My mother is washing dishes. She’s using a paper napkin she found in the kitchen sink, and a little bit of leftover coffee from a mug on the counter. She scrubs at bits of egg stuck to a fork, sets it next to the saucer she’s just cleaned. Then she…
“Disabled” doesn’t describe Emily Bowe, a Gilbert teen who has been blind since birth. The 15-year-old honors student at Campo Verde High School plays the flute, clarinet, and piccolo, speaks German, says she has completed “a few” novels, and is one of the most talented young people in the nation at Braille reading and…
Our health is our most precious resource, yet our health-care system’s more adept at mining wallets than making us healthy. We pay one-and-a-half to two times what other countries pay for health care without appreciably better outcomes. America spends more than $9,500 per person annually, more than one-sixth of our…
It looks and sounds like a city bus. That’s because it used to be one. But now, instead of passengers, the Fresh Express bus is packed with good-quality, low-cost fruit and vegetables. The renovated bus brings fresh produce to mostly low-income neighborhoods where a substantial number of residents have little-to-no…
Harkins Theatres has canceled a planned screening of film alleging a connection between autism and the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine amid complaints from pediatricians. Vaxxed: From Cover-up to Catastrophe will complete its week-long run at Harkins single-screen Valley Art theater in Tempe this evening. But Harkins has pulled the film…
A federal jury has awarded a total of $28 million to Phoenix businessman Marc Wichansky, who alleged that his ex-partner assaulted him, committed fraud, and stole his company. Arizona U.S. District Judge David Campbell remarked that the “business divorce” between former friends and partners Wichansky and David Zowine was the…
Arizona continues to lead the country in reports of flu-like illnesses, and health officials say they’re not sure why. “It’s hard to say why Arizona is topping the charts this flu season,” Cara Christ, director of the Arizona Department of Health Services, stated on the department’s website. She said the…
At some Arizona schools, more than 30 percent of children haven’t been vaccinated against such dangerous infectious diseases as whooping cough and measles. Parents, state Representative Juan Mendez says, have a right to know which ones. The Arizona Department of Health lists vaccination rates for kindergarten and sixth-grade children online for…
Don’t freak out, but the Zika virus is more than likely headed to Arizona. So far, about 30 cases have been reported in the United States, but all but one (an unlucky Texan who appears to have contracted the disease through sexual intercourse with her infected husband) were travelers who…
Striking Phoenix bus drivers admit that they’re starting to worry about how the strike is affecting their lives, but they say they’re not willing to give up. “Even though I don’t have money, I couldn’t face my fellow workers knowing I let them down,” said Vanessa Washington, a driver and…
A few years ago, Debbie Allen’s teenage daughter ran away from her Tucson home. The 18-year-old returned home pregnant and addicted to drugs. “With her being a runaway and being on drugs, it wasn’t a complete shock when she came and told us she was pregnant,” Allen says. “When she…
Will you live a long life? Or die young? That may depend, in part, on your neighborhood. People who live in South Phoenix’s 85004 zip code, for example, have an average life expectancy of 71, according to a new study. But just 12 miles away in Scottsdale’s 85258 zip code…
Arizona is the second worst state in the country at addressing mental-health issues, according to a new study from the nonprofit Mental Health America. To determine the ranking, Mental Health America analyzed the prevalence of mental illness in each state and the District of Columbia using statistics on adults and…
Simon Kunesh arrives at his physical therapy appointment hanging from his mother’s neck, arms locked, swinging back and forth like a pendulum. She’s prying at his fingers, trying to put him down, but he stubbornly has retracted his long, spindly legs and flexed his feet to avoid touching the floor…
Researchers in Phoenix have found genes identified with Broken-Heart Syndrome, a severe heart condition that appears during times of intense stress. The discovery could lead to better treatments for patients who are at risk for the problem, officially known as stress-induced cardiomyopathy, (SIC), say scientists at Barrow Neurological Institute in Phoenix…
Lying in a hospital bed, Phoenix resident Kit Kloeckl was deathly ill and could barely breathe. He had contracted pneumonia, but the treatment wasn’t working, and he was getting sicker. After a battery of tests, an infectious-disease specialist entered his hospital room with a grim expression on his face. “You’re…
Standing on the sidewalk outside the Arizona Department of Health Services building in Phoenix, midwife Wendi Cleckner addressed the crowd of about 200 men and women—many cradling babies or holding protest signs. “What we want is safe birth in Arizona,” said Cleckner, president of the Arizona Association of Midwives, which…
The percentage of Arizona children who don’t have health insurance is shrinking, but, for the fifth year in a row, the state remains among the worst in the nation for access to care, according to a new report from Georgetown University. Ten percent of Arizona children were uninsured in 2014,…
Arizona babies are the least likely in the country to be vaccinated against measles, mumps, and rubella, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s latest immunization survey. About 84 percent of the state’s children between the ages of 19 and 35 months have received the MMR shot,…
Arizona is calling in U.S. health officials to investigate an outbreak of the rare — and sometimes fatal — mosquito-borne illness St. Louis Encephalitis. Nationally, there are typically only about 20 cases of St. Louis Encephalitis annually, said Dr. Rebecca Sunenshine, medical director for the Disease Control Division at the…
The director of the Arizona Department of Health Services has asked a federal judge to throw out a lawsuit challenging a new abortion law requiring doctors to advise women that a chemical abortion can be reversed because it hasn’t hurt anyone yet. The lawsuit, brought by a group of physicians…
Arizona officials have agreed to delay the implementation of a new abortion law requiring doctors to tell women that medication-induced abortions may be reversed until federal courts can review it. Three Arizona doctors and Planned Parenthood, backed by the American Civil Liberties Union, filed a lawsuit earlier this month contending…
