADDitude Magazine, an ADHD-focused publication.

Playing Video Games

Many studies have measured and found that playing video games results in the release of dopamine in the brain for some people, Morikawa noted.

While this in itself is not a bad thing, it can become negative if the feeling of playing video games is too positive or too fun, he added. When “elevating dopamine levels, sometimes you get really hooked [onto] certain activities,” Morikawa said.

In this case, that activity can be video games, which can lead to problems for people who aren’t professional gamers, he added. (For example, students who should be doing homework instead of playing.)

Having Sex

Sex causes a release of endorphins, as Dr. Elizabeth C. Gardner, an orthopedics sports medicine surgeon at Yale Medicine, previously told HuffPost. And studies show it also causes a release of dopamine.

During evolution, the dopaminergic system developed to promote the “survival and maintenance of our species,” Morikawa said. In other words, there’s an instinctual reason sex feels so enticing. Our brains are wired to know that sex is important for survival, and the neurons that release dopamine do so when they sense the reward associated with the act.

Activities That Enhance Your Well-Being

Meditating and other activities can also lead to a release of dopamine, Rajneesh said.

“Engaging in activities that enhance your well-being such as yoga, exercise, hobbies [and] games … can help release dopamine in the brain and further enhance your sense of well-being and health as nature intended it to be,” Rajneesh said.

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Reduce Your Risk of Cancer, Dementia, Heart Disease, and Death – Scientists Recommend Doing This Activity Everyday

The study also found that how fast you walk is as important as how much you walk.

Walking 9800 steps every day was linked to a 50% lower dementia risk. 

The research tracked 78,500 participants using wearable trackers, making them the largest study to systematically track step count in connection to health outcomes. The studies were published in the journals JAMA Internal Medicine and JAMA Neurology.

Researchers from the University of Sydney in Australia and the University of Southern Denmark discovered that walking 10,000 steps per day reduces the risk of dementia, heart disease, cancer, and mortality. A power walk, however, demonstrated advantages above and beyond the number of steps completed.

“The take-home message here is that for protective health benefits people could not only ideally aim for 10,000 steps a day but also aim to walk faster,” said co-lead author Dr. Matthew Ahmadi, Research Fellow at the University of Sydney’s Charles Perkins Centre and Faculty of Medicine and Health.

‘For less active individuals, our study also demonstrates that as low as 3,800 steps a day can cut the risk of dementia by 25 percent,” said co-lead author Associate Professor Borja del Pozo Cruz from the University of Southern Denmark and senior researcher in health at the University of Cadiz.

Key points:

  • Every 2,000 steps lowered the risk of premature death incrementally by 8 to 11 percent, up to approximately 10,000 steps a day.
  • Similar associations were seen for cardiovascular disease and cancer incidence.
  • A higher number of steps per day was associated with a lower risk of all-cause dementia
  • 9,800 steps was the optimal dose linked to a lower risk of dementia by 50 percent, however, the risk was reduced by 25 percent at as low as 3,800 steps a day
  • Stepping intensity or a faster pace showed beneficial associations for all outcomes (dementia, heart disease, cancer, and death) over and above total daily steps.

“Step count is easily understood and widely used by the public to track activity levels thanks to the growing popularity of fitness trackers and apps, but rarely do people think about the pace of their steps,” said senior author Emmanuel Stamatakis, Professor of Physical Activity, Lifestyle and Population Health at the University of Sydney.

“Findings from these studies could inform the first formal step-based physical activity guidelines and help develop effective public health programs aimed at preventing chronic disease.”

How was the study conducted?

The research used UK Biobank data to connect step count data from 78,500 UK participants aged 40 to 79 years with health outcomes 7 years later. Over the course of seven days (minimum 3 days, including a weekend day and monitoring during sleep periods), participants wore wrist accelerometers to track their physical activity.

Through a number of data sources and registries, such as inpatient hospital records, primary care records, and cancer and death registries, this information was connected with the participants’ health records with ethical approval.

