#health news articles

[healthiermetoday7]

Check out the Latest Health News Articles on Healthier Me Today.

Healthier Me Today's readers have a strong drive to stay informed about the latest Health News Articles. Our expert team of writers and researchers relentlessly search the internet for the most recent updates on innovative medical trends and breakthroughs to fulfill this objective. Our wide range of topics encompasses fitness, nutrition, mental health, and chronic diseases to equip our readers with the essential knowledge for leading healthier and more fulfilling lives. Stay updated with the newest health news and expert recommendation from our team by following our website.

[intersectionalpraxis]

"For the study, the team at the University of Georgia prepared the drink using one tea bag per cup steeped for 10 minutes, with no additions such as milk or sugar. They found that all five teas reduced the virus by at least 96 per cent within 10 seconds in the mouth, while black tea reduced the virus by 99.9 per cent." "Inactivating Covid in the mouth works as the virus often infects and replicates inside the oral cavity, passing through the middle part of the throat before reaching the lungs. Malak Esseili, a virologist with the University of Georgia, who led the study, said: “At this stage, we are not suggesting tea as a stand-alone intervention against Covid, because the virus also replicates in the nose and may have already reached the lung by the time a person tests positive." “But tea can be an additional layer of intervention that the patients and their families can easily adopt on a routine basis.” She added that “having something that is accessible, easily prepared, and suitable for all the family would be ideal” to protect against the virus." "The results come after a study published last year in Japan found that drinking a matcha latte or a green tea could “effectively inactivate” Covid. Scientists at the Kyoto Prefectural University of Medicine found that chemicals in tea could bind to the spike protein sticking out from the surface of the virus and prevent it from infecting cells."

I am such a huge tea lover and this is incredible! I hope we get more studies about this in the future too!

[sk-lumen]

How to declutter for a fresh New Year 🫧

The very first time I got into the spirit of minimalism and decluttering physically, mentally and emotionally, it was challenging as I still had a lot of resistance and attachment to things.

I started this during winter many years back, and it's becoming easier and easier. Not just as a great practice before the new year, but also as a habit throughout the year or whenever I feel like it.

When I started seeing how the mental load, the brain fog and distraction and worry... shifted into peace, relief, joy and mental clarity every time I let go of things, I understood why it's important to not be a hoarder. Physically or otherwise. (Of course this has nuance to it and it can be a privilege to be able to do it, but that's for a different topic.)

Here are ways you can start the new year fresh (or just clear the energy any time you need):

Online / social media

delete old files or photos you don't need from your devices or cloud

unfollow accounts on social media that don't inspire/uplift you

delete old messages

archive or delete conversations you no longer want to see

block or delete numbers that are affecting your mental health

Home

throw away things that are broken or falling apart (clothes, items, lingerie, etc)

donate or sell clothes you no longer use or want

sell items you don't use anymore but which are perfectly functional (hair straightener, lamp, etc)

throw away or repurpose gift bags, bags, cards

put away items you still need but are not using in this particular season - ie. put away into storage any winter clothing during summer, it's just cluttering your hangers

reorganize your home, your room, your bathroom, move furniture around or replace decor to give it a fresh exciting new feel and remove any stale energies

Physically

salt bath with essential oils to release any tension or toxins

lemon water, ginger and turmeric shots for cleansing

drink plenty of water or green tea or mint tea for improved digestion

Mentally

dedicate a journal to write down tasks, lists, to vent any negativity, or just thought-dump at the end of the day in order to feel lighter and clear-headed

have a calendar or agenda to note any important things, to lighten the mental load

say things that keep bothering you for days/weeks, do things you've been antsy to get done for days/weeks

Emotionally

journaling is an amazing way to offload emotionally

going to therapy

talking to a friend or family

cultivating healthy boundaries and communicating your needs

Spiritually

do a guided meditation to clear your head

spend time in nature, in the forest, by the sea, away from noise and crowds to clear your energy

you can also use crystals like crystal quartz to cleanse your aura

[sbrown82]

Y’all, it’s happening….

[enihk-writes]

[日久见人心]

characters: present!chung myung + afab!she/her!reader

baek cheon x afab!she/her!reader (implied and one-sided from the reader's end because they are not the main plot point for this fic lol)

summary: old habits die hard, even when you are born in a new body. to his credit, he does try not to seem like he is the reincarnation of the plum blossom sword saint, but his subconscious actions said otherwise. he didn't think you of all people would notice.

word count: 3.85k

author's note: the phrase 日久见人心 (rì jiǔ jiàn rén xīn) is part of the full saying 路遥知马力，日久见人心 (lù yáo zhī mǎ lì, rì jiǔ jiàn rén xīn) and i vaguely remember it was something my mother tongue teacher back in secondary said we could use in our composition essays or whatever,,,, and recently i saw it on those cringey rise-and-grind motivational crypto bro ig pages my ex-classmates are reposting on their stories which kinda gave me an idea lmao.... anyways the meaning of the quote is that we need to take time to understand a person's character (also the fic is the result of my caffeine overconsumption lol and not related to my previous cmxreader because i needed a break from all that angst romance i've been writing wwwwwwww)

═══════════════

chung myung has been starting to think that you were cut out from the same cloth as yu iseol.

quiet, aloof and always watching.

if someone said that you both were twins, he wouldn't be surprised. but then again, there were differences. the most obvious one was that iseol had more talent with the blade than you did, and the other was that iseol had no talent in actually taking care of herself. you were barely managing, but compared to your senior sister? it was far more decent. the two of you had tang soso to thank for not dying as fast as you could have.

chung myung. bowl.

he looks up to see your hand outstretched, waiting to pick up the empty bowl he'd cleaned off long ago. chung myung grunts and hands it over, propping his arm up and resting his head on it as he watched you go around the dining hall to collect the dinnerware.

you lived in mount hua, sure, but you weren't the fighting sort. maybe because anything you did could get you sick — if the weather dropped or rose a little too quickly, your body would tremble and shiver. did you move a little too much today? did you happen to sleep later than you were supposed to that night? by the next morning you were down with a terrible fever that kept you in your room for the rest of the day. but now that tang soso was here, she would drag you down to the medicine hall, grumbling under her breath, all while you looked at her teary-eyed and apologetic.

maybe it was out of shame or embarrassment that made you try to be yourself useful in other ways, though you would often fail and cause more trouble. everyone would just sigh and pick up after your mess, ushering you out to do something else.

during those days, he'd find you hunched behind the baths, sobbing in frustration. chung myung didn't know what to do or say, he'd always talked more with his fist before his heart, so he'd end up hiding in the trees to watch over you instead. and once you've cried it all out, you would stand, wash your face and go to bed. trying something else tomorrow.

chung myung gives credit where credit was due. for a sickly kid, you sure had a thicker skin than the others.

eventually, you stuck with being the cleaner. your weird, meticulous habits somehow working well in this job. the cups and plates were wiped till it shone, silverware were polished until you could see your own face and that hard-to-scrub dirt on the grout would be pristine and white when left in your hands. chung myung wonders secretly if maybe you'd picked this talent up from that neat freak baek cheon.

what are you thinking about?

he almost hits you out of instinct. you really were cut from the same cloth as yu iseol.

he lets out a shaky breath as he turns to face you, who had been sitting behind him. you look at him owlishly and he would have thought you weren't breathing if not for the movement of your nostrils. crossing his leg over the other, he juts his chin at you in acknowledgement.

what is it?

you're quieter, and thinking a lot more than normal today.

ah... this kid... how does everything that comes out of that mouth sound like an insult? chung myung tries to reign in his short temper, he didn't want to hit a frail person for no reason, and he knows that you just happen to always talk like that.

hm. i was thinking about you.

woah. pervert.

ah... maybe he should hit your head just once. just once and he'll never hit you again.

i'm kidding.

really? were you now?

i'm really kidding, don't go and look like you're going hit me like you do with our senior brothers.

okay, you were off the hook. for now.

hmph. you shouldn't tease your elders.

what elder.

chung myung forgets that you were the same age as him. well, in this body, not spiritually. but if he were to talk about life experience and reincarnation, he was the older one but fuck! you didn't know that! he didn't tell anyone he was the plum blossom sword saint ugh!

chung myung, are you going to have an aneurysm?

shut up!

