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Tag: children
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How parents can help kids manage school stress
How parents can help kids manage school stress – CBS News
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Inside the Anti-Vax Facebook Group Pushing a Bogus Cure for Autism
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Czelazewicz is just one of many affiliates who sell Pure Body Extra online, including Larry Cook, one of the best known US anti-vax influencers. Cook and his Stop Mandatory Vaccination group was kicked off Facebook in 2020, but only after it had amassed a following of around 200,000. Today, Cook sells Pure Body Extra as a cure for autism via his Detox for Autism website.
Pure Body Extra is manufactured by a company called Touchstone Essentials, which was founded in 2012 by Eddie Stone and is based in Raleigh, North Carolina.
The company sells a variety of other health and wellness products. On the product page for Pure Body Extra on the Touchstone Essentials website, the company says the product is safe “for all ages,” and in a section labeled “science,” the company states that the product’s “capacity to capture toxins, heavy metals, and environmental pollutants is evidenced by more than 300 studies documented on PubMed.”
However, when WIRED analyzed the 300 studies, it emerged that many were nonhuman trials, including numerous tests on animals. Indeed, over the course of the last 10 years, just seven medical trials on clinoptilolite, the particular type of zeolite used in PBX, had been conducted on humans, all of which were conducted on adults, and some of which didn’t concern detoxification.
“This is a broader trope in alternative health where [anti-vaxxers] rail against the medical establishment, saying they don’t have your best interests at heart and that you can’t trust ordinary doctors or ordinary medical science, but they do love to cherry-pick studies that seem to show favorable results for some cure that they offer,” says Calum Hood, head of research at the Center for Countering Digital Hate. “They’re then misapplying that science to try and sell people on the idea that a bit of zeolite is going to cure their child’s autism.”
When asked to provide proof that clinoptilolite was safe for use in children, Touchstone Essentials did not provide a response, but Sonia O’Farrell, the company’s chief marketing officer, told WIRED that the company “does not claim that Pure Body Extra (PBX) can cure or treat autism, or any medical condition for that matter. Pure Body Extra is a dietary supplement featuring natural zeolite to support the body’s detoxification systems. By definition, dietary supplements may not claim to treat, cure, diagnose, or prevent any disease.”
O’Farrell added that the company does not endorse any individuals who sell its products or how they promote them. “Upon becoming aware of an Affiliate making any medical claims, our compliance team will advise an Affiliate to remove any such materials,” O’Farrell added.
A statement written in small text at the bottom of the Touchstone Essentials website states: “These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. Our products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.”
The FDA did not respond to a request for comment about the way Pure Body Extra is being promoted online.
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David Gilbert
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No, Wisconsin Sen. Baldwin did not give federal money to a ‘transgender-affirming clinic’ for youth
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With about a month until Election Day, U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., is leading Republican challenger Eric Hovde in the most recent Marquette University Law School poll. Criticisms of one by the other are at a fever pitch.
During a Sept. 16 appearance on the Vicki McKenna Show on WIBA (1310), Hovde dogged Baldwin for a federal earmark she requested for a Madison-area organization that serves at-risk youth.
In doing so, Hovde claimed, Baldwin “gave our taxpayer money to a transgender clinic, affirming clinic — which is their buzzword — that does it without even telling parents.”
His remark strays from the facts. Let’s take a closer look.
Hovde mischaracterizes organization’s work
When asked for the evidence behind the claim, a Hovde spokesperson pointed to the $400,000 in federal money that Baldwin requested from a $1.2 trillion government spending package passed in March for Fitchburg-based Briarpatch Youth Services, which serves runaway and homeless youth in Dane County.
Its programs include a youth homeless shelter, employment services and help for people navigating the criminal justice system, among others.
The money was specifically for therapeutic and clinical counseling for youth who are experiencing homelessness, according to the request posted to Baldwin’s website.
But the move triggered Republican uproar because Briarpatch also runs a program called Teens Like Us, which supports LGBTQ+ youth ages 13 to 18. Last year, its website mentioned that youth did not need a guardian’s permission to join the program, and that gender-affirming clothing like chest binders and swimwear was also available.
Neither point appears on the page today, a move the organization told Wisconsin Watch it made to protect youth safety. Briarpatch Executive Director Jill Pfeiffer told PolitiFact Wisconsin that in most cases, parents are the ones bringing their children to the Teens Like Us program to give them a safe place to explore their identity.
PolitiFact Wisconsin asked Hovde’s team to clarify what he meant in saying the organization “does it” without telling parents. His spokesperson declined to specifically answer the question, noting that news outlets reported the gender-affirming clothing offering and that youth can join the program without permission.
But in the multiple times Hovde has offered variations of this claim, he doesn’t mention clothing. Instead, he’s made vague claims that the organization works with children on “transgendering them,” helps kids “go through the transgender process,” or, in the case of the specific statement we are examining here, “does it.”
After his statement, McKenna claimed the organization would “alter children, mutilate them surgically or put them on drugs that can have a permanent impact on their quality of life” — things Hovde didn’t dispute.
Taken together, this all connotes an element of gender-affirming medical care that Briarpatch does not provide. Not only does his phrase “transgender clinic” misconstrue the organization’s overall mission, law prohibits Wisconsin minors from getting medical treatment without a parent or guardian’s signature.
Second, the taxpayer money Hovde refers to is not going to the Teens Like Us program, Baldwin’s staff told the Journal Sentinel in March and Pfeiffer confirmed to PolitiFact Wisconsin.
Because the request came from the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Service Administration, a Baldwin spokesperson told the Journal Sentinel, the funds would be prohibited from being used for the activities described in the Teens Like Us program. Pfeiffer confirmed the money is for counseling for youth experiencing homelessness and other hardships.
Our ruling
Hovde claimed that Baldwin gave taxpayer money to a transgender-affirming clinic that “does it without even telling parents.”
Baldwin did secure funds for Briarpatch Youth Services, which has a program for LGBTQ+ youth that doesn’t require parental permission to join. But Hovde’s vagueness leaves room for the idea that there’s gender-affirming medical treatment happening, which is not accurate. On top of that, and most significantly, the funds Baldwin requested went to an entirely different program, and are not being used for the purpose Hovde claimed.
We rate this claim False.
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Halloween superfans see the culture catching up to them. (A 12-foot skeleton helped)
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Home Depot was about to launch something big — really big — when the pandemic hit in the spring of 2020: a 12-foot skeleton.
“There were a lot of internal discussions. It was like, is there going to be Halloween this year?” said Lance Allen, senior merchant of decorative holiday at Home Depot. “Are customers going to think this is in poor taste? Should we go forward with it?’”
Home Depot did. And the towering skeleton arrived at the perfect time.
“Nobody could possibly need a 12-foot skeleton, but everybody wanted a 12-foot skeleton,” Allen said.