Only individuals who had no history of dementia, cancer, or cardiovascular disease at the beginning of the trial and had remained healthy for the first two years were evaluated at the end. Statistical adjustments were also applied to account for confounders such as the fact that those who walk more steps generally move quicker.

The researchers note that the studies are observational, meaning they cannot show direct cause and effect, however, note the strong and consistent associations seen across both studies at the population level.

“The size and scope of these studies using wrist-worn trackers make it the most robust evidence to date suggesting that 10,000 steps a day is the sweet spot for health benefits and walking faster is associated with additional benefits,” said Dr. Matthew Ahmadi.

“Going forward more research with longer-term use of trackers will shed more light on the health benefits associated with certain levels and intensity of daily stepping.”

References:

“Prospective Associations of Daily Step Counts and Intensity With Cancer and Cardiovascular Disease Incidence and Mortality and All-Cause Mortality” by Borja del Pozo Cruz, Ph.D., Matthew N. Ahmadi, Ph.D., I-Min Lee, MBBS, ScD and Emmanuel Stamatakis, Ph.D., 12 September 2022, JAMA Internal Medicine.
DOI: 10.1001/jamainternmed.2022.4000

“Association of Daily Step Count and Intensity With Incident Dementia in 78 430 Adults Living in the UK” by Borja del Pozo Cruz, Ph.D., Matthew Ahmadi, Ph.D., Sharon L. Naismith, Ph.D. and Emmanuel Stamatakis, Ph.D., 6 September 2022, JAMA Neurology.
DOI: 10.1001/jamaneurol.2022.2672



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Healthy Diet Tips: 5 Everyday Foods That May Help You Stop Feeling Hungry – Expert Suggests

Are you someone who feels hungry all the time? If yes, then you surely know how irritating the feeling is. The continuous hunger not only keeps us angry all the time, but also lowers the energy by leaps and bounds. That’s not all. It also leads to untimely eating or over eating, leading to weight gain and other lifestyle diseases. But, have you ever wondered why do you feel hungry all the time? While some might think it is due to stress, the real reason, as per experts, is lack of nutrition. Before getting into details, let’s first understand what do we mean by wholesome meal. It is not eating to your heart’s content (which is important too!), but fulfilling the body’s daily nutrient needs. And if you do not do the same, you will end up feeling hungry all the time.

(Also Read: Healthy Diet: 7 Healthy Alternatives For Everyday Foods And Drinks That May Be Harmful)

Explaining the phenomenon, celebrity nutritionist Lovneet Batra states, “Hunger pangs caused by certain hunger hormones in our body occur for a variety of reasons. And to fight them you need to find the right fix that stabilises energy in our system.” And the best way to stabilise energy is by loading up of nutritional foods. Lovneet Batra further took to Instagram to share some food options that might help you curb those untimely hunger pangs. Take a look.

Also Read: 5 Guilt-Free Snacks to Fight Evening Hunger Pangs

Healthy Diet Tips: Here’re 5 Foods To Curb Untimely Hunger Pangs:

Almonds:

Almonds are considered superfood. They are enriched with antioxidants, vitamin E, magnesium, healthy fats, protein and fibre. According to Lovneet Batra, “Both protein and fibre are known to increase feelings of fullness. Also, study found that consuming almonds reduced hunger and improved dietary vitamin E and monounsaturated fat.”

(Also Read: Healthy Diet: Try This Whole-Wheat, Refined Sugar-Free Chocolate Banana Cake (Recipe Video Inside)

Coconut:

Did you know, coconut can be a great snack to curb your hunger pangs?! “The medium chain triglycerides (MCTs include capric, caprylic, caproic, and lauric acid) present in coconut are known to burn body fat faster and reduce appetite leading to a spontaneous decrease in calorie intake,” the nutritionist explained. She further stated that the high fibre content of coconut meat could also boost the feeling of fullness, which subsequently might help prevent overeating.