═══════════════

winter in mount hua was really cold. and chung myung, surprisingly, didn't do so well with the cold. though, he would rather die than let anyone ever find out about that.

he wakes up early to train as usual, but the cold this morning was so biting, he was tempted to just stay in bed, it wasn't easy being an old man. ah, but the other disciples would be celebrating if he didn't appear for morning practice and that was no good. after all, the future of the sect still depended on him, didn't it?

he got dressed and stepped out of his room —

chung myung.

fuck! couldn't you talk to people like a normal person? why do you love to sneak up on people like this? cheong mun sa-hyung please, please, please give him patience and strength.

you look cold.

he was! great observation! chung myung wants to yell that to you with gritted teeth. he was still, unfortunately, very unnerved by how he couldn't feel your presence.

follow me. i have something for you.

you didn't wait for him to reply, instead grabbing his hand as you dragged him to the kitchen. he didn't try to resist, letting you pull him wherever, like a parent going to see what their child just found.

the two of you walk across the training grounds that had been buried under a blanket of pristine snow, the dim light of your paper lantern showing you the way. treading past and leaving two sets of footprints behind.

you push him into the kitchen, hanging the lantern up on a hook in the wall. chung myung notices the fire in the stone stove, you had already started it before going out to find him, probably because you were boiling something in that pot standing over the fire. chung myung sits on the ground, huddling before the blaze, it felt warm and comforting in the kitchen. the sound of water boiling in the pot and the crackling of the charred wood its heat blowing across his frigid face was, unsurprisingly, giving him a boost of energy.

you carefully move the pot to the side, removing the lid to check the contents in it. looking pleased with the result, you take out a bowl still steaming into your hands and placed it on the ground between you and chung myung as quickly as you could.

he looks over curiously. it looked like some kind of pudding, he doesn't think he's seen it before —

it's milk pudding, with lotus seeds and almonds

oh? he pondered, eyeing the bowl as you handed him a spoon.

aren't these ingredients used to make mooncakes?

chung myung asks, folding his arms. he notices that you were avoiding his gaze. don't tell him you...?

did you steal these from the warehouse?

hey! steal is a strong word!

oh i'm sorry, your highness, did you perhaps take the ingredients from the fucking warehouse?

he scoffed mockingly, exaggerating his manner of speech in mild irritation. he laughed at your grimace and pouty expression. ah, he feels like he's making fun of a toddler, he should be ashamed for bullying a kid at his age.

hm, he hasn't done something this juvenile in a long time. it was oddly nostalgic, in a way. he mused, digging into the soft and smooth surface of the pudding with the spoon, trying to scoop up the lotus seeds and almonds in it too.

mmh. 's not bad.

wow, i didn't know you knew how to compliment people

should i take that back then?

i'm sorry.

═══════════════

you had been working hard in cleaning the floors for spring cleaning. but the boys were so heavy-footed and honestly far too uninterested in their surroundings that the well-polished wooden floorboards you were really proud of was always dusty.

should you just barricade the entrance of the dorms until nightfall? just so they wouldn't walk all over your hard work?

you sit on the steps, your hair tied into a scarf, head resting on the propped broom you held between your legs. thinking long and hard over your predicament while looking over at the training grounds where chung myung was drilling down on everyone else.

the sun hung high in the cloudless afternoon sky, its rays casting down on the compound harshly. you were beginning to feel dizzy and closed your eyes, hoping to relieve the pain growing in your head.

you didn't hear anything outside the constant ringing in your ears, so one can only imagine your surprise when the reddish tint you saw while your eyes were closed grew dark.

who?

you cracked open your eyes to try and make out the person standing before you, wincing when the bright light nearly blinded you.

a familiar chuckle graced your ears as the ringing grew quiet. ah, it was senior baek cheon.

he taps the bamboo flask against your forehead, the water in it swishing against the walls. you take it, grateful, chugging down the contents, choking on it a little when a few drops went down the wrong pipe.

hey, hey... slow down... no one's going to take it away from you...

you cough, turning away in embarrassment. baek cheon sits down next to you on the steps, watching your antics in quiet amusement. you didn't want to look at him, not when he was practically topless, with his hair tied up high and swept over his shoulder.

chung myung looks at the scene from afar, not really clocking anything in his mind until he sees the way you were trying to scoot a little further away like a snail touching salt and your hands covering up your cheeks.

oh.

oh?

so you and baek cheon huh?

chung myung feels the cogs in his brain turn. at times like these he wishes he had someone to talk about this with, maybe tang bo. he would have loved to hear about petty gossip like this, and they could have teased the kids like the old men they were.

so you think something is going on between her and baek cheon sasuk too, huh?

jo-gul's voice comes up from behind, and chung myung didn't need to look over to see the guy's eyes trained on his targets.

if you have so much free time to discuss other people's love lives, i think we can continue with our training right, sahyungs?

chung myung called out loudly for everyone to hear.

jo-gul you fucking bastard!

you and your big mouth...

ugh... i can't get up...

the poor guy could only hang his head in quiet embarrassment. baek cheon laughed at the antics of the others, getting up to walk back to the training grounds. but not before he reached out to tuck a stray strand of your hair behind your ear.

if you're going to rest, do it in the shade. i don't think you want to fall ill again tomorrow, do you?

he asks, and you shake your head in response.

mmh. i'll see you around?

see you...

you wave meekly as he left, your insides going through an entire acrobatics routine. wondering what that short exchange was all about. it couldn't be that he liked you back? or did he catch onto your growing crush? you wanted to throw yourself off the cliff.

═══════════════

i didn't take you for a guy that had habits like this.

chung myung gulped down the last of the warm water in his cup, setting it down on the counter, and looked at you quizzically. your elbows were propped up over the edge of the counter and you were perched on the stool in a rather un-ladylike manner.

it's good for your health you know.

psh... isn't that an old wives tale?

he scoffs and shakes his head.

haah...

he sighs.

the young people these days.

you look at him, head tilted in confusion. humming for a bit, you let your thoughts simmer before you decided to pose the question.

hey, why'd you speak like that?

chung myung pauses.

like what?

you know... like an old man?

he sucks in a quick breath. there was no way you of all people would have figured it out, right?

he felt like he was spiralling into a bit of a panic.

hey.

you snap your fingers in his face, moving to stand beside him while he was deep in thought.

earth to chung myung?

he looks at you.

he takes a good look at you.

you were not the brightest bulb in the bush, or however that saying goes, at least when compared to him. there was no way you connected the dots and figured out he was the plum blossom sword saint. yeah, this was for sure a case of the right formula and the wrong answer.

he had to divert your thoughts before you start to think deeper.

i think i hear baek cheon sasuk coming over.

huh?

it was your turn to panic a little, and he darts out of the kitchen to escape what would have been your incoming torrent of scrutiny. you realise just then that you had been completely bamboozled by the bastard chung myung.

running to the door, you yell out a string of curses at the run-away instigator. ah, your blood pressure...

