How to avoid the emergency room during the holidays
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(NEW YORK) — Three states — Louisiana, Kentucky and New Hampshire — are reporting high levels of respiratory illness, including common cold, flu, RSV and COVID, according to the CDC. In addition, children under four are currently experiencing the highest levels of RSV hospitalizations.
Dr. Neil C. Bhavsar, an emergency medicine resident at New York-Presbyterian Hospital and a member of the ABC News Medical Unit, said that those illnesses come out “roaring” at this time of year because people are staying indoors, coming from all over and spending time with family.
He wants people to know the severity of their illness and where to go so it’s best treated, he said.
“Urgent Care is a quick fix,” Bhavsar said. Typically, it’s best for non-life-threatening conditions that are addressed within 30 minutes to a few hours.
“The ER or the emergency department is for serious injuries, life-threatening illness or something that can become very serious,” he said.
He explains that respiratory illnesses may take a few days to figure out.
“When we’re talking about respiratory illnesses, I would say, if you’re not feeling too well for like two to three days, have a low grade fever, a cough that’s been lingering for a little bit longer than you want, some facial pressure, sinus pressure, congestion, urgent care is your friend,” Bhavsar said.
But he warns that if “your fingertips are blue, your lips are blue, you’re feeling short of breath and you have chest pain” to go to the emergency department. Any child with these symptoms, especially trouble breathing, should be evaluated in an emergency room.
For upper respiratory illnesses, Bhavsar urges people to stay hydrated.
“Drink warm fluids, soup, broths, hot teas, you can try a nasal spray for congestion and honey is a big thing we’ve been doing for a sore throat or a cough,” Bhavsar said. But he warns honey should never be given to infants or anyone less than a year old due to the risk of a severe illness called botulism.
He also recommends steam inhalation and over-the-counter decongestants for respiratory illnesses, but these should not be used for more than 3-5 days in a row.
In addition, Bhavsar said ibuprofen or acetaminophen can help with body aches and chills. Always follow dosing instructions, ages for use, and consult with a physician if uncertain on how to take any these medications.
(WASHINGTON) — Named to lead the nation’s sprawling Department of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has big ideas for busting public health policy norms.
His Senate confirmation hearings — should they happen — will come with lots of questions about what Kennedy’s ideas would look like in practice.
His new role would mean relinquishing his outsider critic status and working from within a massive government system, leading an agency of 80,000 employees and dealing with everything from drug approvals to food recalls to the pandemic response.
So, what happens when his motto “Make America Healthy Again” collides with one of Washington’s largest government bureaucracies?
“He seems very clear on what it is he wants to get done. I’m just not sure he has an understanding of what it will take to get that done,” said one former senior HHS official who worked in the Biden administration.
Vaccines
On vaccines, President-elect Donald Trump’s picks of Johns Hopkins University professor Marty Makary to lead the Food and Drug Administration, former GOP Rep. Dave Weldon to head the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Dr. Janette Nesheiwat as surgeon general certainly add to Kennedy’s ability to make changes — if they’re confirmed by the Senate.
Both Makary and Weldon have raised questions about vaccine side effects, although they’ve also at times been supportive overall of the role vaccines play in public health. Kennedy himself has falsely claimed that vaccines cause autism, which has been debunked by numerous studies.
In their new positions, Makary, Weldon and Kennedy would have the power to select the experts who sit on important FDA and CDC advisory panels. Those panels play a key role in vaccine recommendations and authorizations for the general public, ultimately creating public health guidance for years to come.
“I think massively, in large part, the health care community would continue to move forward on vaccines as they do now, as they are considered to be one of the massive successes of public health in the last 100 years. And I don’t think that would change,” said Tom Inglesby, a former senior adviser to HHS and the White House during COVID-19 during the Biden administration.
“But what could change is potentially the cost of vaccines, the access to vaccines, guidance around new vaccines that might come online, and also confusion around public messaging from the federal government about safety and effectiveness of vaccines,” Inglesby said.
Food and nutrition
When it comes to chemicals and the food Americans consume, it’s less clear how Kennedy could make changes at HHS, as opposed to the Environmental Protection Agency or the Department of Agriculture, which have more oversight of areas such as water fluoridation, which Kennedy opposes, or school lunches, which he says he wants to make healthier. He has said, however, that he would gut the entire nutrition department at the FDA.
Kennedy could also move around funding — he’s said he’d deprioritize infectious disease research in favor of chronic illness research, for example. As avian flu cases continue to rise — raising concerns about a new pandemic — public health experts and former government officials have pushed back strongly on that idea.