Sprouts:

The goodness of sprouts needs no introduction. It is always considered a great option to indulge in while maintaining a healthy diet regime. Lovneet Batra stated, “Chana sprouts are rich in protein and fibre that give you a feeling of being full.” Besides the protein content in sprouts helps us keep full for long – it takes longer to digest protein and also the hunger hormone levels in the body. These factors “potentially help you eat less at your next meal,” she mentioned.

Buttermilk:

Buttermilk or chaas is considered a great source of probiotic. It is high in whey protein and helps keep us hydrated and full for long. “Studies also suggest that the high calcium and protein contents of buttermilk influence appetite and energy intake,” added the nutritionist.

Vegetable Juice With Flaxseeds:

Vegetable juice makes for a wholesome drink. The ingredients (used in the juice) help you load up on antioxidants and fibre, further flushing out toxins from the body. It helps keep you full and promotes better gut health. “Add a dose of healthy fats with a tablespoon of roasted flaxseeds,” added Lovneet Batra.

(Also Read: Healthy Diet May Reduce The Risk Of Acquired Hearing Loss, Reveals Study)

Now that you have these healthy diet tips handy, we suggest, implement them in your diet and enjoy healthy living. But always remember, moderation is the key.

Disclaimer: This content including advice provides generic information only. It is in no way a substitute for qualified medical opinion. Always consult a specialist or your own doctor for more information. NDTV does not claim responsibility for this information.



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Everyday Activities That ‘Count’ As Exercise

Photo: Kucher Serhii (Shutterstock)

Physical activity is important for health, and you’re probably sick of hearing that we should all be doing at least 150 minutes per week of “moderate” exercise like walking, or 75 minutes of “vigorous” exercise like running. But there are more ways to stay active than just these, and you may be doing some of them already.

The physical activity guidelines for Americans define moderate intensity activity as anything that registers between 3.0 and just under 6.0 METs, or metabolic equivalents. A single MET is defined as the amount of energy you burn just by existing, somewhere in the range of a calorie per minute. (This will, of course, vary from person to person based on your body size, age, and more.) So if a brisk walk gets you burning four times as much energy as you expend while lying in bed, we would say that counts as 4 METs and is solidly in the “moderate” category.

Here’s the cool thing: Lots of things register between 3 and 6 METs. Teams of scientists have tested the energy burn of different activities in the lab, and produced charts of their MET measurements. These include household tasks like some types of cleaning, as well as activities that you may not think of as exercise, like playing golf or working a job that has you on your feet all day. Here are some of the things that register in the “moderate” range:

Activities between 3 and 4 METs:

  • Slower tempo ballroom dances, like waltz, foxtrot, slow dancing, samba, tango, 19th century dance, mambo, and cha cha.
  • Fishing
  • Walking and carrying a small child who weighs 15 lbs. or more
  • Hammering nails
  • Plumbing tasks
  • Playing guitar in a rock and roll band (standing up)
  • Working as a bartender, store clerk, librarian, or other jobs that have you standing or walking
  • Bowling
  • Playing frisbee
  • Sailing, including windsurfing and ice sailing
  • Making beds
  • Working on a car
  • Caribbean dances, including Abakua, Beguine, Bellair, Bongo, Brukin’s, Caribbean Quadrills, Dinki Mini, Gere, Gumbay, Ibo, Jonkonnu, Kumina, Oreisha, and Jambu
  • Washing cars, washing windows, or cleaning the garage

In general, most jobs or tasks that have you on your feet clock around 3 METs. Want a step up? The following are 4 METs or more:

  • Doing laundry where you’re washing clothes by hand and hanging them up
  • Elder care, including bathing, dressing, or moving the person into and out of bed
  • Housekeeping work, like cleaning bathrooms and pushing a cart of cleaning supplies around
  • Coaching football, soccer, basketball, baseball, swimming, etc.
  • Pushing or pulling a stroller or walking with children
  • Planting things in the garden
  • Taking care of horses by feeding and watering them, and cleaning stalls
  • Dances like Greek and Middle Eastern folk dances, hula, salsa, merengue, bamba y plena, flamenco, belly, and swing
  • Mowing the lawn with a power mower
  • Doubles tennis
  • Recreational swimming, like a leisurely backstroke