═══════════════

you think chung myung might have been raised by old people. because there was no other plausible reason that he acts the way he does.

sometimes he walks with his hands behind his back, and while most people your age would stand straight and position their arms in a stiff way, chung myung puts his hands on his lower back — like he was supporting it. you know who else does this? the sect leader and the other elders. and it doesn't help his case that he was always slouching a little.

another thing you notice was how his taste in food was a few notches blander than the rest of you. he wasn't fond of anything too salty or sour or anything undercooked. he'd always pick out the softest parts of any cooked meat, saying it was the juiciest, which was somewhat believable. but then wasn't it also nearest to where the animals organs used to be before it was gutted? wouldn't it taste bitter?

speaking of bitter, chung myung liked to eat food that made you squeamish. he'd nag at the nutritional value of them and when nobody wanted to try it out, he'd mumble something about kids these days not knowing what's good for them and scarf it down by himself.

that was another thing about him, why was he always calling you a kid when you were the same age as him? it wasn't that big of a deal for you. but calling the other seniors kids? you wondered if it was his way of showing his martial superiority in a twisted way, or if it was another underlying reason.

surely, it must be because he was raised by the elderly.

god, you were so smart, weren't you? connecting the dots like that?

═══════════════

chung myung was sure you were dropped on the head as an infant.

you had cornered him in the toilets. broke down and the door and everything, just to ask him who he was raised by. it was ridiculous, the scene that was folding out right then and he chooses to ignore that your weak body had somehow broken down a fucking wooden door. he has to ignore that, for his own sanity.

you were on the walls, hands clawing and feet digging on the rough surface. chung myung shirks away, exasperated. somewhere in the afterlife, he thinks he could hear the loud cackle of his friends at his predicament.

chung myung.

he tries to evade eye contact.

chung myung.

oh man, look at that spider on the ceiling spinning a web.

hey where are you looking? i'm over here.

he finally looks at you turning his head slowly.

uh... i think... you might be a bit too close...

a bit too close was a forgiving statement. your head had craned forward far enough that your face was almost less than a centimetre away from his.

you lean back at his reply. still not keeping your eyes off him. after all, he still hadn't answered your question.

you know that i'm an orphan... right?

yeah. so am i.

i wasn't raised by anybody...

oh.

you step back, pondering for a moment. chung myung feels the breath he was holding leave his lungs. you caused him so much anxiety. remember when he thought you were cut from the same cloth as yu iseol? he stands corrected, but you were insane in the opposite direction.

okay. so who raised you?

chung myung feels his eye twitch. why were you asking the same thing? he already told you!

i'm telling you—!

nuh-uh. that's not what i want to know. i want to know if you grew up with old people.

then you should have asked that from the beginning!

i panicked, okay?

he sighs, deeply, and covers his face in his hands. he feels his miraculous second life leaving his body at this exchange.

to answer your question. no, i didn't.

huh. i see.

you answer simply.

chung myung peeks at you through his fingers, surprised at your unusual silence. you, on the other hand, had grown more confused by his answer. if he hadn't been raised by the elderly, then how would anybody act the way he did? not to mention, he had knowledge of niche historical facts that nobody other than a person living in that time would have known of.

can i go now?

huh? oh yeah... sure...? oh! wait—!

you had answered too absentmindedly! you weren't done questioning him! shit! the slippery bastard had gotten away!

you jog out the door, only to bump into someone when turning a corner. a pair of arms catch you from falling. looking up you were met with baek cheon's worried gaze, which morphed into confusion when he realized at the same time as you did that you had ran out of the boys' toilets.

uh... wait... i can explain...

you wondered if a lighting bolt could strike down in broad daylight.

═══════════════

you were sulking in the kitchen.

the guy you had a somewhat infatuation with caught you in an embarrassing moment. you had convinced yourself all chances you had with him were ruined. this was all chung myung's fault. every time you had the slightest inconvenience you would secretly curse him out a little in your heart. you used to feel bad when you still had a working conscience, but not anymore though.

speak of the devil, and he comes walking in.

chung myung came in to ransack the cellar behind the kitchen for wine. he had been craving it for the past few days after his own stash ran out. he had waited for everyone else to be asleep before sneaking in as quietly as he could.

so one can only imagine the shock he felt, even though he swears he had already seen it all, when he finds your shadowy figure sitting crossed-legged on the counter and your two eyes staring right back at him in the darkness.

keugh—!

chung myung bites back a scream. fuck! can he please have one, one. peaceful day where you didn't fuck around with his psyche?

you didn't know he was coming in so soon. but you didn't care much since you had something to give him anyway.

shoving the lacquer box engraved with floral designs into his chest, you motion for him to take a look inside. chung mying complied, hesitantly lifting off the lid to find rows of thin mooncakes, without the egg yolks probably, and another layer under that was filled with a flaky-looking biscuit.

it's called tau sar piah.

he hums, taking the round ball out to inspect it. shrugging, he popped it into his mouth and chews down on the pastry. the flavour, it was familiar. he thinks, was it—?

dried mung bean paste?

you nodded, grinning.

what's this for though?

don't tell me you forgot.

forget? what did he forget?

it's your birthday you goon. well, in a few hours but still.

oh. he had forgotten, momentarily. you really were a good kid, remembering this old man's birthday and making something for him. shit, chung myung thinks he might tear up. was this what it was like to have grandchildren? he thinks he understands why cheong mun sa-hyung might have suggested he take on disciples of his own, or well, trusted him enough to babysit the children of the sect back then. ugh, he was a grandfather after all, and you were somehow his most troublesome child.

he sniffles. closing the lid on the box and grabbing the wine. well, it would be lonely to eat all of this on his own, and waking up the others would be too much of a hassle. suppose you would make do as his drinking buddy tonight. hooking an arm under your knees, he slings you over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. the other grabbing the food and drink.

he jumps on the roofs until he brings you to a spot where the moon felt the closest. he drops you on your feet as you balance yourself on the uneven shingles. chung myung plopped down, leg crossed over the other, as he began to down the wine straight from the bottle.

he hands you the lid of the box, picking out the mooncake and biting into it.

wow. tastes kinda ass.

ugh, ungrateful much?

i never said i wouldn't eat it.

can't you just say your appreciation like a normal person?

a pause.

...thank you.

chung myung replied in a softer voice.

hmph. see? that wasn't so hard?

you huffed, teasing him.

chung myung only scoffed and rolled his eyes.

the night drudged on, and you spent the time talking about everything and nothing. things that happened that week, gossip you've heard, events that had happened in the past, antics of the other sect members...

chung myung feels his eyelids grow heavy. was it alright to rest his grieving heart for a while on his birthday? cheong mun sa-hyung and the others' surely wouldn't mind.

and as he feels himself drifting off to sleep, your voice quips up.

hey, do you think i should confess to sasuk?

psh—!

chung myung spits out the wine in his mouth, choking on the liquid that went up and out his nose. it felt as though he was vomiting out blood from that question alone.

you were really his most troublesome kid.