The retailer’s gamble upped the game for decorations. A population stuck at home and wanting some semblance of community entertainment created a Halloween phenomenon that’s now bigger than any one store. (Others carry various versions of the larger-than-life skeleton.)
And as stores race to get the latest and greatest Halloween score out as soon as possible, superfans say it’s about time.
Halloween is celebrated earlier
Home Depot’s 12-foot skeleton is affectionately known by fans across the internet and globe as “Skelly.” When Skelly was launched, the thinking was that he’d be out for a week or two leading up to Halloween night, Allen said, the usual consumer behavior observed at the time.
But the pandemic changed that timeline.
“Everybody started decorating in early October for something to do,” Allen said. “And we’ve really seen a shift in the market where now people are decorating for Halloween how we’ve seen with Christmas historically, planning out decorations five to six weeks, two months ahead of time.”
Mak Ralston, a Halloween fanatic known as Haunt Former on YouTube, who posts Halloween videos year-round, has noticed the shift.
“There used to be a kind of a calendar as to when I would expect things to come out in stores,” Ralston said, noting that orange and black and witches and skeletons used to roll in at the start of September, maybe mid-August.
“This year, I saw some stuff in stores for Halloween in June, early July,” he said. “It’s never been earlier.”
For some, it’s always Halloween
“Some average people who aren’t as invested don’t realize that for people who are really committed to both Halloween and the horror culture, they’re in it to win it like all year,” Ralston said.
“I can post a video about a horror movie or about a Halloween mask that’s coming out in October in February, and people eat it up,” he said.
Nate Rambaud, known as That Guy Nate on Youtube, started his channel by posting videos of abandoned stores such as Toys R Us, a niche interest on the video-sharing platform. Now with more than 440,000 subscribers, his bread and butter is a more spooky niche. He posts videos touring Spirit Halloween locations, which often occupy abandoned stores.
Rambaud has been to well over 300 Spirit Halloween locations in all 50 states.
“Halloween is so easy to attach to. It doesn’t require anybody else whatsoever,” said Rambaud.
Christmas “kind of requires other people, your family. You’re out buying stuff for people. And then kids sit around and wait for Christmas — that’s really all they can do for Christmas,” he said. “But Halloween — anyone can associate with Halloween and you can do it any time all the time.”
As a result of the year-round party, Skelly’s had some work done for his fifth birthday. Allen said the new Skellys for sale this season will have more UV additive to hold up against the sun longer, along with a more durable resin mixture to withstand colder temperatures. And he now has a dog.
“People are taking the skeletons on dates. They’re going out to the beach, he’s playing in the sand,” Allen said. “We’ve seen him at weddings.”
Jacob Humphrey, an artist in Texas, helps moderate a Facebook group of Home Depot Halloween superfans. There is a little bit of healthy competition over decorations, he said.
“A lot of times people will say, ‘I know this is not as good as everyone else’s, but I wanted to share this,’” Humphrey said. Group members join to find like-minded fans, he said, “but let’s be honest, people want to show off.”
Why are so many people so wild about Halloween?
Perhaps it all has to do with a fundamental part of the holiday: children.
Humphrey was out painting his fence recently when a girl walked by. She told him his house always has the best decorations.
“I didn’t realize kids memorize that. And that’s really kind of a badge of honor,” Humphrey said. ”Also, like, great, now I have no choice, I’m going to make sure I do a great job.”
Ralston recalled that growing up, he was the kid who carried around a skeleton instead of a teddy bear.
And Rambaud, whose videos showcase Halloween animatronics worth hundreds of dollars, remembers a simpler time from his childhood that helped spark his love for Halloween.
“My dad used to make what he would call a spook tunnel. He would take cardboard boxes, like refrigerator boxes, and he put them all together and made a maze that we had to crawl through,” he said. ”That was our little haunted house.”
To Humphrey, the holiday’s appeal can be summarized this way:
“Halloween is an extrovert day for introverts,” he said. “Why wouldn’t you want to celebrate that?”
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At the UN, young people push to make sure the generational shift is faster — and more substantial
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UNITED NATIONS (AP) — They were sharing the world stage to discuss a plan to give young people more input in decisions that shape lives. And 26-year-old Daphne Frias, talking to the head of the United Nations, had thoughts.
“Truly, it’s time for the people who do so much of the talking to do less of the talking,” the disability and climate activist told Secretary-General António Guterres. “And to have the voices of my generation … lead.”
Their exchange this month, at a leadup event to the U.N. General Assembly’s meeting of nations’ leaders, was a measure of diplomacy’s generation gap.
A big young cohort is coming of age in a troubled world, and it’s coming with ideas about inclusion, participation and authority. Those ideas are nudging the hierarchical, bureaucratic ways of an international order set up when their grandparents were kids or not even born.
“My generation messed up when it comes to the world today,” the 75-year-old U.N. chief told Frias and an audience of activists and others in the vast, coolly elegant assembly hall.
The world needs a new generation that understands “we are living to disaster” and can turn it around, Guterres said, adding emphatically: “We cannot do that if your generation is not part of the decision-making process that is still controlled by my generation that messed up.”
Passing the torch can be difficult
But how to make that change in a global system and governments largely run by older people, and a United Nations that has tried to engage the young but still has some procedures, protocol — and even architecture — reflecting what was “modern” more than seven decades ago? Does the U.N. matter, anyway, to a social-network-native generation with its own means of connecting and organizing across borders, and with a sense of urgency that chafes at the pace of intergovernmental accords?
Marinel Sumook Ubaldo, a 27-year-old Filipina climate activist, has been involved in U.N. conferences and believes the world body can be a valuable platform for advocacy. But so can grassroots organizing and building public pressure outside big organizations, Ubaldo says.
“If the U.N. can shift from symbolic inclusion to truly empowering youth with decision-making authority and accountability mechanisms, I would say it would remain relevant,” she said. “But if not, young people will continue to forge new paths.”
Over 1.9 billion people — nearly a quarter of the world population — are between ages 10 and 24. But young people are sparse in the corridors of power. Under 3% of members of national legislatures are under 30, according to the Inter-Parliamentary Union, a global group of such bodies.
Of course, today’s young activists aren’t the first to worry about the world they’re inheriting, to yearn to be heard or to feel they can’t wait patiently for the creaky wheels of change to turn.
But this generation has been steeped in a particular brew of risks and crises: post-9/11 wars and security culture, a financial meltdown, a pandemic, billions of people living in conflict zones, a planet that’s warming at the fastest rate ever measured. And, with the rise of social media, the generation’s ideas about solutions to such challenges move around faster than ever before.
As Frias puts it, “we don’t have time for dues to be paid” to try to influence things.
“We constantly get told that we are inspirational, that we’re doing a great job, that we are the future,” Frias, an American-born daughter of Dominican immigrants, said in an interview. “But inspiration doesn’t change the world. Action does.”
There’s growing momentum — to a point
Over the years, the U.N. has made various overtures to young people. An assistant secretary-general for youth affairs, Dr. Felipe Paullier, was tapped last year. There had previously been a lower-level youth envoy.