Farm and yard tasks show up a lot in this range, alongside exercises like power yoga and using a rowing machine on one of the lighter settings. Next up, things that register 5 METs or more:

  • Ballet, modern, or jazz dance
  • Cleaning gutters
  • Painting the outside of your house
  • Skateboarding
  • Using crutches
  • Spiritual dancing in church
  • Shoveling snow at a “moderate effort” (“shoveling snow, general” is in a higher category)
  • Hiking or walking through fields and hillsides
  • Fast ballroom dancing
  • Hitting a punching bag
  • Ice skating at 9 mph or less
  • Rodeo sports
  • Moving furniture and carrying boxes

The 5-and-up category also includes boot camp classes, Army-style obstacle courses, heavy squatting, and lap swimming. Anything that’s harder work than what’s listed here is likely to be in the 6 METs-and-up category, which starts with basketball, cheerleading, and driving a drag race car, and goes up from there.

   

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Claes Oldenburg Dies at 93; Pop Artist Made the Everyday Monumental

Claes Oldenburg, the Swedish-born American Pop artist known for his monumental sculptures of everyday objects, died on Monday at his home and studio in the Soho section of Manhattan. He was 93.

His death was confirmed by Adriana Elgarresta, a spokeswoman for the Pace gallery in New York, which, along with the Paula Cooper Gallery, has long represented him.

Mr. Oldenburg entered the New York art scene in earnest in the late 1950s, embracing the audience-participation “Happenings” then in vogue and expanding the boundaries of art with shows that incorporated things like street signs, wire-and-plaster clothing and even pieces of pie. His approach to everyday objects, performance and collaboration has continued to influence generations of artists.

An early project, “The Store” (1961), opened in a storefront in the East Village and sold absurd plaster facsimiles of everyday objects — like a shoe or a cheeseburger out of a comic strip, only covered with the recognizable drips and improvisational dashes of Abstract Expressionism.

As he focused more and more on sculpture, he began increasing the scale of his work, taking as his starting point ordinary objects like hamburgers, ice cream cones and household appliances and then enlarging them to unfamiliar, often imposing dimensions.

One of his most famous installations, erected in 1976 — the bicentennial of the Declaration of Independence — is “Clothespin,” a 45-foot-high, 10-ton black steel sculpture of precisely what the title indicates, complete with a metal spring that appropriately evokes the number 76. The work stands in stark contrast to conventional public sculpture, which Mr. Oldenburg, impersonating a municipal official, said was supposed to involve “bulls and Greeks and lots of nekkid broads.”

Mr. Oldenburg was heavily influenced by the French artist Jean Dubuffet, who brought so-called Outsider art into galleries and museums, upsetting the status quo of institutional art. But like many Pop artists, Mr. Oldenburg also took cues from Marcel Duchamp, whose so-called readymade sculptures from the early 20th century were actually ordinary, mass-produced objects (a bicycle wheel, a urinal). Mr. Oldenburg’s sculptures, however, were handcrafted rather than store-bought, and he wanted them to be, as he put it, “just as mysterious as nature.”

“My intention is to make an everyday object that eludes definition,” he once said. He rarely depicted people; instead he focused on items closely associated with human needs and desires. “I’ve expressed myself consistently in objects with reference to human beings rather than through human beings,” he said. As the art dealer Arne Glimcher, who knew and worked with Mr. Oldenburg since the early 1960s put it in an interview on Monday, “His work was almost psychoanalytic.”

Mr. Glimcher noted that precise drawings served as the basis for Mr. Oldenburg’s work. “He was a draughtsman comparable to Ingres or Picasso,” he said, but “with the daring to mess it up.”

His most important contribution to sculpture, Mr. Glimcher said, was turning it from something hard, like bronze or wood, to something soft. The sculptures would deflate, and Mr. Glimcher recalled Mr. Oldenburg instructing his associates to “fluff them up.”