[ravenkings]

[...]

EACH WAR TEACHES us something new about trauma. In World War I, hospitals overflowed with soldiers who screamed or froze or wept, described in medical texts as “moral invalids.” By the end of World War II, a more sympathetic view had emerged, that even the hardiest soldier would suffer a psychological collapse after sufficient time in combat — somewhere, two experts from the surgeon general’s office concluded, between 200 and 240 days on average.

Russia’s war in Ukraine stands out among modern wars for its extreme violence. Its front lines are close together and barraged with heavy artillery, and rotations from the front line are infrequent. Ukraine’s forces are largely made up of men and women who, until a year ago, had no experience of combat.

“We are looking at a war that is basically a repetition of the First World War,” says Robert van Voren, who heads the Federation Global Initiative on Psychiatry, which provides mental-health support in Ukraine. “People just cannot fight anymore for psychological reasons. People are at the front line too long, and at a certain point, they crack. That’s the reality we have to deal with.”

With each conflict, our view of trauma has become more expansive. In the aftermath of Vietnam, it became clear that wartime experiences could imprint a generation of men, making it difficult for them to work or take part in family life.

Now researchers believe that the effects of trauma may stretch even further, beyond the end of a human life, encoding traits that shape children not yet born.

These possibilities haunt Dr. Oleh Chaban, a psychiatrist who has advised Ukraine’s Defense Ministry. He has observed Ukraine’s soldiers since 2014, when Russia seized Crimea. Chaban finds them intensely focused in combat, sharpened by adrenaline. It’s when they leave the war zone that symptoms begin to surface, nightmares and flashbacks and insomnia.

Chaban, a professor of psychology at the Bogomolets National Medical University in Kyiv, worries about what this will mean in years to come. Epidemiologists studying children born after famine have found, decades later, traces of what their parents experienced. Higher rates of obesity, schizophrenia, diabetes. Their lives are shorter. “It worries me,” he says. “I want my grandchildren and great-​grandchildren to live in a country called Ukraine.”

FOR THE DOCTORS at Pavlivka, it is all they can do to keep up. Dr. Antonina Andrienko, who oversees one of the soldiers’ wards, realized, early on, that her workload would not allow her to go home. On weeknights she sleeps on a cot in her office.

In her ward, the soldiers rest and take smoke breaks. There is no gym — just two exercise bikes in a room off her office — and no psychotherapist. Standard treatment at the hospital, says its director, Dr. Vyacheslav Mishyev, “is as it was: mostly medication.”

After three or four weeks, soldiers return to their units to be assessed by a medical commission. Mishyev estimates that some 70 percent of them will return to duty.

“This is the reality in which we work,” he says. “Either we return them to the armed forces or we recommend to declare them unfit for military service due to pronounced changes in personality and psychological trauma.”

In her office, Dr. Andrienko listens to them, sometimes for hours. She starts by asking about simple things, the pain in a soldier’s back or stomach, circling around the subject of the terrible things they have seen. This is what they need, she says: someone to listen to their stories. Their wives and children cannot do it.

Once they start talking, it can be hard to get them to stop. There was a soldier whose parents lived in the gray zone, and they were sitting in the kitchen when someone threw a grenade in their window. He went home to collect their remains and took two bags. One for his father, one for his mother.

“What tablet will help?” the psychiatrist said. She groped for something to say to the soldier, and finally told him, “to compensate for this somehow, you have to find a girl and marry, and give birth to five children, and give them all the love which you could not receive from your parents.” Her voice wavered. She swallowed.

“In the current situation, no pill will help,” she said.

The soldiers describe symptoms coming on mysteriously, as a failing of the body. Oleksandr, a fisherman before the war, began to feel it during a rotation from the combat zone. He stuttered, his hands shook, his blood pressure rose. He was no longer in danger, but his body was permanently on alert.

Ruslan, the junior lieutenant, was an art teacher before the Russian invasion. Now he cannot shake the feeling that something terrible is about to happen. In Bakhmut, he commanded a sapper unit and was assigned to plant mines in front of Ukrainian lines, steering a vehicle loaded with ammunition and men, back and forth, back and forth, under fire. He made it through, incredibly, but this is the paradox: Now the experience is with him all the time.

“All the horrors in Bakhmut are now starting to haunt me,” he says. “It was hell; I live in hell.”

Many describe a feeling of remoteness, even among family. Valeriy, who was a construction worker before the war, says: “Sometimes my wife talks to me, and then she will notice. She says, ‘Did you hear what I said?’” It’s true; sometimes he can’t hear her. His thoughts rotate on an axis, something that happened at the front: a whole crew, his friends, who burned to death inside a tank. He remembers their names, their hometowns, their positions, the names of their wives.

Valeriy recalls promising one of them, in a conversation just before sleep, to help fix his roof. “Our beds were next to each other, and then he was gone,” he says. The bodies had not been retrieved from the site of the fire, and this fact eats at him. Another thing eats at him, too: One wife asked how her husband died, and he could not tell her.

“Sometimes I wake up at night and can’t breathe,” he says. “It takes time to calm down. I have a pill ready on my bedside table to take right away.”

He has been in the ward since the summer, but other men arrive and depart. The soldier stunned into silence by the drone attack was off again last week, scheduled to appear before a medical commission that would determine whether he was fit to return to war.

“He was grasping at straws to avoid going back,” Dr. Andrienko says. This is a familiar refrain, she says: “Mama Tonia, write something so I can stay another two days.” She tries to approach these questions practically; the country is fighting a full-scale war.

Before the soldiers leave, she takes their photographs. She hangs them on the wall so she won’t forget them — the living ones in a gallery in her office, and the dead ones in the hallway outside.

[pandemic-info]

Vance is advocating a partial or complete return to the system that existed before Obamacare. In that world, prior to 2014, it was very difficult to find affordable coverage unless you were on Medicare, Medicaid, or got insurance through your employer. There was a market for individual insurance, and it was possible to buy plans if you didn’t get coverage through a government plan or through work. But that market was dominated by “adverse selection” — the only way insurers could make money was to weed out any customers likely to need medical care.

Cheap plans could be sold to people who were young and healthy. Oftentimes, those plans denied coverage for any preexisting condition, or had hidden limits on the amount the insurer would have to pay, so if you got very sick, you would discover you faced ruinous costs not covered by your insurance.

Obamacare turned that dysfunctional individual market into a market that offered affordable plans even for people who aren’t young and healthy. It did this by restricting the degree to which insurers can charge higher rates based on age (they can only make older customers pay a maximum of three times the rate they charge young customers). More importantly, it prevented insurers from screening out customers with a preexisting condition or denying coverage for necessary procedures.

Those regulations do have costs. They prevent insurers from cherry-picking young and healthy customers with cheap bare-bones plans — which means young and healthy people might pay more than they did before Obamacare. But it also means the individual insurance market actually makes coverage and medical care available to people who need it.

...

What [Vance] doesn’t tell the audience is that allowing insurers to give cheaper plans to the young and healthy means letting them charge more — much, much more — to people who aren’t young and healthy. Perhaps some people have a member of their family who has an expensive medical condition. Those people would be unable to obtain decent coverage, as was the case before Obamacare.

