Carotenoids are plant pigments. They make tomatoes red and give carrots their distinctive orange hue. You see them when leaves change colors in the fall. But carotenoids are not just decorative.
Among the roughly 600 carotenoids in nature, two in particular, lutein and zeaxanthin, have been found to improve the function of the human brain, according to researchers at the University of Georgia. Read More
Georgia’s child well-being ranking has climbed one spot, to 38th among the states, in an annual national report on kids.
The KIDS COUNT Data Book for 2019, released Monday, measures children on education, economic well-being, health, and family and community. Georgia has come a long way from a ranking of 48th in 1990, the report said. Read More
More than 150 Covington-area residents turned out for a community meeting Thursday to discuss toxic pollution coming from a local medical device sterilizing plant.
Speakers and audience members called for independent testing of a sterilizing gas, ethylene oxide, being released from the BD plant.
Georgia’s insurance commissioner is warning consumers of the potential financial risks of joining a Health Care Sharing Ministries program as an alternative to regular insurance.
In these organizations, members agree to share one another’s health care costs. Members of an HCSM typically have a particular religious faith in common, and make monthly payments to cover expenses of other members. Read More
Georgia’s uninsured rate rose slightly in 2018, to 13.7 percent, the U.S. Census Bureau reported Tuesday.
That gives Georgia the nation’s third-highest rate of people without health insurance. The state trails only Texas and Oklahoma.
Georgia had the fourth-highest percentage in 2017.
The national uninsured rate also rose in 2018, from 7.9 percent of Americans, or 25.6 million, to 8.5 percent, or 27.5 million, the Census Bureau said.
The Georgia increase is small enough not to be statistically significant, said Bill Custer, a health insurance expert at Georgia State University. But he added, “We’ve lost ground to other states’’ whose uninsured rates have dropped in recent years.
Such negative numbers have prompted the state’s political leadership to seek action. Read More