But he has also called for restrictions on food additives, dyes and ultra-processed foods, something he could have direct influence over through the FDA, which determines safe thresholds for the “Acceptable Daily Intake” on substances.
Kennedy has generally received a more cautious welcome from the public health community regarding his focus on healthy food.
“There are some things here that are worth working on. You know, if we’re looking at the school lunch program in America, 30 million children get more than half of their calories from that program. It would be a wonderful thing to make that the best school lunch program possible,” said Dr. Richard Besser, former CDC acting director.
But many public health experts are also wary of giving Kennedy credit, for fear it could lend credibility to other false information he promotes. He advocates drinking raw milk, for example, even though the pasteurization process kills off bacteria that can cause serious illness, including the fast-spreading avian flu.
“One of the dangerous things about RFK Jr. is that there are bits of things he says that are true, and they’re mixed in. And it makes it really hard to sort out what things you should follow because they’re based on fact, and which things are not,” Besser told ABC News, where he was former chief health and medical editor.
Experts also question Kennedy’s ability to counter powerful Washington lobbies — one of his stated main goals — in a Trump administration focused on working with big business on deregulating industries.
Abortion access
Another area where Kennedy could be out of line with the Trump administration is abortion access. Kennedy has said he supports legal abortion access until fetal viability (despite an earlier comment on the campaign trail that he later walked back about supporting a 15-week ban) and that such decisions should be up to women.
Many abortion rights advocates still expect the Trump administration to quickly move to rescind protections and halt legal fights the Biden administration initiated after the fall of Roe v. Wade — but are hopeful that Kennedy and the broader administration would not attempt sweeping bans.
“[Trump’s] obviously waffled on this and other issues a thousand times so I’m not going to trust every word he says, but I do think there’s the possibility that he and his administration has seen that actually, abortion access is very popular,” said Katie O’Connor, senior director of abortion policy at the National Women’s Law Center.
“We have seen that over the past three elections, and there could be pushback if this administration does something to further restrict abortion access.”
There are certainly members of Trump’s orbit who would support broader restrictions on abortion, but Trump himself has said he would not sign a federal ban if Congress passed one.
Some of the policies O’Connor expects to see rolled back would include the Pentagon paying for service members who need to cross state lines to get an abortion because of where they were stationed, as well as expanded access to abortion pills through telemedicine.
As HHS secretary, Kennedy could undo these rules and also build on the first Trump administration’s efforts. He could expand protections for health care providers who don’t want to perform abortion procedures, allowing more providers to deny care, and make it more difficult for private insurers to cover abortion, leaving it more expensive for patients, O’Connor said.
Large-scale bans, were they executed, would focus on removing access to the medication abortion pill called mifepristone, either by attempting to take medication abortion off the market by way of the FDA approval process, or employing a very old law called the Comstock Act to prohibit the pills from being mailed.
“I do hold out hope that this administration doesn’t want to expand political capital on abortion,” O’Connor said.
After more than two years of gender-affirming treatments, LW, the Tennessee teenager behind a landmark case at the U.S. Supreme Court, says, “I feel normal now.” (ABC News)
(NASHVILLE) — The transgender Tennessee teenager behind a historic hearing at the U.S. Supreme Court this week doesn’t want to show her face on television but is eager to speak about a case she says has the potential to make thousands of American kids feel “seen” for who they are.
“The court has definitely ruled in ways that would make me think that they don’t exactly value bodily autonomy, but I have heard that they’ve been a little bit better about trans cases than people would think,” said 16-year-old LW in an exclusive interview with ABC News alongside her parents Samantha and Brian Williams.
The court on Wednesday will hear the Williams family’s challenge to Tennessee’s 2023 ban on gender-affirming medical treatments for minors, including puberty-blocking medication and hormone therapies that have dramatically improved LW’s quality of life.
While the medications have been used safely to treat minors of all genders for years, they are now prohibited in Tennessee when used to treat trans kids struggling with gender dysphoria, the distress experienced when one’s gender assigned at birth is different from one’s sense of identity.
“It’s not very comfortable being trapped in [your body] because it just doesn’t feel like you,” said LW, who reports significant improvement since beginning the treatments in 2022.
Since the state law took effect, LW now has to take time away from school to make a 10-hour round trip out of state to continue receiving care. The travel has also been a costly and time-consuming burden, her parents say.
“It would definitely be horrible for me to have to continue to go out of state to get care,” said LW. “I feel normal now.”
Backed by the American Civil Liberties Union, the Biden administration, and major American medical associations, the Williamses sued Tennessee last year alleging the ban on certain gender-affirming treatments for minors discriminates on the basis of sex and overrides the rights of parents to make medical decisions for their children.