If you care about your own health or that of your loved ones, about science, fact and integrity — vote Harris.

[puppyeared]

for like 3 weeks i was wondering why i was sleeping so much and felt listless. and just now I managed to email 3 people and responded to a month old message in the span of an hour because I got back to TAKING MY FUCKIN MEDS..........

[acti-veg]

Experts have been warning for years that factory farms are an ideal incubator for disease and make mutations far more likely - if we carry on farming animals as we are now (which we have to in order to meet anything even close to current levels of demand), the next zoonotic pandemic is a matter of when, not if.

[thoughtportal]

undefined

Childbirth Is Deadlier for Black Families Even When They’re Rich, Expansive Study Finds 

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/02/12/upshot/child-maternal-mortality-rich-poor.html

In the United States, the richest mothers and their newborns are the most likely to survive the year after childbirth — except when the family is Black, according to a groundbreaking new study of two million California births. The richest Black mothers and their babies are twice as likely to die as the richest white mothers and their babies.

Research has repeatedly shown that Black mothers and babies have the worst childbirth outcomes in the United States. But this study is novel because it’s the first of its size to show how the risks of childbirth vary by both race and parental income, and how Black families, regardless of their socioeconomic status, are disproportionately affected.

“This is a landmark paper, and what it makes really stark is how we are leaving one group of people way behind,” said Atheendar Venkataramani, a University of Pennsylvania economist who studies racial health disparities and was not involved in the research.

The study, published last month by the National Bureau of Economic Research, includes nearly all the infants born to first-time mothers from 2007 to 2016 in California, the state with the most annual births. For the first time, it combines income tax data with birth, death and hospitalization records and demographic data from the Census Bureau and the Social Security Administration, while protecting identities.

That approach also reveals that premature infants born to poor parents are more likely to die than those born into the richest families. Yet there is one group that doesn’t gain the same protection from being rich, the study finds: Black mothers and babies.

Are you a Black parent who recently gave birth? Tell us about it.

“It suggests that the well-documented Black-white gap in infant and maternal health that’s been discussed a lot in recent years is not just explained by differences in economic circumstances,” said Maya Rossin-Slater, an economist studying health policy at Stanford and an author of the study. “It suggests it’s much more structural.”

If anything, the study’s findings understate the dangers of childbirth in much of the United States, a variety of researchers said, because California’s maternal mortality rate has been declining over the last decade, as deaths have gone up in the rest of the country.

Rich Families Have More Premature Babies. But Those Babies Are Less Likely to Die.

Perhaps unexpectedly, babies born to the richest 20 percent of families are the least healthy, the study finds. They are more likely to be born premature and at a low birth weight, two key risk factors for medical complications early in life. This is because their mothers are more likely to be older and to have twins (which are more common with the use of fertility treatments), the researchers found.

But even with those early risk factors, these babies are the most likely to survive both their first month and first year of life.

A similar pattern emerged when it came to the health of the parents themselves: Rich and poor mothers were equally likely to have high-risk pregnancies, but the poor mothers were three times as likely to die — even within the same hospitals. Rich women’s pregnancies “are not only the riskiest, but also the most protected,” the paper’s authors wrote.

 A pair of charts showing the relationship between a mother’s income and rates of premature births and infant mortality. The first chart shows that as a woman’s income rises, the likelihood of preterm birth rises. The second chart shows that as a woman’s income rises, rates of infant mortality fall.  

This finding suggests that the American medical system has the ability to save many of the lives of babies with early health risks, but that those benefits can be out of reach for low-income families.

Resources outside the medical system also play a role. Separate research on children with leukemia, for example, has found that even when treated at the same hospital and using the same protocol, those from high-income families fared better than those from poorer families.

“It’s not just about the medical care that kids are receiving,” said Anna Aizer, a health economist at Brown University. “There are all sorts of other things that go into having healthy babies. If you’re a higher-income mom who can take time off work, who doesn’t have to worry about paying rent, it’s not surprising you’ll be able to manage any health complications better.”

Money Protects White Mothers and Babies. It Doesn’t Protect Black Ones.

The researchers found that maternal mortality rates were just as high among the highest-income Black women as among low-income white women. Infant mortality rates between the two groups were also similar.

 Two charts showing the relationship between a mother’s income and rates of infant mortality by race. The first chart shows that as a Black mother’s income increases, the rate of infant mortality generally drops. The same is true in the second chart for white mothers, but at much lower rates than for Black women.  

The richest Black women have infant mortality rates at about the same level as the poorest white women.

The babies born to the richest Black women (the top tenth of earners) tended to have more risk factors, including being born premature or underweight, than those born to the richest white mothers — and more than those born to the poorest white mothers. It’s evidence that the harm to Black mothers and their babies, regardless of socioeconomic status, begins before childbirth.

“As a Black infant, you’re starting off with worse health, even those born into these wealthy families,” said Sarah Miller, a health economist at the University of Michigan. She was an author of the study with Professor Rossin-Slater and Petra Persson of Stanford, Kate Kennedy-Moulton of Columbia, Laura Wherry of N.Y.U. and Gloria Aldana of the Census Bureau.

Black mothers and babies had worse outcomes than those who were Hispanic, Asian or white in all the health measures the researchers looked at: whether babies were born early or underweight; whether mothers had birth-related health problems like eclampsia or sepsis; and whether the babies and mothers  died. There was not enough data to look at other populations, including Native Americans, but other research has shown that they face adverse outcomes nearing those of Black women and infants in childbirth.

 Charts that show the relationship between a mother’s income by group. The groups are Hispanic mothers and Asian mothers. Generally, rates for Hispanic mothers and Asian mothers track more closely with those of white mothers than Black mothers.  

Even before the new paper, research found that Black women with the most resources, as measured by education and class mobility, did not benefit during childbirth the way white women did. The new study demonstrates that disparities are not explained by income, age, marital status or country of birth. Rather, by showing that even rich Black mothers and babies have a disproportionately higher risk of death, the data suggests broader forces at play in the lives of Black mothers, Professor Rossin-Slater said.

“It’s not race, it’s racism,” said Tiffany L. Green, an economist focused on public health and obstetrics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “The data are quite clear that this isn’t about biology. This is about the environments where we live, where we work, where we play, where we sleep.”

There is clear evidence that Black patients experience racism in health care settings. In childbirth, mothers are treated differently and given different access to interventions. Black infants are more likely to survive if their doctors are Black. The experience of the tennis star Serena Williams — she had a pulmonary embolism after giving birth, yet said health care professionals did not address it at first — drew attention to how not even the most famous and wealthy Black women escape this pattern.

But this data shows how the effects of racism on childbirth start long before people arrive at the hospital, researchers across disciplines say, and continue after they leave. The stress of experiencing racism; air pollution in Black communities; and inequitable access to paid family leave, for example, have all been found to affect the health of mothers and babies.

“Even when it’s not about the direct disrespect that’s going on between the patient and the care provider, there are many ways systemic racism makes its way into the well-being of a pregnant or birthing person,” said Dr. Amanda P. Williams, the clinical innovation adviser at the California Maternal Quality Care Collaborative.

California Is a Best-Case Scenario. It Still Lags Behind Other Wealthy Parts of the World.