A roster of youth delegates, advisory groups and more have taken part in U.N. activities over the decades. Some have attracted considerable attention, including speeches by Afghan girls’ education advocate and Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai, climate activist Greta Thunberg and K-pop stars BTS.
A 2018 initiative called “Youth 2030” is meant to make young people “full-fledged partners” in the U.N.’s work. A recent update said progress has been “steady but slower than desired.”
Now comes the “ Pact for the Future,” a wide-ranging document approved Sunday at a summit that kicked off this year’s big General Assembly gathering. The pact includes pledges to spend more on youth services, to create jobs and to promote “meaningful youth participation” in national policymaking and U.N. processes.
That might sound bland to the casual observer. But through a U.N. lens, devoting a chapter to youth and future generations in a laboriously negotiated global blueprint — and getting 193 nations to sign off — elevates and enshrines youths as a priority.
“Ten or 15 years ago, you know, young people were just seen as beneficiaries of policies,” Paullier, 33, said in an interview. “There are many things changing that are showing institutions, decision-makers, are saying, ‘OK, we need to engage with them as partners.’”
There’s still far to go, he notes.
Participation must actually be meaningful
Nudhara Yusuf, who co-chaired a civil society conference that helped prepare for the recent summit, says the U.N. has made “a real turn” toward engaging young people. Now it’s a question of making promises of “meaningful” participation … meaningful.
“How do you go beyond just putting someone on a panel? How do you ensure that they’re part of the dialogue offstage, as well?” asks Yusuf, 25. Born in Britain and raised in India, she’s a researcher at the Stimson Center think tank in Washington.
Young activists also may lack the resources to move in international circles when it entails far-flung travel. While many have started organizations and done fundraising, some say it’s hard getting past a “youth organization” rubric to tap bigger pools of grants, despite working on broader issues.
Amani Joel Mafigi, who co-founded an entrepreneurship organization in Uganda, thinks the U.N. should establish a youth empowerment fund to back climate, social justice and innovation initiatives. The 27-year-old offered that suggestion to the secretary-general at the same event with Frias.
In an interview, Mafigi added that he’d want young “changemakers” to be central to structuring such a fund and steering its work.
“I have seen how much young people with little resources can do and can achieve within a minimum period of time, with less bureaucratic processes,” said Mafigi, who fled Congo as a refugee in 2008.
Guterres told him, Frias and others in the assembly hall that the U.N. aims to add more young staffers and to give youths a voice “when things are being decided, not when things have been decided.”
“But, I mean, let’s be clear: Power is never given. Power is taken,” Guterres said. “So I encourage young people not to be afraid to fight for their rights.”
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See more of AP’s coverage of the U.N. General Assembly at https://apnews.com/hub/united-nations
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Unbelievable facts
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Gordon Ramsay has chosen not to leave a large inheritance for his children, doesn’t allow them…
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Can We Safely Use Melamine Dishes and Polyamide Plastic Utensils? | NutritionFacts.org
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I recommend glass, ceramic, porcelain, or stainless steel tableware and wooden or stainless steel cooking utensils.
Melamine is used to make a variety of hard plastic “food contact items such as cups, plates, bowls, and utensils because they are dishwasher safe, inexpensive, and durable.” If that word sounds familiar, it may be because melamine has also been added illegally to protein products to game the system to make it appear that “food commodities” like pet food contain more protein than they actually do. By 2007, more than a thousand potentially contaminatedpet food products were recalled after “the chemical was found to be a contaminant in wheat gluten used in those products,” but not before it caused disease and death in pets throughout North America.
“It is presumed that melamine was intentionally added by suppliers in China to falsely elevate the measured protein content and, hence, the monetary value of these products.” The pet food scandal was just the writing on the wall. The following year, “melamine was discovered to be the cause of an outbreak of urinary tract stones and renal failure” (kidney stones and kidney failure), affecting hundreds of thousands of infants and young children throughout China. “Investigations revealed that the compound was added illegally to powdered milk and baby formulas to falsify protein content.”
As I discuss in my video Are Melamine Dishes and Polyamide Plastic Utensils Safe?, in the United States, you can find it in food packaging and sneaking its way into animal feed. However, those using melamine dishware can be exposed directly, as it migrates straight into the food upon exposure to heat. In fact, “cooking spoons and crockery made of melamine resin are not suited for microwaves and cooking,” according to food safety authorities. Okay, but what if you never cook with it, fry with it, or microwave it? What if you just use melamine to eat out of?
In “A Crossover Study of Noodle Soup Consumption in Melamine Bowls and Total Melamine Excretion in Urine,” researchers measured the amount of melamine flowing through the study subjects’ bodies compared to eating the same soup out of ceramic bowls. Their findings? “Melamine tableware may release large amounts of melamine when used to serve high-temperature foods”—and not even hot foods. “Melamine migration can be detectable from daily-use melamine-made tableware, even in the low temperatures,” like just warm water. Why do we care? Because the level of melamine you’re exposed to “is significantly associated with kidney function deterioration in patients with early-stage CKD,” chronic kidney disease, in which even relatively “low melamine levels may cause a rapid decline in kidney function.” So, I would suggest glass, ceramic, porcelain, or stainless steel tableware instead.
What about polyamide utensils, common black plastic spoons, spatulas, and the like? All sorts of different plastic materials are used in kitchen utensils. Polyamide is “typically used for turners [spatulas] or ladles due to their high heat and oil resistance.” “However, components of this plastic can migrate from the utensils into the food and consequently be ingested by consumers.” Out of 33 utensils tested, nearly 1 in 3 exceeded the upper safety limit. The German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment “recommends that consumers keep contact with food as brief as possible when using PA [polyamide] kitchen gadgets, especially at high temperatures,” such as above the temperature at which we may drink hot tea or coffee.
A different survey of black plastic kitchen utensils found about a third contaminated with flame retardant chemicals. Why? Because it may be made from plastic recycled from electronic equipment that was impregnated with the stuff. Then, should you dip the polyamide utensil into oil, the chemicals can trickle out, suggesting that using such “utensils for frying may lead to considerable dietary exposure.”
The black dye itself in some polyamide utensils can leach out, too. Eventually, with enough use, the levels drop, but it may take the equivalent of boiling the utensils for about a hundred hours before the dye leaking approaches safety levels. It’s probably just easier to use utensils that are wooden or stainless steel.
This is the last in a three-part series of cookware videos. If you missed the others, check out Are Aluminum Pots, Bottles, and Foil Safe? and Stainless Steel or Cast Iron: Which Cookware Is Best? Is Teflon Safe?.
It may not be safe to microwave melamine, but what about microwaving in general? See Are Microwaves Safe? and The Effects of Radiation Leaking from Microwave Ovens.