Paula Cooper, the New York art dealer who co-represented Mr. Oldenburg for many years, said of his everyday sculptures: “They were funky but always formally strong, and over time the work became grander. He would take a simple idea and expand it.”

Claes Thure Oldenburg was born in Stockholm on Jan. 28, 1929, the son of Gosta and Sigrid Elisabeth (Lindforss) Oldenburg. His father, a diplomat, had postings in London, Berlin, Oslo and New York before being appointed in 1936 as the Swedish consul general in Chicago, where Claes grew up and attended the Latin School of Chicago.

Mr. Oldenburg studied literature and art history at Yale University from 1946 to 1950. He returned to the Midwest to study at the Art Institute of Chicago in the early 1950s with the painter Paul Wieghardt, a student of Paul Klee’s at the modernist Bauhaus school in Weimar, Germany. During his early years in art school, Mr. Oldenburg worked for the City News Bureau of Chicago, where one of his duties included drawing comic strips. He was the only major artist associated with Pop Art to have drawn comics professionally.

Mr. Oldenburg became a United States citizen in 1953 and moved to New York in 1956. His first exhibition, at the Judson Gallery in May 1959, included drawings, collages and objects made of papier-mâché.

His first significant shows in New York were The Street (1960), which consisted of cars, street signs and human figures made of cardboard and burlap, and The Store (1961), for which he opened his studio, then occupying a storefront on the Lower East Side, to visitors, bringing art and commerce together in the artist’s atelier. Objects for sale included sandwiches, pieces of pie, sausages and clothing made of wire and plaster and painted in an exuberant dripping style recalling Abstract Expressionism. His work quickly increased in scale.

In 1960, Mr. Oldenburg married Patty Mucha, an artist who became his first collaborator and appeared in his films. He would make drawings of the objects he would turn into sculptures, like his famed “soft” sculptures, made of canvas and later vinyl, filled with foam, and Ms. Mucha, for the most part, sewed them. “Floor Cake” and “Floor Burger,” both from 1962, led to a “Giant Toothpaste Tube” and an entire “Bathroom” installed at the Museum of Modern Art in 1969.

He also participated in Happenings by Jim Dine, Robert Whitman, Simone Forti and other artists.

Mr. Oldenburg was thinking even bigger, however, sketching tongue-in-cheek proposals for monuments like a “Fan in Place of the Statue of Liberty,” a “Design for a Tunnel Entrance in the Form of a Nose,” and a pair of “Scissors in Motion,” to replace the Washington Monument.

His first realized “Colossal Monument,” as he called this type of work, was “Lipstick (Ascending) on Caterpillar Tracks.” Here a giant tube of lipstick fabricated in vinyl and mounted on tractor wheels, with obvious phallic and military overtones, was rolled onto Yale’s campus in 1969 at the moment Vietnam War protests and the student movement were rocking colleges and universities across the country.

Vincent Scully, the Yale architecture scholar and a champion of “Lipstick,” later described the scene as “a good deal like Petrograd, 1917.” “Lipstick” was fabricated in steel in 1974 and installed at Yale in the courtyard of the residential Morse College.

During his early years in New York, Mr. Oldenburg became acquainted with artists like Allan Kaprow, George Segal and Robert Whitman, and got involved in the Happenings that would blossom into performance art. He renamed his studio The Ray Gun Theater in 1962 and held performances there on weekends. In 1965, he rented the pool in a health club for a happening titled “Washes,” which involved colored balloons and people floating in the pool. Two decades later, Mr. Oldenburg was still combining art and theater. In 1985, in collaboration with the Dutch writer and curator Coosje van Bruggen and the architect Frank Gehry, he staged an elaborate land-and-water spectacle in Venice titled “The Course of the Knife,” with a ship shaped like a Swiss Army knife as its centerpiece.

Mr. Oldenburg had met Ms. van Bruggen after he and Ms. Mucha divorced in 1970. Ms. van Bruggen was a staff member at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam at the time. Mr. Oldenburg’s first collaboration with her was in 1976, on the final version of “Trowel I,” an oversize garden implement installed on the grounds of the Kröller-Müller Museum in Otterlo, the Netherlands.