Many parts of the United States have much higher maternal mortality than California, and fewer policies to support families. California was the first state to offer paid family leave. It has one of the most generous public insurance programs for pregnant women. The state has invested in specific programs aimed at reducing maternal deaths and racial disparities in childbirth.

Yet even in this best-case American scenario, mothers and babies fare worse compared with another rich country the researchers examined: Sweden. At every income level, Swedish women have healthier babies. This held true for the highest-income Swedish women and those from disadvantaged populations, including low-income and immigrant mothers.

 A pair of charts showing the relationship between birth outcomes in Sweden and California. The first chart shows that Swedish women have heavier babies at every income level. The second chart shows that Swedish women have lower rates of preterm birth than California women at every income level.  

Swedish women have heavier babies at every income level ...

... and far lower instances of preterm birth.

In the United States, earning more regularly translates into superior access to the fastest, most expensive health care. But even with that advantage, the richest white Californians in this study still gave birth to less healthy babies than the richest Swedish women. Their newborns were more likely to be premature or underweight. The two groups had roughly equal maternal death rates.

“That finding really does strongly suggest that it’s something about the care model,” said Dr. Neel Shah, chief medical officer of Maven Clinic for women’s and family health and a visiting scientist at Harvard Medical School. “We have the technology, but the model of prenatal care in the United States hasn’t really gotten an update in the last century.”

 A chart showing where the U.S. falls on the spectrum of maternal mortality among peer countries. The U.S. is last in a ranking that includes New Zealand, Norway, the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden, Switzerland, Australia, Britain, Canada and France, in that order.  

Paper

Sweden, like most European countries, has universal health insurance with low out-of-pocket costs for the patient. Midwives deliver most babies in Sweden and provide most of the prenatal care, which has been linked to lower C-section rates and lower rates of preterm births and low birth weights. It has long paid leaves and subsidized child care.

Like California, Sweden has also started targeted efforts to reduce maternal deaths. When officials there recognized that African immigrants giving birth were dying more frequently, they began piloting a “culture doula” program, with doulas who were immigrants themselves helping pregnant women navigate the country’s health system.

Local maternal health programs could begin to help reduce racial disparities in the United States, too, as could a more diverse medical workforce, research suggests. Nonprofits and universities have experimented with ways to address racism and poverty, with programs like cash transfers for low-income pregnant women and initiatives to improve the environments of Black communities.

By the time a woman is pregnant, Professor Miller said, “it’s almost too late.”

“Health is going to depend on exposures throughout her life, health care she’s received, environmental factors,” she said. “A lot goes on prior to the pregnancy that affects the health of the mother and baby.”

About the data

The researchers collected birth certificate data for all babies born to first-time mothers in California from 2007 to 2016. The final sample included 1.96 million births. They collected hospitalization and death records for babies for one year from the California Department of Health Care Access and Information, as well as hospitalization records for mothers for nine months before the birth and a year after. They collected maternal death records for the same period from a Social Security Administration data set. They provided birth records to the Census Bureau, which assigned anonymous identification codes to access I.R.S. data and determine new parents’ incomes in the two years before the birth. (Infant mortality records were  available only until 2012. Maternal mortality data covers a longer period than in government records, which generally include data for six weeks after a birth, and most likely capture some deaths unrelated to childbirth.)

In Sweden, the researchers collected similar health and mortality data from the National Board of Health and Welfare. The final sample included 463,865 births. Analogous maternal morbidity data was unavailable. They linked babies to their parents and collected parents’ demographic and financial data from Statistics Sweden. Sweden has a smaller gap between the highest and lowest earners than the United States.

[lilyrizzy]

this is maybe a controversial opinion but if they're going to fire daniel, can they just do it and stop dangling it over him like a rotten carrot???

[americanivoryblog]

Election 2024 - The American Dream Is Being Lost; Even Among Our Own Citizens

I'm an independent. I've thought about my vote this year and I don't know if I will.

Trump:

-Good for economics/money (Whether you like him or not, he knows how money works)

-He's good for peace among nations and international affairs….he understands America's value/brand.

-Trump is Pro-Life. But, under the circumstances, if the woman is raped or the mother or the child is going to have complications; I do believe the woman has a choice.

But, I'm for legal immigration and I'm against not allowing honest human beings across the world to use America as a refuge away from danger; a safe haven.

I also disagree with the dissolution of Social Security. America's population is stagnant. The population isn't increasing enough equal to the money made by individuals to say people don't need it. And the population isn't decreasing enough to not afford it.

The States in America have enough tax money and profits from gambling alone to afford it. And If people need help with finances until they get themselves on their feet, they should get it. If they need a break from life while dealing with mental health issues, they should get financial help.

If people go through the process for financial help legally and honestly without abusing the system they should get it.

The American Dream ironically due to the direction of penalizing Capitalism and a decline in societal values, morals and selection of who should be rich and who doesn't deserve it is putting the American Dream at risk....which leads me to Biden.

Biden:

-I don't like the path he is setting for people, their futures, their families, education and peace - both within American Communities and Internationally.

-I'm completely against his new proposal of increasing the Capital Gains Tax. If people find a way to financial freedom. Allow it. The Capital Gain Tax is fine the way it is. He's determining who doesn't deserve the American Dream and if they get it, penalize them.

-I'm against his social-class warfare he's creating; in a way which determines who does deserve the American Dream vs. if they get the American Dream, penalize them.

-I'm against him not holding colleges accountable and liable for not helping ALL students of race, religion and politics to get a job in the field they studied.

-I'm against him not holding colleges accountable and allowing college's to allow students and people not of the campus or enrolled at the college to protest on matters that they are completely not only un-educated about; but matters that are encouraging division and enticing violence. This breaks the law of peaceful protests, especially if it is intentional to get or encourage a violent reaction. In the end, taking the luxury of our Freedoms for granted.

It should not be wrong to support your country with an American Flag or frowned upon. The Freedoms this country was founded on, has not been at risk of invasion in over 100 years, the closest anyone has come is Pearl Harbor and 9/11. 2 events on 2 days....there hasn't been years of risk of invasion like most countries in the world.

-He's terrible with foreign affairs.

-He refuses to take a strong position on anything. He can't take a stand and call what is yellow is yellow and what is purple is purple.

On both sides, there is too much allowance for generalizations among people, race, religion, populations, social classes, politics, governance and nations. For example, just because I'm white, doesn't mean I like every white person; if I'm treated poorly by someone, am I supposed to like them? So the thinking and reasoning of just because I'm white, I like every white person is a generalization. And a historical example, yet an extreme example - just because Germany was ran by Nazi's doesn't mean there were no German citizens who were against the Nazi's. There were Germans who wanted out; and if they went against the Nazi party they were murdered.

It's an extreme example, but my point is - You can't generalize people, race, religion, populations, social classes, politics, governance and nations.

(Note: What astonishes me with these college kids who claim to be Hamas supporters; if they showed support for Hamas in Hamas controlled territories/sanctions, but Hamas found out they're American. There's a high chance they'd be murdered or held hostage - for just being an American.

There is some dis-connect with these "Pro-Palestinian" supporters at these college campus' not understanding, that they are representing Hamas in these protests.

And I'm certain that these protestors don't recognize, that there are most likely Palestinians who do not want to be associated with Hamas.

This is the misunderstood pro-active movement being a vehicle for a generalization.)