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Michael Greger M.D. FACLM
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Prince Harry says harms of social media have created an ‘epidemic’ for today’s youth
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NEW YORK (AP) — Prince Harry said today’s youth is in the midst of an “epidemic” of anxiety, depression and social isolation due to negative experiences online, as he brought his campaign to help children and their parents navigate cyberspace to this week’s Clinton Global Initiative.
“These platforms are designed to create addiction,” Harry, 40, said in remarks Tuesday in New York City. “Young people are kept there by mindless, endless, numbing scrolling — being force-fed content that no child should ever be exposed to. This is not free will.”
Beyond supporting parents and youth throughout this advocacy, The Duke of Sussex stressed the need for corporate accountability. He asked why leaders of powerful social media companies are still held to the “lowest ethical standards” — and called on shareholders to demand tangible change.
“Parenting doesn’t end with the birth of a child. Neither does founding a company,” said Harry, who revealed that his smartphone lock screen is a photo of his children, five-year-old Prince Archie and three-year-old Princess Lilibet. “We have a duty and a responsibility to see our creations through.”
Harry’s remarks arrive as pressures continue to mount on tech giants like Meta, Snap and TikTok to make their online platforms safer, particularly for younger users. Many children on these platforms are exposed to content that is not age appropriate, such as violence, or misinformation. Others face unrealistic beauty standards, bullying and sexual harassment.
Companies have made some changes over the years — with Instagram, for example, announcing last week that it would be making teen accounts private by default in a handful of countries. But safety advocates have long-stressed that there’s more work to be done. Many also maintain that companies still put too much responsibility on parents when it comes to keeping children safe on social media.
Harry’s contribution to this year’s CGI annual meeting was part of the “What’s Working” theme, in a panel that included former President Bill Clinton, Clinton Foundation Vice Chair Chelsea Clinton and World Central Kitchen founder Jose Andres.
The Archewell Foundation, which Harry founded with his wife, Meghan Markle, to carry out their philanthropic work recently launched an initiative supporting parents whose children have suffered or died due to online harms. Harry highlighted the work of that initiative, called The Parents Network, in his speech Tuesday.
The foundation has also partnered with the World Health Organization and others to end violence against children, an issue he and Meghan outlined during a recent trip to Colombia. Harry on Tuesday pointed to the inaugural Global Ministerial Conference on Ending Violence Against Children, which is set to take place in Bogotá this November. He said that this meeting could result in the first global agreement for prioritizing child safety and protection online.
His CGI address was part of a string of appearances for Harry in New York at the growing number of humanitarian and philanthropic events that run alongside the United Nations General Assembly Week.
On Monday, he appeared at an event for The HALO Trust, where he discussed how the work of the landmine clearing charity was influential on his late mother, Princess Diana, as well as at the 2024 Concordia Annual Summit, where he spoke with winners of The Diana Award.
“The HALO Trust’s work in Angola meant a great deal to my mother,” he said. “Carrying on her legacy is a responsibility that I take seriously. And I think we all know how much she would want us to finish this particular job.”
Harry’s message on Tuesday was generally well-received at the conference.
Nia Faith, 22, co-founder of the Canadian nonprofit Revolutionnaire, which works to empower youth and uses social media to mobilize members, said she saw his presentation as a “call to action” on an issue that does not get enough attention.
“I was incredibly moved by Prince Harry’s speech,” she said. “At Revolutionnaire, we use digital advocacy and social media to empower youth to make a positive impact. We also recognized that social media is being used in a way that is harmful and detrimental to the mental health of young people.”
Faith hopes that Harry’s work will convince companies and governments to take action to protect children while encouraging the use of platforms to drive more positive action.
Ashley Lashley, 25, whose Ashley Lashley Foundation works to address environmental challenges in her native Barbados by motivating young people to take action in their communities, said she was impressed by his remarks, even though she also worries about the digital divide in her country.
“His message really hit home that parents, teachers, and students really need to unite to educate each other about the safe usage of digital technology,” she said. “I really believe that there needs to be a multi sectorial approach. That’s what we’re seeing here at CGI where different persons from different sectors — from governments, from private sectors, from philanthropy organizations — can really work together to ensure that there is peace and equity across all social media platforms.”
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Associated Press coverage of philanthropy and nonprofits receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. For all of AP’s philanthropy coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/philanthropy.
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How to Teach Kids About Money and Set Them Up for Success | Entrepreneur
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Although 83% of U.S. adults said parents are the most responsible for teaching their children about money, 31% of American parents never speak to their kids about the topic, according to a survey from CNBC and Acorns.
Last week, the subject came up on Northwestern Mutual’s A Better Way to Money podcast, which featured social media star and owner of Stur Drinks Kat Stickler and Northwestern Mutual vice president and chief portfolio manager Matt Stucky.
“I love and respect my parents, but we didn’t really talk about money ever — I never saw them talk about money,” Stickler told Stucky during the conversation. “It was taboo. It wasn’t brought up once.”
According to Stucky, parents can instill strong money management skills like any other good habit.
“It just takes a lot of repetition — things like saving, investing,” Stucky said. “I’m not going to teach my 4-year-old about investing, but just the idea of if I save a dollar, that means I can spend it down the road on something that I really want. That takes a while to sink in.”
Money might not have been a regular topic of discussion while Stickler was growing up, but the entrepreneur says her mother did show her the value of a dollar in other ways: repurposing old jeans into shorts or empty butter tubs into containers for school lunch.
In addition to talking to their kids about money, parents can lead by example when it comes to smart financial decisions.
“There are new risks that are now in the equation of being a parent,” Stucky said. “Things like, What if something happens to me; what if I can’t work anymore? How does that impact my child’s financial life?“
Navigating those uncertainties means planning for big-ticket items, according to Stucky. Stickler, who has a young daughter, said she’s already taken some key steps to secure her future: setting up a will complete with a month-by-month timeline and establishing funds for healthcare and school — and even one for clothes and toys.
Related: What Your Parents Never Taught You About Money
According to Stucky, parents should leverage today’s circumstances for tomorrow’s success.
Stucky recommends setting up a 529, to which you can contribute funds for education, and a Roth IRA for your child.
“[With a Roth IRA], you are able to contribute on their behalf up to the child’s earned income amount or the current contribution limits of $7,000, and the dollars come out tax-free after age 59 ½ or if they need to use it for a qualifying life event,” Stucky explains. “It’s a way to set up your children for their retirement, as well as support generational wealth.”
Parents might also consider a Uniform Transfer to Minors Account (UTMA), which has no limit on the amount that goes in and allows them to retain control until their kids reach 18-21, depending on where they live, Stucky says.
Finally, Stucky recommends the “often overlooked option” of permanent life insurance for your child.
“The policy will pay a death benefit someday so long as the required premiums are paid,” he explains. “In addition, policies accumulate cash value, which your child could access during their lifetime.”