The couple married in 1977. They collaborated on more than 40 projects, including “Spoonbridge and Cherry,” from 1985 to 1988, at the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden, and “Giant Binoculars” (1991), which was incorporated into Mr. Gehry’s design for the Chiat-Day Building in Venice, Calif.

Mr. Oldenburg is survived by two stepchildren, Paulus Kapteyn and Maartje Oldenburg, and three grandchildren. Ms. van Bruggen died of breast cancer in 2009 at 66. His brother, Richard E. Oldenburg, the director of the Museum of Modern Art from 1972 to 1994, died in 2018 at 84.

In addition to his sculptural commissions, Mr. Oldenburg was the subject of many solo exhibitions, including one at the Museum of Modern Art in 1969. In 1995, the National Gallery of Art in Washington and the Guggenheim Museum in New York jointly organized the retrospective “Claes Oldenburg: An Anthology.” His and Ms. van Bruggen’s work is in the collections of most major modern art museums in the United States and Europe.

While Mr. Oldenburg’s work is most often linked to the Pop Art of the 1960s, he saw his monumental versions of humble objects as more than just celebrations of the mundane.

“A catalog could be made of all such objects,” he was quoted as saying, “which would read like a list of the deities or things on which our contemporary mythological thinking has been projected. We do invest religious emotion in our objects. Look at how beautifully objects are depicted in ads in Sunday newspapers.”

Mr. Glimcher took that one step further, seeing Mr. Oldenburg as an observer of American culture, in which certain objects gain traction and mean something, even the humble telephone, hamburger or ice cream cone. “They were prophetic,” he said of Mr. Oldenburg’s objects. “They were sociological statements.”

Danielle Cruz contributed reporting.

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Red flag: Consumers are using Buy Now, Pay Later to cover everyday expenses

That’s a concern for economists and consumer advocates, who say the surge in the use of these services, coupled with a lack of transparency and little regulatory oversight, leaves them wondering just how much debt Americans are actually getting into.

While other household debt, such as credit card spending and auto loans, is gathered and tracked by the Federal Reserve, Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) data is not included because the financing is typically provided by non-bank sources and not yet reported in a comprehensive manner to credit bureaus.

That means there’s no publicly available database of BNPL-related consumer debt levels, transaction volume, delinquency rates, and fees and interest charges.

“There’s no question there’s a big hole in our understanding of people’s financial situations, if you don’t include Buy Now, Pay Later,” said Matt Schulz, chief credit analyst for LendingTree. “And that’s a problem for credit scoring companies, credit bureaus and for lenders.”

Red flags

From Affirm and Apple to PayPal and Zip, BNPL transactions are currently estimated to be at least $100 billion annually — a figure that analysts say could skyrocket to between $1 trillion to $4 trillion within a few years. These services split a purchase into four or more installment payments over a period of few weeks or months. They are typically offered with zero or minimal interest, and often come without a credit check.

To make money, the BNPL providers charge merchants between 1.5% to 7% of the transaction price, according to Kansas City Federal Reserve research. For some retailers, the costs are worth it, according to research from RBC Capital Markets, which showed online BNPL offerings boosted average ticket sales by 30% to 50% and increase the share of customers who ultimately made a purchase.
Despite its rapid growth, BNPL has raised red flags for economists, regulators and attorneys general. They’ve cautioned that because the services are not regulated as credit products, it has resulted in a Wild West-style market with varying terms and conditions and few checks and balances.

One significant downside is the opportunity to get into debt fairly easily without realizing it, said Terri R. Bradford, a research specialist in payment systems for the Kansas City Federal Reserve.

The installment process makes it seem like someone is paying practically nothing for the goods or service they’re acquiring, she said.

“So the possibility is that you could, in your mind, think of everything that you’re buying in those four installments and, as a result, take on more debt than you would if you had to pay for them in full each and every time,” she said.

“The opportunity to stack your debt by using multiple Buy Now, Pay Later loans through multiple service providers is one of the biggest risks I see,” she added.