Generalizations are dangerous; the entire point of disagreement is to come to a sound conclusion and decision. And this country, we have lacked that for decades. The constitution and amendments were based on disagreement to come to a sound conclusion. Laws in which we still live by, that were made based off the Mayflower Compact; the first governance order in America to allow peace is still supposed to be upheld.

There are different factions among people, race, religion, populations, social classes, politics, governance and nations.….and if people aren't educated to understand factions and operations to have disagreements with the goal of a sound conclusion….You will NEVER get a unified nation….It will always be division….even to its form into government as saying well they're Republican or they're Democrat…..no, you can't generalize like that….there are Far Right, Far Lefts, Right, Lefts and Moderates in each and believe it or not there are Rights, Lefts and Moderates who do agree on things and want to make sound decisions; but what does the media cover and promote?

The generalization of division simply made as Republican vs. Democrat.

It's absolutely ridiculous and completely uneducated.

America is the place of refuge, the melting pot. An idea and dream to not only be safe, but a land of opportunity. That is being lost. The American dream, even among our own nation and home grown citizens is being lost. The sense of ownership especially with land and homes; the ownership to be part of the American dream is disappearing. Especially when people can't afford homes and land anymore.

And the media, whether left, right or moderate outlets refuse to educate the people about anything and continually allow generalizations to encourage decision making.

It is all re-active reporting with an agenda "that appears" to encourage pro-active decision making for the future, thus making people feel they are making a difference while it is simply re-active reporting with an agenda to create the upcoming future.

People don't realize, that the media is simply pre-programmed. Do not think for one second that the media (whether left, right or moderate) hasn't planned the programming for future reporting ahead of time for that week or even, maybe that month. Literally in the guide of your cable television; you can see each outlet now labeling their shows as Episode 1, 2 and so on.

And all the while the journalism is absolutely terrible; simply just keywords to keep a viewer watching while reporting limited information for a controlled perspective without giving the audience truth among both sides to allow the viewer the free will to make their own decision and come to their own conclusion.

This is not journalism. This is not un-biased reporting. Honestly, it should be illegal.

And I truly believe, if the media took the initiative to recognize this. People would be empowered to attempt to be unified, rather than being empowered by differences.

Media outlets focusing on Trump's trial as a priority while ignoring real conversation American's should be having and being aware of true issues that effect the future without an un-biased opinion should be a priority. America is going to enter a fragile state.

There is no pro-active reporting without agendas. The Daily Show worked in the early 2000's to make jokes of political ridiculousness; it was popular and worked then....And tension in America is so tight, the jokes are out.

I just read an article on Jerry Seinfeld and within so many words, due to the current state - it is hard to be a comedian...people need comedy. But, tensions are too high and everything is offensive.

So, whether its the media or the politicians. You just can't generalize everything. Life is complicated, but you have to call the color what it is.

I'm not defending anyone who comes to your yard sees the dandelions there yellow, believes that your dandelions are purple while they're in your yard trying to convince you the dandelions are purple....when they're yellow.

I can't get behind that.

[gideonisms]

Also anyone know any book podcasts that focus more on analysis/big picture "what is this book saying/what cultural influences or other literature is it engaging with" type stuff? I feel like there is an abundance of podcasts where people sit down and discuss books but avoid spoilers and just give basic "did I like it or not" type info which is not really what I'm looking for atm

[boricuacherry-blog]

"I was rushed to the hospital, where they told me that the extreme blood loss was due to 'fibroids.' My Gyno made it seem like it was so normal and common," explained Pettway in the post. "I didn't think much of it, however I was passing clots the size of a placenta, which was really alarming."

Ross points out that the type of "terrible medical care" Pettway experienced disproportionately affects Black women. Black women have the lowest rate of follow-up after an abnormal cervical cancer screening, and over half of Black women between ages 18 and 49 say they've had to "speak up to get the proper care" they need. Black women are also 41 percent more likely to develop cervical cancer than white women and are 75 percent more likely to die from it, according to the National Library of Medicine.)

Pictured: Jessica Pettway

[incoldbloodsblog]

The Dark Side of Honor Killings: Cases that Shocked India

Honor killings remain one of the most disturbing forms of violence in India, highlighting the clash between age-old traditions and modern legal and moral standards. Rooted in rigid concepts of family honor, caste, and patriarchy, these heinous acts often target young couples who defy social norms, such as inter-caste or inter-religious relationships. What makes honor killings even more tragic is the involvement of the victims' own families, driven by the belief that they are restoring honor through violence.In most cases, the victim is a woman, although in several cases the man/boy is also targeted. The victims in some cases are also those belonging to the queer (LGBTQ+) community.

Several cases of honour killings from India’s urban and rural pockets go unreported. The National Crimes Record Bureau’s report for 2020 revealed that 25 cases of “honour killing” were reported in the preceding year. In the previous years, the reports stated that only one incident each took place in 2018 and 2017. But Evidence, an NGO, revealed in November 2019 that as many as 195 known cases of honour killings were reported from Tamil Nadu alone in the past five years.

India has witnessed several brutal cases that shook the nation’s conscience, raising awareness of the deep-seated cultural norms that perpetuate this violence.

https://journals.sagepub.com/

5 Recent Brutal Murders: A Closer Look

1. Nitish Katara Murder Case (2002)

Another chilling case is that of Nitish Katara, a young businessman who was brutally murdered by Vikas Yadav, the son of a prominent politician, because he was in love with Vikas’ sister, Bharti Yadav. The Yadav family, a powerful political dynasty, opposed the relationship as they felt Nitish did not belong to their caste or social class. Nitish was abducted, beaten, and burnt to death in a gruesome crime that shocked the country.The long legal battle for justice was a testimony to how honor killings are often connected to the powerful political class, where perpetrators use their influence to evade justice. The Katara family fought relentlessly, and in 2016, Vikas Yadav was sentenced to life imprisonment, marking a major victory against entrenched social inequalities and caste hierarchies.

https://www.ndtv.com/

2.Manoj-Babli Case (2007)

The infamous Manoj-Babli case from Haryana became a turning point in India's fight against honor killings. Manoj and Babli, who belonged to the same "gotra" (clan), defied societal norms by eloping and marrying. Their marriage enraged Babli’s family and village elders, who deemed their union incestuous, even though it was legal by Indian law. The Khap Panchayat, a local caste council, ordered their murder, and the couple was abducted, tortured, and killed by Babli's relatives.This case was significant as it led to the conviction of several members of the Panchayat, as well as Babli’s family, making it the first time an Indian court had handed down such a severe punishment for an honor killing. The case exposed the authority of Khaps in rural India, which often override state laws, and underscored the urgent need for legal reform to protect young couples.

https://blog.ipleaders.in/

3. Ilavarasan-Divya Case (2013)

The tragic love story of Ilavarasan and Divya from Tamil Nadu exposed how caste continues to dictate relationships and, in extreme cases, lead to honor-based violence. Ilavarasan, a Dalit man, married Divya, a woman from a higher Vanniyar caste, defying the rigid caste system in rural Tamil Nadu. Divya's family and her community could not tolerate their marriage, and her father was accused of driving her to leave Ilavarasan after intense pressure.Soon after, Ilavarasan was found dead near railway tracks, in what many believe to be a planned murder disguised as a suicide. The case caused widespread protests across Tamil Nadu, exposing the caste-based discrimination that still plagues rural India. Ilavarasan’s death was a grim reminder of how deep-rooted prejudices continue to determine the fate of young couples in love, often ending in tragedy.