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Amanda Breen
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Here Comes the Sun: Prince Harry, Meghan Markle and more
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Here Comes the Sun: Prince Harry, Meghan Markle and more – CBS News
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California governor to sign a law to protect children from social media addiction
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SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California will make it illegal for social media platforms to knowingly provide addictive feeds to children without parental consent beginning in 2027 under a bill Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom will sign, his office said Friday.
California will follow New York state, which passed a law earlier this year allowing parents to block their kids from getting social media posts suggested by a platform’s algorithm. Utah has passed laws in recent years aimed at limiting children’s access to social media, but they have faced challenges in court.
The California bill will take effect in a state home to some of the largest technology companies in the world after similar proposals have failed to pass in recent years. It is part of a growing push in states across the country to try to address the impacts of social media on the well-being of children.
“Every parent knows the harm social media addiction can inflict on their children — isolation from human contact, stress and anxiety, and endless hours wasted late into the night,” Newsom said in a statement. “With this bill, California is helping protect children and teenagers from purposely designed features that feed these destructive habits.”
The bill bans platforms from sending notifications without permission from parents to minors between 12 a.m. and 6 a.m., and between 8 a.m. and 3 p.m. on weekdays from September through May, when children are typically in school. The legislation also makes platforms set children’s accounts to private by default.
Opponents of the legislation say it could inadvertently prevent adults from accessing content if they cannot verify their age. Some argue it would threaten online privacy by making platforms collect more information on users.
The bill defines an “addictive feed” as a website or app “in which multiple pieces of media generated or shared by users are, either concurrently or sequentially, recommended, selected, or prioritized for display to a user based, in whole or in part, on information provided by the user, or otherwise associated with the user or the user’s device,” with some exceptions.
The subject garnered renewed attention in June when U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy called on Congress to require warning labels on social media platforms and their impacts on young people. Attorneys general in 42 states endorsed the plan in a letter sent to Congress last week.
State Sen. Nancy Skinner, a Democrat representing Berkeley who authored the California bill, said after lawmakers approved the bill last month that “social media companies have designed their platforms to addict users, especially our kids.”
“With the passage of SB 976, the California Legislature has sent a clear message: When social media companies won’t act, it’s our responsibility to protect our kids,” she said in a statement.
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Associated Press writer Trân Nguyễn contributed to this report.
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Austin is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. Follow Austin on X: @sophieadanna
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Can We Safely Use Aluminum Foil, Bottles, and Pots? | NutritionFacts.org
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DNA damage is assessed in users of aluminum cookware.
“Over the last decades, the toxicity of aluminum for humans has been heavily discussed and is still not completely clarified.” Those occupationally exposed to aluminum—for instance, in smelter plants—suffer from oxidative stress and free radicals that can damage their DNA. What about just using aluminum cookware? Articles like “Metal Exposures from Aluminum Cookware: An Unrecognized Public Health Risk in Developing Countries,” suggesting an “unrecognized public health risk,” were limited to the developing world where “cookware is made in informal shops by casting liquid aluminum melted from a collection of scrap metal,” including the likes of vehicle radiators, lead batteries, and computer parts, which is how you can get so much lead leaching into people’s food.
Then “The Relationship Between Plasma Aluminum Content, Lymphocyte DNA Damage, and Oxidative Status in Persons Using Aluminum Containers and Utensils Daily” was published, suggesting that aluminum itself may be harmful. Most of our aluminum exposure comes from processed junk food containing aluminum additives, “including those within some processed cheeses, baking powders, cake mixes, frozen dough, and pancake mixes.” However, about 20 percent of the daily intake of aluminum may come from aluminum cooking utensils, such as “pans, pots, kettles, and trays.”
Might this cause a problem? Researchers took blood from consumers who used aluminum cookware versus those who did not and found that not only did the aluminum users have twice the level of aluminum in their blood, as you can see below and at 1:33 in my video Are Aluminum Pots, Bottles, and Foil Safe?, but they had more free radical damage of their body fats and proteins. What’s more, the total antioxidant capacity of the bloodstream of those using aluminum cookware was compromised, so they suffered significantly more DNA damage.
Indeed, as you can see below and at 1:52 in my video, those with the highest levels of aluminum in their blood tended to suffer significantly more damage to their DNA. No surprise, since “aluminum is considered to be a pro-oxidant agent.”
These folks weren’t just casually using aluminum pots, though. Specifically, they use them every day to cook and store acidic foods, like yogurt and tomato sauce, which can leach out more aluminum. But, even using “camping dishes,” which tend to be aluminum since it’s so light, for just one week, could greatly exceed the tolerable weekly intake guidelines, especially for children, if you incorporated something acidic, like marinating a fresh catch in lemon juice. Once in a while won’t make much difference, but these findings suggest that you may not want to cook in aluminum day in and day out.
What about aluminum drinking bottles? They’re nice and light, but children drinking two cups a day of tea or juice from them could exceed the tolerable aluminum exposure limit. So, out of an abundance of caution, safety authorities like the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment “recommend that consumers avoid the use of aluminum pots or dishes for acidic or salted foodstuffs such as apple sauce, rhubarb, tomato puree, or salt herring…thus prophylactically avoiding the ‘unnecessary ingestion’ of aluminum.”
What about aluminum foil? Wrapping and baking food in aluminum foil is a common culinary practice. The concern is that this could represent “a potentially hazardous source of aluminum in the human diet.” When put to the test, there was leakage of aluminum from the foil to the food, but the amount was so small that it would be more of an issue for small children or those suffering from diminished kidney function.
What about just wrapping food in foil to store it in the refrigerator? Only marginal increases in aluminum are seen—except when the food is in contact with the foil and, at the same time, certain other types of metal, such as stainless steel, which is largely iron. That sets up a battery and “can lead to tremendous food aluminum concentrations.” For example, as you can see below and at 4:34 in my video, the aluminum levels in a ham before and after a day coveredin foil are negligible; there’s hardly a bump in the foil-covered ham. But, if that same foil-wrapped ham sits on top of a steel tray or serving plate for a day, the aluminum levels in the ham shoot up.
Finally, you know how aluminum foil is often glossy on one side and dull on the other? Which would be worse? Fish fillets were baked and grilled both ways, wrapped with the glossy side out versus the dull side out, and no significant difference was found.
This is the first in a series of three videos on cookware. Stay tuned for Stainless Steel or Cast Iron: Which Cookware Is Best? Is Teflon Safe? and Are Melamine Dishes and Polyamide Plastic Utensils Safe?.
I’ve discussed aluminum in antiperspirants, food, medications, and tea. Check out the related posts.
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Michael Greger M.D. FACLM
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Instagram makes teen accounts private as pressure mounts on the app to protect children
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Instagram is making teen accounts private by default as it tries to make the platform safer for children amid a growing backlash against how social media affects young people’s lives.
Beginning Tuesday in the U.S., U.K., Canada and Australia, anyone under 18 who signs up for Instagram will be placed into restrictive teen accounts and those with existing accounts will be migrated over the next 60 days. Teens in the European Union will see their accounts adjusted later this year.