The three major credit bureaus have said they’ll start including BNPL activity on credit reports but they still need to rely on the providers for that information.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau said it plans to address these concerns, in addition to probing unclear terms, potential data harvesting, and the lack of other protections. The agency has been collecting information from BNPL providers and expects to publish its findings later this year.

However, the fear is that any potential fixes may not come quickly enough, said Marshall Lux, a Harvard Kennedy School research fellow who authored a recent study on Buy Now, Pay Later. These easy-to-use options are exploding just as people’s financial situations are worsening — creating a perfect storm that will put some of the most vulnerable Americans at risk, he said.

“With everything going on in the economy, this is not getting the attention this deserves,” he said. “Meanwhile, young people and the underbanked are being hurt badly, potentially ruining their credit for years to come.”

Typical BNPL consumers are younger — primarily Gen Zers and Millennials — and have credit histories considered to be subprime, Lux noted, citing research from TransUnion. They gravitate toward the services to avoid credit card interest but also to make purchases that don’t fit in their budget, according to Lux and the TransUnion survey.

“People are buying more than they should, and they admit it. Whether it’s aggressive marketing, whether it’s impulse buying, whether it’s a belief that, ‘I’ll have more tomorrow,’ they’re using lots of these [services],” he said.

The biggest red flag to Lux, a former chief risk officer for Chase, is what people are buying with these services.

“They’re buying cleaning supplies, they’re buying socks, they’re buying sneakers, they’re buying everyday household items,” he said. “When people start [using revolving credit for] everyday purchases like groceries, you know there’s a problem.”

Means to an end

BNPL providers say they view their offerings as a safer and more sustainable option to traditional lines of credit.

“The product and the business, ultimately, is entirely built around the premise of the consumers’ long-term success and their ability to repay,” said Libor Michalek, president of technology, risk and operations at Affirm. “And if they’re not able to, that is where we share in the negative outcome.”

In a statement emailed in response to questions from CNN Business, a Klarna spokesperson wrote:

“Our interest-free products are designed to keep people out of debt. We conduct strict eligibility checks on each purchase, constantly reassess our lending criteria and spending limits, and restrict the use of our services until missed payments are fulfilled.”

Some consumers are using BNPL services with the hope of trying to stick to a budget or balancing out their finances month-to-month, said Charlotte Principato, financial services analyst for Morning Consult.

“What it signals to me is this is a means to an end,” she said. “It’s a considered choice about how to make money go a little further and still achieve the goals that you want and still get the things that you feel like you need.”

That’s especially true for the plurality of Americans who don’t have a steady paycheck month to month, she said.

“They have to work with imperfect data about what their paycheck’s going to be every month and still manage to meet what are rather fixed expenses and still make the discretionary purchases that everyone should be allowed to make,” she said.

No wiggle room

For people like Linda Ramirez, the historically high level of inflation has meant there’s no wiggle room left for even the basics.

The single mother, who lives in a small South Texas town, has a 90-minute commute each day. At home, she has three growing adolescents.

“I feel like it’s doubled, everything’s doubled [in price],” Ramirez said. “So I’m paying $50 to $55 to fill up my vehicle; and groceries, same thing. Here in Texas, a carton of eggs has doubled from $3 or $4 to $7 or $8, depending on where you go.”

To help make her budget stretch, she uses BNPL for discretionary purchases and for some necessities as well, including a recent $400 grocery bill.

For Ramirez, spreading out the cost via a Buy Now Pay Later app was a better alternative to putting the tab on a credit card, drawing a loan or forgoing payment on a utility bill. If all payments are made on time, most BNPL services don’t charge interest or late fees.

“I don’t want to do this forever, but it’s good to know that if I ever find myself in a rut in the future, then I can always use this again,” she said.

CNN Video’s Zach Wasser contributed to this report.

Correction: An earlier version of this article misstated estimates for the size of the BNPL industry. Transactions were projected to be at least $100 billion in 2021.