“Our state legislature had made such a big deal out of parents’ rights during COVID, about masks and vaccines that that’s for parents to decide these medical decisions for their children,” Samantha Williams said. “And then they made this medical decision for our child.”
State lawmakers who support the law, SB1, say it is meant to protect kids from potentially irreversible effects from treatment and that contradictory scientific evidence and uncertainty about long-term adverse consequences warrant caution.
“We made the policy decision on behalf of our constituents that in Tennessee we think this is a risky procedure,” said state Sen. Jack Johnson, the Senate GOP leader who sponsored the bill. “It is our role as policymakers here in the state of Tennessee to set those guardrails.”
The American Academy of Pediatrics says the effects of puberty blockers are not permanent if treatment is discontinued and that many effects of hormone therapy can also be reversed. Long-term risks may include fertility challenges and possible harm to bone density, but the Academy says those risks require further study.
Worldwide, several countries which had previously embraced the treatments for transgender children have subsequently reversed course, citing unclear data about their purported benefits and alleged harms. In many of those places, the treatments remain available, but on a much more limited basis.
In Tennessee, there are an estimated 3,000 transgender teenagers between ages 13 and 17, according to the Williams Institute at UCLA Law School, which has analyzed Census data. It is not known how many were receiving treatments that are now outlawed or how many suffered alleged harm.
A study published in the medical journal JAMA Pediatrics in October 2024 found the overwhelming majority of participants in a long-term survey of 220 transgender youths reported high levels of satisfaction and low levels of regret in the three to five years after receiving puberty blockers and hormone therapy.
Major American medical associations have for more than a decade endorsed the use of puberty blockers and hormone therapy as part of “individually tailored interventions” to support trans kids and affirm their sense of self.
“It all begins and ends with science. This is not about any sort of agenda,” said Dr. Ben Hoffman, president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, in an interview with ABC.
Clinical practice guidelines from the American Endocrine Society — based on more than 260 research studies — recommend consideration of medications to treat gender dysphoria in young people but waiting until a child reaches adulthood to consider gender-affirming surgery.
“It’s crucial that there be a deep understanding of both the risks and benefits, and truly informed consent,” Hoffman said. “And for that reason, it is, by definition, going to take months or years.”
The Williams family said the decision to use medication to delay LW’s puberty followed months of careful consultation with medical experts and mental health providers. They said they grew worried that masculine changes to LW’s body would compound her gender dysphoria.
“There is this time clock sitting here,” said Brian Williams. “The kids can go through puberty and it can have permanent effects on them. So these two things you’re trying to balance at the same time.”
“She’s not suicidal, but she shouldn’t have to be suicidal, right?, to get the care that she needs,” added Samantha Williams. “When that really hit me, I was like, ‘OK, let’s do blockers. Let’s get moving.'”
More than a year later, LW began receiving hormone therapy to better align her body with her gender identity. The course of treatment led to a reduction in discomfort.
“That was incredibly helpful,” LW said. “I feel amazing after that. You know, maybe it’s just because the gender dysphoria was so bad.”
The outcome of the case U.S. v. Skrmetti could have a sweeping impact on health care for the more than 300,000 American teens who identify as transgender, as well as the broader LGBTQ community.
“This is one of the most significant LGBTQ cases to ever reach the Supreme Court. I think this is an inflection point,” said Chase Strangio, the ACLU attorney representing the Williams family. He will be the first openly transgender person to argue a case before the nation’s highest court.
“Is this going to be a Bowers v. Hardwick type moment that sets off years of government legitimized discrimination against LGBTQ people? Or, is this going to be a Bostock moment that clarifies what we all have been assuming all this time, which is that LGBTQ people are protected under the Constitution and civil rights laws,” Strangio said.
In its 1968 decision in Bowers, the court upheld state laws criminalizing private same-sex conduct; it was overturned in 2003. The Court’s 2020 decision in Bostock v. Clayton County found that employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity is illegal.
Twenty-six states have laws banning gender-affirming treatments for minors, according to the Human Rights Campaign, an LGBTQ advocacy group.
“What concerns me as a physician is that legislators are going to be able to make decisions about a diagnosis, which is very unusual. I mean, that really hasn’t happened,” said Dr. Susan Lacy, a physician who specializes in hormone management and transgender care for teens and adults at her private practice in Memphis.
Lacy, who is also a party to the Supreme Court case, agrees with Tennessee lawmakers that more research is needed on gender-affirming treatments for minors, but that a debate over the data shouldn’t deny patients the chance to make an informed decision of their own.