Parent company Meta acknowledges that teenagers may lie about their age and says it will require them to verify their ages in more instances, like if they try to create a new account with an adult birthday. The Menlo Park, California company also said it is building technology that proactively finds teen accounts that pretend to be grownups and automatically places them into the restricted teen accounts.
The teen accounts will be private by default. Private messages are restricted so teens can only receive them from people they follow or are already connected to. “Sensitive content,” such as videos of people fighting or those promoting cosmetic procedures, will be limited, Meta said. Teens will also get notifications if they are on Instagram for more than 60 minutes and a “sleep mode” will be enabled that turns off notifications and sends auto-replies to direct messages from 10 p.m. until 7 a.m.
While these settings will be turned on for all teens, 16 and 17-year-olds will be able to turn them off. Kids under 16 will need their parents’ permission to do so.
“The three concerns we’re hearing from parents are that their teens are seeing content that they don’t want to see or that they’re getting contacted by people they don’t want to be contacted by or that they’re spending too much time on the app,” said Naomi Gleit, head of product at Meta. “So teen accounts is really focused on addressing those three concerns.”
The announcement comes as the company faces lawsuits from dozens of U.S. states that accuse it of harming young people and contributing to the youth mental health crisis by knowingly and deliberately designing features on Instagram and Facebook that addict children to its platforms.
While Meta didn’t give specifics on how the changes might affect its business, the company said the changes may mean that teens will use Instagram less in the short term. Emarketer analyst Jasmine Enberg said the revenue impact of the changes “will likely be minimal.”
“Even as Meta continues to prioritize teen safety, it’s unlikely that it’s going to make sweeping changes that would cause a major financial hit,” she said, adding that the teen accounts are unlikely to significantly affect how engaged teens are with Instagram “not in the least because there are still plenty of ways to circumvent the rules, and could even make them more motivated to work around the age limits.”
New York Attorney General Letitia James said Meta’s announcement was “an important first step, but much more needs to be done to ensure our kids are protected from the harms of social media.” James’ office is working with other New York officials on how to implement a new state law intended to curb children’s access to what critics call addictive social media feeds.
Others were more critical. Nicole Gill, the co-founder and executive director of the nonprofit Accountable Tech, called Instagram’s announcement the “latest attempt to avoid actual independent oversight and regulation and instead continue to self-regulate, jeopardizing the health, safety, and privacy of young people.”
“Today’s PR exercise falls short of the safety by design and accountability that young people and their parents deserve and only meaningful policy action can guarantee,” she said. “Meta’s business model is built on addicting its users and mining their data for profit; no amount of parental and teen controls Meta is proposing will change that.”
Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), the co-author of the Kids Online Safety Act that recently passed the Senate, questioned the timing of the announcement “on the eve of a House markup” of the bill.
“Just like clockwork, the Kids Online Safety Act moves forward and industry comes out with a new set of self-enforcing guidelines,” she said.
In the past, Meta’s efforts at addressing teen safety and mental health on its platforms have also been met with criticism that the changes don’t go far enough. For instance, while kids will get a notification when they’ve spent 60 minutes on the app, they will be able to bypass it and continue scrolling.
That’s unless the child’s parents turn on “parental supervision” mode, where parents can limit teens’ time on Instagram to a specific amount of time, such as 15 minutes.
With the latest changes, Meta is giving parents more options to oversee their kids’ accounts. Those under 16 will need a parent or guardian’s permission to change their settings to less restrictive ones. They can do this by setting up “parental supervision” on their accounts and connecting them to a parent or guardian.
Nick Clegg, Meta’s president of global affairs, said last week that parents don’t use the parental controls the company has introduced in recent years.
Meta’s Gleit said she thinks the teen accounts will incentivize parents to start using them.
“Parents will be able to see, via the family center, who is messaging their teen and hopefully have a conversation with their teen,” she said. “If there is bullying or harassment happening, parents will have visibility into who their teen’s following, who’s following their teen, who their teen has messaged in the past seven days and hopefully have some of these conversations and help them navigate these really difficult situations online.”
U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy said last year that tech companies put too much responsibility on parents when it comes to keeping children safe on social media.
“We’re asking parents to manage a technology that’s rapidly evolving that fundamentally changes how their kids think about themselves, how they build friendships, how they experience the world — and technology, by the way, that prior generations never had to manage,” Murthy said in May 2023.
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Associated Press writer Anthony Izaguirre in New York contributed to this report.
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This story has been updated to correct the name of Nicole Gill.
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The meaning of Au Pair: more than just childcare – Growing Family
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Collaborative text
Have you ever wondered what it really means to be an au pair? Do you think it’s just about childcare, or is there much more to this unique role?
In this article, we’ll cover what an au pair can provide for your children, and unpack the rich cultural exchange and personal growth that comes with the role.
What is an Au Pair?
An au pair is an adult from another country who lives with a host family and helps with childcare in exchange for room, board, and a cultural experience. But what exactly is the au pair meaning? It’s certainly more than just a nanny; it’s about cultural exchange and learning by both parties.
When looking for an au pair, it’s really important to do your research and identify agencies that have good reviews. Always aim to interview more than one candidate to ensure you find a good fit for your family.
Cultural exchange and learning
An au pair can bring added cultural perspective to your family. By sharing their customs, language, and traditions, au pairs create a special learning opportunity for both children and parents alike.
To make the most of the experience, you could invite your au pair to cook traditional meals or celebrate their holidays with you, or schedule cultural nights when everyone shares something about their way of life.
Beyond childcare: additional roles of an Au Pair
An au pair can do so much for you beyond just looking after your kids. For example, they often help with light housework, the school run, or homework. This additional help can make family life run smoothly and even free up time for yourself.
To promote a positive relationship between your au pair and your children, you can encourage them to share fun activities like arts and outdoor games.
Benefits for host families
How can hosting an au pair make your life easier? Well, with flexible childcare and help in the house, you will now have more time for work and leisure. Want to build a lasting bond? Welcome your au pair as part of the family and try to provide a supportive atmosphere. Communicate your expectations loud and clear from the outset to help things run smoothly.
How to find the right Au Pair
If you’re not sure where to start finding the right au pair for your family, begin with reputable agencies that have a screening process for candidates. Be clear about your family’s needs and expectations, and communicate these in interviews. Consider an au pair’s personality, interests, and experience. Finally, references are important, as is feedback from previous host families.
Have you considered employing an au pair to support your family?
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Catherine
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Philadelphia airport celebrates its brigade of stress-busting therapy dogs
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PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A pack of four-legged therapists got a break of their own on Monday when they were honored at the airport where they dutifully work to ease stress and calm travelers.
The event at Philadelphia International Airport marked five years since the 23 members of the Wagging Tails Brigade began greeting people and serving as therapy dogs.
Several of them were presented with birthday presents and a customized cake while passersby were invited to eat cupcakes and sign an oversized birthday card.