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We asked healthcare professionals about their face masks of choice for everyday use

New data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported Friday emphasizes the importance of wearing the right mask while in a high-risk setting.

According to the data, surgical masks reduce the risk of testing positive for COVID-19 by 66 percent. More effective masks, like N95 and KN95 masks, decrease the risk of infection by 83 percent. A KN95 filters 95 percent of particles, and so does an N95. A KF94 filters 94 percent of particles. The difference between the letters is the government standard certification.

“These data from real-world settings reinforce the importance of consistently wearing face masks or respirators to reduce the risk of acquisition of SARS-CoV-2 infection among the general public in indoor community settings,” the CDC said in its Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.

The research was conducted by the California Department of Public Health between Feb. 18 and Dec. 1, 2021 — before the omicron variant wave took off. The researchers surveyed 652 people who recently tested positive for the coronavirus and 176 who had tested negative. All of the participants were asked whether they had been in schools, restaurants, stores, churches or another public indoor setting within 14 days before getting tested, and whether or not they had worn a mask.


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This research adds to the evidence that surgical masks, N95 and KN95 masks, are better than cloth masks. Nearly two years into the pandemic, guidance on masking has changed quite a bit. In the beginning, public health officials told the public not to buy masks because they should be saved for medical professionals. Then, any kind of mask was advised, including cotton and cloth masks that many sewed at home. Most recently in January, the CDC updated its guidance on face masks, saying loose cloth masks offer the least protection against COVID-19. While their stance is still any mask is better than no mask, it has become more clear that cloth masks are less effective.

So, does that mean that everyone should wear surgical masks, N95 and KN95 masks all the time?

“My recommendation on masks obviously depends on context, even though it may appear that we’re peaking with respect to the current omicron wave, we’re still at a level where infections are high, and more importantly, hospitalizations have not completely fallen off yet,”  Dr. Jahan Fahimi, who’s the Medical Director for the emergency department at the University of California–San Francisco (UCSF), told Salon.”And so whether it’s hospitalizations for or with COVID, what we’re recognizing is that it is still posing a pretty significant burden on the healthcare system, and so for that reason I would continue to recommend pretty liberal use of masks for all indoor spaces.”

Fahimi said as numbers fall, that can be reevaluated. For low-risk people who are vaccinated and boosted and around other low-risk people who are vaccinated and boosted, outside of their households, Fahimi said he’d recommend wearing surgical masks.

However, if you’re in a crowded space with little ventilation — like an airport — an N95 is appropriate. For Fahimi, as an emergency physician, he always wears an N95 at work. Outside of work, he wears a surgical mask.

“I wear regular surgical masks, and I just make sure that I have a good sort of seal on that surgical mask, that makes sure that the nose bridge is high and, and well fitted on the top of my nose, and obviously, I don’t take it down, I don’t let it slide down,” Fahimi said. “And to be totally honest, when I see folks who are wearing a cloth mask that slides down below their nose, I keep six feet of distance.”

RELATED: Is my mask good enough to fight omicron?

Dr. Monica Gandhi, infectious disease doctor and professor of medicine at the UCSF, told Salon that there are six masks that she believes fit well and filter out the coronavirus effectively.

“I always recommend one of these six:  an N95, KN95, FFP2, KF94, double mask (cloth plus surgical) or a cloth mask with a pocket for a filter,” Gandhi said. “I wrote a paper with Linsey Marr where we explore the protection of the latter two options and find strong protection.”

Gandhi said her personal favorite is the cloth mask that has a filter inside.

“The filter made of polypropylene material physically repels the virus (the polypropylene is negatively charged and so is the virus),” Gandhi said. “It is the lightest, thinnest option with the best protection and I find it the most comfortable. Moreover, you can wash the cloth mask and change the filter regularly; I change the filter every 2 days and wash the mask every 3-4 days.”

Dr. Amesh Adalja, who works in an intensive care unit, said when he is required to wear a mask he wears a surgical one that he usually obtains from the hospitals where he is on staff. He changes his mask everyday.

Read more on the omicron variant:

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