https://www.thehindu.com/

4. Afsana Case (2020)

Afsana’s case was yet another painful example of how interfaith relationships can become lethal in India. Afsana, a young Muslim woman from Uttar Pradesh, fell in love with a Hindu man, which led to escalating tensions within her conservative family. Afsana’s family disapproved of the relationship, fearing that it would bring shame to their community.In a brutal turn of events, Afsana was strangled to death by her own father and brothers to preserve the family's so-called honor.Afsana’s murder was one among several interfaith love stories in India that faced a similar fate, amplifying the communal tensions surrounding interreligious marriages. Her death not only reflected the patriarchal control over women’s bodies and choices but also pointed to the growing religious intolerance in the country.

https://www.thehindu.com/

5. The Keelvenmani Murders (2021)

In another heart-wrenching case from Tamil Nadu, a Dalit boy, Nirmal Kumar, and his lover, Subhashree, from the dominant Vanniyar caste, were brutally murdered by Subhashree’s family for eloping. The couple, aged just 21 and 20, had sought refuge from Subhashree's relatives who opposed their relationship due to the caste divide. Despite fleeing for safety, they were tracked down and killed in cold blood.This modern-day horror reignited debates about casteism in India, as Subhashree's family faced no remorse for taking the lives of their own kin and her partner. The media coverage and outrage that followed demonstrated how honor killings transcend mere family dynamics and are deeply rooted in India's hierarchical social structure.

https://www.rediff.com/

Laws to Deal with ‘HONOUR KILLING’

In India, honor killings are not governed by a specific law but are prosecuted under general criminal laws, particularly those dealing with murder, homicide, and violence. However, there have been legal measures, court rulings, and proposed bills to address the unique nature of such crimes. Below is an overview of the legal framework and key court interventions in dealing with honor killings:

1. Indian Penal Code (IPC)

Honor killings are generally prosecuted under the following sections of the IPC, which deal with murder and other violent crimes:

Section 302 (Murder): Punishes the crime of murder with life imprisonment or the death penalty.

Section 307 (Attempt to Murder): Applies to cases where the victim survives the attack.

Section 120B (Criminal Conspiracy): Used when multiple people are involved in planning and executing the killing, such as family members or community leaders.

Section 34 (Acts Done by Several Persons in Furtherance of Common Intention): Often used when several people collectively carry out the crime.

Section 364 (Kidnapping or Abduction in Order to Murder): Applied when the victim is kidnapped before being murdered.

Section 376 (Rape): In some cases, sexual assault is also part of the violence related to honor crimes.

2. The Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005

While not specifically designed for honor killings, this act provides civil remedies for women facing violence or abuse, including threats of harm related to "family honor." In cases where women are threatened with honor-based violence by their families, they can seek protection under this law.

3. The Indian Constitution

Article 21 (Right to Life): The Supreme Court of India has held that honor killings violate the fundamental right to life and personal liberty enshrined in Article 21 of the Constitution.

Article 14 (Right to Equality): Honor killings, often motivated by caste or gender-based discrimination, are seen as violations of this article, which guarantees equality before the law.

Article 15 (Prohibition of Discrimination on Grounds of Religion, Race, Caste, etc.): In cases where caste or religious differences motivate honor killings, Article 15 is cited.

4. Key Court Judgments

The Supreme Court of India has played a crucial role in addressing honor killings through its judgments, recognizing them as a serious violation of fundamental rights.

Shakti Vahini vs. Union of India (2018): In this landmark judgment, the Supreme Court strongly condemned honor killings and directed state governments to take preventive, remedial, and punitive measures. The court issued guidelines aimed at curbing the influence of Khap Panchayats (traditional caste councils) that often sanction such killings.

Arumugam Servai vs. State of Tamil Nadu (2011): The Supreme Court declared that any person or organization supporting or encouraging honor killings would be subjected to harsh penalties, including the death penalty in certain cases.

5. Proposed Legislation: Prevention of Crimes in the Name of 'Honor' and Tradition Bill, 2010

This proposed bill, introduced in the Rajya Sabha in 2010, sought to address honor killings specifically. Although the bill has not yet become law, it aimed to:

Criminalize the intimidation or harassment of couples who marry against societal or familial norms.

Penalize acts of violence, harassment, or coercion by family members or caste councils (Khap Panchayats).

Impose stricter penalties, including imprisonment and fines, for those found guilty of such crimes.

Criminalize the act of forcing a person into marriage to restore "family honor."

The bill has not been passed, and honor killings continue to be prosecuted under existing criminal laws.

6. Law Commission of India (2012) Recommendations

The Law Commission of India, in its 242nd Report, recommended a specific legal framework to deal with honor crimes. The report called for:

The introduction of a new Section 300A in the IPC to criminalize honor-based crimes.

Recognizing crimes committed in the name of honor as a distinct offense, with special provisions for harsher punishment.

Creating a legal mechanism to tackle the involvement of village or caste panchayats in sanctioning honor killings.

7. Preventive Measures

Police Protection: Courts can direct the police to provide protection to couples who fear for their lives due to the threat of honor killings.

District Magistrate’s Role: The Supreme Court has directed district magistrates to take preventive measures, such as keeping a watch on areas where such crimes are prevalent, and ensuring that couples who marry out of choice are protected.

8. Death Penalty for Honor Killings

While Indian law does not provide a specific provision for the death penalty in honor killing cases, courts have imposed the death sentence in some cases under the "rarest of the rare" doctrine. This doctrine allows for the death penalty in cases where the crime is deemed exceptionally brutal or heinous, as in many honor killing cases.

Honor Killings: The Larger Picture

The common thread in these cases is the deep-seated social structure in India that prioritizes family honor, caste purity, and community approval over individual freedoms and personal choices. Honor killings often occur in rural areas but are not limited to them. The influence of caste-based councils, or Khaps, is still strong in many parts of the country, where they wield unofficial but significant authority, often leading to such heinous crimes.

The Legal Struggle

Despite the growing awareness around honor killings, India does not have a specific law addressing this form of violence. Such killings are prosecuted under general murder laws, but activists argue that these laws fail to address the cultural and social factors that fuel such crimes. Several attempts have been made to pass a comprehensive law targeting honor-based violence, but progress has been slow.

Conclusion

Honor killings reflect the darkest aspects of India’s social fabric, where archaic traditions collide with modern values of personal freedom and choice. The cases of Manoj-Babli, Nitish Katara, Ilavarasan-Divya, and others serve as tragic reminders of the lives lost to this outdated concept of family and social honor. As India continues to evolve, the need for legal reforms, societal education, and support systems for young couples becomes ever more critical to prevent such atrocities in the future. Although India does not have a dedicated law for honor killings, the existing legal framework provides several avenues to prosecute and punish offenders. The judiciary has been proactive in addressing the issue through landmark judgments, while civil society continues to push for specific legislation that acknowledges the unique social and cultural dimensions of honor crimes. Until a comprehensive legal framework is enacted, honor killings will continue to be prosecuted under general criminal laws, and the battle against these brutal practices will rely heavily on enforcement, awareness, and education.

Sources:

www.newindianexpress.com

newindianexpress.com

www.britannica.com