Members of the brigade and their volunteer human handlers are at the airport for at least two hours a week, impressing people with their tricks and doing what they can to raise the spirits of road-weary passengers. Dogs wear vests asking people to “pet me.”
Alan Gurvitz, a volunteer with Hope, a Labrador retriever, said their goal is to make travel a bit more pleasant.
“I like to refer to the airport as the land of cancellations and delays. So people tend to be very stressed out here,” Gurvitz said.
Jamie and Victoria Hill, on their way to their honeymoon in the Dominican Republic, turned to pet Bella while trying to stay positive after their flight was delayed.
“It’s reminded us of our dog back at home,” Jamie Hill said. “We miss him.”
Back in June, Nancy Mittleman recalled, she was at the airport with her German shepherd Tarik while bad weather snarled air traffic. The two of them spent several hours entertaining stranded children and their parents.
“Soon enough, I had an entire crowd around me,” Mittleman said. “There must have been 10 kids sitting around him and they were talking to each other. And the beauty of it was before that, there were a lot of stressed out parents and a lot of unhappy children.”
Volunteers try to coordinate to have at least one brigade member at the airport to greet travelers, especially on days with significant delays or disruptions.
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This story has been updated to correct the spelling of a volunteer’s first name to Alan Gurvitz, not Allan.
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This city is hailed as a vaccination success. Can it be sustained?
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LOUISVILLE, Ky. — On his first day of school at Newcomer Academy, Maikel Tejeda was whisked to the school library. The 7th grader didn’t know why.
He soon got the point: He was being given make-up vaccinations. Five of them.
“I don’t have a problem with that,” said the 12-year-old, who moved from Cuba early this year.
Across the library, a group of city, state and federal officials gathered to celebrate the school clinic, and the city. With U.S. childhood vaccination rates below their goals, Louisville and the state were being praised as success stories: Kentucky’s vaccination rate for kindergarteners rose 2 percentage points in the 2022-2023 school year compared with the year before. The rate for Jefferson County — which is Louisville — was up 4 percentage points.
“Progress is success,” said Dr. Mandy Cohen, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
But that progress didn’t last. Kentucky’s school entry vaccination rate slipped last year. Jefferson County’s rate slid, too. And the rates for both the county and state remain well below the target thresholds.
It raises the question: If this is what success looks like, what does it say about the nation’s ability to stop imported infections from turning into community outbreaks?
Local officials believe they can get to herd immunity thresholds, but they acknowledge challenges that includes tight funding, misinformation and well-intended bureaucratic rules that can discourage doctors from giving kids shots.
“We’re closing the gap,” said Eva Stone, who has managed the county school system’s health services since 2018. “We’re not closing the gap very quickly.”
Public health experts focus on vaccination rates for kindergartners because schools can be cauldrons for germs and the launching pad for community outbreaks.
For years, those rates were high, thanks largely to mandates that required key vaccinations as a condition of school attendance.
But they have slid in recent years. When COVID-19 started hitting the U.S. hard in 2020, schools were closed, visits to pediatricians declined and vaccination record-keeping fell off. Meanwhile, more parents questioned routine childhood vaccinations that they used to automatically accept, an effect that experts attribute to misinformation and the political schism that emerged around COVID-19 vaccines.
A Gallup survey released last month found that 40% of Americans said it is extremely important for parents to have their children vaccinated, down from 58% in 2019. Meanwhile, a recent University of Pennsylvania survey of 1,500 people found that about 1 in 4 U.S. adults think the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine causes autism — despite no medical evidence for it.
All that has led more parents to seek exemptions to school entry vaccinations. The CDC has not yet reported national data for the 2023-2024 school year, but the proportion of U.S. kindergartners exempted from school vaccination requirements the year before hit a record 3%.
Overall, 93% of kindergartners got their required shots for the 2022-2023 school year. The rate was 95% in the years before the COVID-19 pandemic.
Officials worry slipping vaccination rates will lead to disease outbreaks.
The roughly 250 U.S. measles cases reported so far this year are the most since 2019, and Oregon is seeing its largest outbreak in more than 30 years.
Kentucky has been experiencing its worst outbreak of whooping cough — another vaccine-preventable disease — since 2017. Nationally, nearly 14,000 cases have been reported this year, the most since 2019.
The whooping cough surge is a warning sign but also an opportunity, said Kim Tolley, a California-based historian who wrote a book last year on the vaccination of American schoolchildren. She called for a public relations campaign to “get everybody behind” improving immunizations.
Much of the discussion about raising vaccination rates centers on campaigns designed to educate parents about the importance of vaccinating children — especially those on the fence about getting shots for their kids.
But experts are still hashing out what kind of messaging work best: Is it better, for example, to say “vaccinate” or “immunize”?
A lot of the messaging is influenced by feedback from small focus groups. One takeaway is some people have less trust in health officials and even their own doctors than they once did. Another is that they strongly trust their own feelings about vaccines and what they’ve seen in Internet searches or heard from other sources.
“Their overconfidence is hard to shake. It’s hard to poke holes in it,” said Mike Perry, who ran focus groups on behalf of a group called the Public Health Communications Collaborative.
But many people seem more trusting of older vaccines. And they do seem to be at least curious about information they didn’t know, including the history of research behind vaccines and the dangers of the diseases they were created to fight, he said.
Some of the CDC’s recent communications take a gentle approach.
One example is a digital media ad that depicts a boy playing with a toy Tyrannosaurus rex. The caption reads, “He thinks ‘diphtheria’ is the name of a dinosaur.” It’s an attempt to use humor while sending a message that children no longer know much about the infections that used to be common threats — and it’s better to keep it that way.
Dolores Albarracin has studied vaccination improvement strategies in 17 countries, and repeatedly found that the most effective strategy is to make it easier for kids to get vaccinated.
“In practice, most people are not vaccinating simply because they don’t have money to take the bus” or have other troubles getting to appointments, said Albarracin, director of the communication science division within Penn’s Annenberg Public Policy Center.
That’s a problem in Louisville, where officials say few doctors were providing vaccinations to children enrolled in Medicaid and fewer still were providing shots to kids without any health insurance. An analysis a few years ago indicated 1 in 5 children — about 20,000 kids — were not current on their vaccinations, and most of them were poor, said Stone, the county school health manager.
A 30-year-old federal program called Vaccines for Children pays for vaccinations for children who Medicaid-eligible or lack the insurance to cover it.
But in a meeting with the CDC director last month, Louisville health officials lamented that most local doctors don’t participate in the program because of paperwork and other administrative headaches. And it can be tough for patients to get the time and transportation to get to those few dozen Louisville providers who do take part.
The school system has tried to fill the gap. In 2019, it applied to become a VFC provider, and gradually established vaccine clinics.
Last year, it held clinics at nearly all 160 schools, and it’s doing the same thing this year. The first was at Newcomer Academy, where many immigrant students behind on their vaccinations are started in the school system.