“I think the most compelling thing is to listen to the patients,” Lacy said. “I have about 700 transgender patients out of about 3,000 total patients, and I have not seen anybody have a serious complication — not one.”
“I think we’re just at a point where we’re still in the process of treating people and having studies that will give us more and more data to support this treatment,” she said.
Johnson said he hopes the Supreme Court will uphold an appeals court ruling that affirmed Tennessee’s right to impose restrictions on treatments for transgender minors.
“States should be the laboratories of democracy,” he said. “We should be making the vast majority of decisions about what’s best for our people, our constituents here in the statehouse.”
The Williams family says care that has improved the life of their daughter should not be up for political debate.
“I want to listen to the doctors. I want to listen to my kid. I want to take care of her, you know?” Brian Williams said.
(NEW YORK) — President-elect Donald Trump announced Tuesday that heart surgeon-turned-TV-host Dr. Mehmet Oz would lead the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS).
“America is facing a Healthcare Crisis, and there may be no Physician more qualified and capable than Dr. Oz to Make America Healthy Again,” Trump said in a statement. “He is an eminent Physician, Heart Surgeon, Inventor and World-Class Communicator, who has been at the forefront of healthy living for decades.”
The position of CMS administrator requires Senate confirmation.
Here’s what to know about Oz, his medical career and some medical claims he’s made that have come under fire.
Is Oz a real doctor?
Oz graduated with a Doctor of Medicine degree from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and completed a Master of Business Administration from UPenn’s Wharton School of Business at the same time.
He completed his surgical training in cardiothoracic surgery at New York Presbyterian Hospital (Columbia Campus).
He was previously the director of the Cardiovascular Institute at New York Presbyterian Hospital and vice-chairman and professor of surgery at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons. His title was then changed to Professor Emeritus of Surgery in 2018.
Medicine “was my calling,” Oz said in a Wharton Magazine profile from 2010. “I knew it from a very early age. I played a lot of sports growing up, and like a lot of other athletes, I really enjoyed the challenge of using my hands. I just loved the idea of being in a field where you could [do that].”
Oz began his TV career as a health expert on “The Oprah Winfrey Show” before launching “The Dr. Oz Show,” which ran from 2009 to 2022. The show ended when Oz launched an unsuccessful bid for the U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania.
What would Oz run as CMS administrator?
CMS administers the Medicare program, the federal health insurance program for those mostly aged 65 and older.
The agency also works with state programs to administer Medicaid, which is health insurance for disabled and low-income Americans, and the Children’s Health Insurance Program, which provides low-cost coverage to children with families that don’t qualify for Medicaid.
Oz has supported Medicare Advantage, which is run by commercial insurers and has been promoted by Trump. Project 2025 — a plan of conservative policy proposals proposed by the Heritage Foundation and not endorsed by Trump — has proposed Medicare Advantage be the default option for Medicare coverage.
Experts have said this could privatize the program and prevent people from receiving care from doctors and hospitals that don’t accept Medicare Advantage.
In Tuesday’s announcement, Trump said Oz would work closely with Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. the president-elect’s pick to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees CMS.
What are Dr. Oz’s past controversies?
During the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, Oz promoted hydroxychloroquine, an anti-malarial drug, as a COVID-19 treatment. Trump later touted the drug as a “game changer,” although medical researchers warned more study was needed.
In June 2020, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration revoked emergency authorization for hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine to treat COVID-19, saying evidence shows the recommended dose is unlikely to be effective against the virus.
Oz also made past statements indicating that he endorsed spacing out childhood vaccines and expressed ambivalence towards a discredited theory that vaccines cause autism, according to a 2022 study. In later episodes of his TV show, Oz would go on to endorse the measles, mumps, rubella shot.
Oz also came under fire due to his claims about certain “miracle” products to help consumers lose weight.
During a 2014 hearing before the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee on consumer protection, then-Sen. Claire McCaskill of Missouri grilled Oz, claiming he had a role in “perpetuating” scams.
“When you feature a product on your show, it creates what has become known as the ‘Oz effect,’ dramatically boosting sales and driving scam artists to pop up overnight using false and deceptive ads to sell questionable products,” she said. “While I understand that your message is also focused on basics like healthy eating and exercise, I’m concerned that you are melding medical advice news and entertainment in a way that harms consumers.”
During the hearing, Oz defended his statements, saying he believed in the benefits of the products he promoted on his show.
“I actually do personally believe in the items I talk about in the show. I passionately study them. I recognize that often times they don’t have the scientific muster to present as fact. But, nevertheless, I give my audience the advice I give my family all the time. I give my family these products, specifically the ones you mentioned. I’m comfortable with that part,” he said.