It’s been challenging, Stone said. Funding is very limited. There are bureaucratic obstacles, and a growing influx of children from other countries who need shots. It takes multiple trips to a doctor or clinic to complete some vaccine series. And then there’s the opposition — vaccination clinic announcements tend to draw hateful social media comments.
But there’s also a lot of support. The local health department and nursing schools are crucial partners, and city leaders support the endeavor.
At the recent vaccination celebration, Mayor Craig Greenberg acknowledged access problems and that vaccinations have become politicized.
But “to me, there’s nothing political about improving public health, about improving the health of our kids,” said Greenberg, a Democrat. “There should be no debate about that.”
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AP video journalist Mary Conlon contributed to this report.
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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
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The Uplift: Cupfuls of love
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The Uplift: Cupfuls of love – CBS News
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Adams 14 to add more than a dozen new electric school buses to its fleet – The Cannabist
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Adams County School District 14 will roll out 14 new electric school buses by 2025, adding to the 144 electric buses that already are ferrying school children in Colorado or are on-order for districts across the state.
The Adams 14 buses will phase out more than half of the 25 diesel buses used by the district. The school district also will build solar-powered canopies to house the new buses, and that solar power will be used to charge them, said Josh Cochran, the district’s operations director.
The solar power also will help electrify Alsup Elementary School, which is next to the district’s bus depot in Commerce City.
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Noelle Phillips
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Social media fuels fentanyl crisis as drug dealers take to platforms to connect with minors
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Fentanyl overdoses have become a leading cause of death for minors in the last five years or so, even as overall drug use has dropped slightly. In a 2022 analysis of fentanyl-laced prescription pills, the DEA found that six out of 10 contained a potentially lethal dose of the drug.
And social media, where tainted, fake prescription drugs can be obtained with just a few clicks, is a big part of the problem. Experts, law enforcement and children’s advocates say companies like Snap, TikTok, Telegram and Meta, which owns Instagram, are not doing enough to keep children safe.
In 2022, two weeks after she turned 17, Coco left home just outside New York City to meet with a dealer she’d messaged through Instagram who promised to sell her Percocet, her mom, Julianna Arnold, recalled recently. She never made it home. She was found dead the next day, two blocks from the address that the guy had provided her.
Whatever the dealer gave Coco, her mother said, was not Percocet. It was a fake pill laced with fentanyl, which can be lethal in a dose as small as the tip of a pencil.
Mikayla Brown lost her son Elijah, who went by Eli, to a suspected fentanyl overdose in 2023, two weeks after his 15th birthday. His father found him unresponsive on a September morning last year. His cause of death was accidental fentanyl overdose. But he wasn’t trying to buy fentanyl, he was looking for Xanax, and, like Coco, ended up with tainted pills that killed him.
Jae C. Hong / AP
Rampant availability
While data on the prevalence of drug sales on social platforms is hard to come by, the National Crime Prevention Council estimates that 80% of teen and young adult fentanyl poisoning deaths can be traced to some social media contact.
In a sweeping 2023 report on the problem, Colorado’s attorney general called the availability of fentanyl and other illicit substances online “staggering.”
“Due to their ubiquity, convenience, and lack of regulation, social media platforms have become a major venue for drug distribution,” the report said. “Where once a teen might have had to seek out a street dealer, hassle friends, or learn to navigate the dark web to access illicit drugs, young people can now locate drug dealers using their smartphones — with the relative ease of ordering food delivery or calling a ride-share service.”
Accidental overdoses in the U.S. have decreased slightly each year since 2021 according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Paul DelPonte, executive director and CEO of the National Crime Prevention Council, attributes this partly to more education and awareness about the issue. Among young people ages 0 to 19, there were 1,622 overdose deaths in 2021, then 1,590 in 2022, and 1,511 last year.
The decline, DelPonte said, is “very small.”
Response from social media platforms
In a statement, Meta said drug dealers “are criminals who stop at nothing to sell their dangerous products. This is a challenge that spans across platforms, industries, and communities, and it requires all of us working together to address it.”
The company added that it works with law enforcement and proactively took down 2 million pieces of content, 99.7% before they were reported in the first three months of 2024.
Meta says it blocks and filters “hundreds” of terms associated with illicit drug sales and links to recovery and substance abuse resources when possible. But drug dealers and other bad actors constantly shift their strategies, coming up with fresh ways to avoid detection.
Snap, in a statement, said it is “heartbroken by the fentanyl epidemic and are deeply committed to the fight against it.”
“We’ve invested in advanced technology to detect and remove illicit drug-related content, work extensively with law enforcement helping to bring dealers to justice, and continue to raise awareness and evolve our service to help keep our community safe. Criminals have no place on Snapchat,” said Jacqueline Beauchere, Global Head of Platform Safety at the company.
While it can happen on any social media site, experts often single out Snapchat as a particularly dangerous platform, something the company vehemently disagrees with. In October 2022, a group of parents who say their children bought fentanyl from drug dealers they met through Snapchat sued the company for wrongful death and negligence, calling it a “haven for drug trafficking.”
Advocates are hoping that regulation of tech companies could help address the problem, as it might help with other dangers kids face on social media. In July, the Senate passed the Kids Online Safety Act, legislation designed to protect children from dangerous online content. It still awaits a vote in the House. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., and Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., meanwhile, introduced a bill that would require social media companies to report illicit fentanyl, methamphetamine and fake pill activity occurring on their platforms to law enforcement.
“We must do more at the federal level to combat the flow of fentanyl into our communities, and it starts by holding social media companies accountable for their part in facilitating illicit drug sales,” Shaheen said.
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Dave Grohl says he’s father to a new daughter outside his 21-year marriage
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LOS ANGELES — LOS ANGELES (AP) — Dave Grohl says he recently fathered a daughter outside his 21-year marriage to Jordyn Blum, with whom he has three older daughters.
“I’ve recently become the father of a new baby daughter, born outside of my marriage. I plan to be a loving and supportive parent to her,” the Foo Fighters front man and former Nirvana drummer said Tuesday in an Instagram post. “I love my wife and my children, and I am doing everything I can to regain their trust and earn their forgiveness. We’re grateful for your consideration toward all the children involved, as we move forward together.”
Grohl, 55, did not share any other details about the baby or her mother, and his representatives declined any comment beyond the posting.
Grohl married Blum, a former model turned film and television producer, in 2003. They have three daughters together, including 18-year-old singer Violet Grohl, along with a 15-year-old and 10-year-old.
He was previously married to photographer Jennifer Leigh Youngblood, from 1994 until 1997, and has acknowledged that infidelity helped lead to their divorce.
Grohl started the Foo Fighters in 1994, soon after the death of Kurt Cobain brought an end to Nirvana. In 2022 the band’s longtime drummer and Grohl’s closest friend, Taylor Hawkins, died during a South American tour.
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