Health

“Women continue to look for answers outside the health system”

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For decades, the menopause It has been a topic relegated to the private sphere and, too often, silenced in medical consultations. Given the lack of accessible clinical information, the Internet has become the great refuge for many women who need to resolve their concerns and do not know where to turn. However, what search engines return has changed drastically: health has given way to marketing. What has been seen. A new study published in JAMA has put figures on this phenomenon by analyzing search patterns in Google Trends over two decades in the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia. Based on all this information, researchers have detected an increase of between 15 and 20 percentage points in searches aimed at commercial products and services. That is why the internet is no longer just a place to search for the meaning of a symptom; It is an immense showcase of payment solutions. The health system. This commercial shift in search engines does not occur in a vacuum, but, as Nuria Marín, a menopause specialist, points out, in his analysis for the Science Media Center Spain, the massive increase in these searches reflects a worrying reality: there are fundamental needs not covered in the traditional health system. Women turn to the Internet because they do not find the time, specialized management or comprehensive answers to their routine consultations. However, the study of JAMAdespite being published in a high-impact journal, has a methodological limitation that Marín highlights: Google Trends is an algorithmic and “blind” tool. It does not tell us the age, biological sex, or exact menopausal status of the person typing, which prevents us from establishing direct cause-and-effect relationships at a clinical level. The misinformation. The real problem with seeking answers to questions about our own health is that the algorithm rewards economic profitability over scientific rigor. This means that when a patient searches for information about menopause, she enters a digital ecosystem full of interests. Here is a 2025 study published in B.M.J. revealed that 77.2% of online content on hormone replacement therapy to ‘treat’ menopausal symptoms presented commercial conflicts of interest. But even worse is that 67.2% of the medical claims on these pages They openly contradicted official clinical guidelines based on medical evidence. The quality of the information is quite doubtful, since it was seen that 35% of the websites on menopause had some type of medical quality certification, and more than half required a level of reading comprehension much higher than that recommended for health dissemination. Side B. Not all of the technological landscape is negative, but we have tools that, when designed based on scientific evidence and not aggressive marketing, prove to be a great support for women. Here we have, for example, mobile apps to monitor symptoms which point out that women can see their physical symptoms reduced due to the very fact that the patient structures what is happening to her. That is why the challenge we have ahead of us right now is to offer access to this type of tools and to destigmatize menopause in society. Images | Pexels In Xataka | You get up, you get a cup of hot water, you drink it: more and more people are embracing Chinamaxxing

Human beings evolved to breed in tribes and sleep in sections. We have tried to do exactly the opposite and it is costing us our health.

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It’s three in the morning, the light of a state-of-the-art baby monitor flickers in the darkness and an exhausted mother tries by all means to get her son to fall asleep again to finally achieve those long-awaited eight hours of sleep in one go. The room is full of amenities, but she feels a knot in her stomach. She is surrounded by technology, but feels more alone than ever. If you ask in your group of friends or on any internet forum how exhausting parenting is today, the answer is unanimous: “It is extremely exhausting and constant.” However, science and history tell us that our ancestors probably did not suffer from this level of sleep deprivation, much less this suffocating loneliness. And here comes the great paradox of our era. We might think that the problem is a lack of male involvement, but the data show a different picture. As we recently explained in Xatakaparents millennials Today they spend approximately four times more time caring for their children than parents of the generation of the baby boom. In countries like Spain, policies have taken a historic leap by equating paternity and maternity leave to 19 weeks. The father, culturally and legally, is at home. So why are parents still on the brink of collapse? The answer lies not in a lack of will, but in our biology: we are fighting a losing battle against millions of years of evolution. Human beings evolved to breed in tribes and sleep in sections. Our modern society demands exactly the opposite from us, and it is costing us our health. The end of the tribe and the ancestral dream To understand what has happened to us, we must look to the past. As he explains to the BBC evolutionary anthropologist Sarah Blaffer Hrdy, the human species would never have survived if mothers had not had “alloparents”—grandmothers, uncles, older brothers, and other members of the community—to care for babies who were born extremely immature. Studies in traditional populations they confirm it: In hunter-gatherer groups such as those in the Congo Basin, babies spend much of the day in arms, with alternative caregivers to the mother providing up to 43% of the baby’s direct care. But not only the tribe has vanished; We have also altered our natural way of resting. In fact, the idea that we should have an uninterrupted eight hours of sleep It is a “modern invention”since before the Industrial Revolution and the arrival of artificial light, the biological pattern of humanity was the biphasic sleep or segmented: people slept for the first part at dusk, woke up in the early morning for a couple of hours (which they took advantage of to chat, pray or take care of the fire), and went back to sleep until dawn. In today’s industrial societies, waking up at three in the morning is diagnosed as insomnia and generates deep anxiety. However, when researchers examine current hunter-gatherer tribes — whose sleep patterns last between 5.7 and 7.1 hours and are full of microawakenings — discover something fascinating: They don’t consider it a problem. The loneliness epidemic and mental burden This break with our evolutionary past is having devastating consequences. In different investigations they talk that we are facing a true epidemic of isolation: today, 65% of parents feel lonelys, a figure that shoots up to 77% in the case of single-parent families. This “clinical loneliness” is not just a passing sadness. It is triggering Perinatal Mood and Anxiety Disorders (known in English as PMADs), which according to medical research affect up to 17.7% of mothers worldwide. Lack of support and isolation increase the risk of depression and cardiovascular problems. In its most extreme cases, psychiatric causes (including suicides and overdoses) have become one of the main causes of maternal mortality. A slab that disproportionately crushes single-parent families, racialized people or those at risk of exclusion and with financial stress, who lack the economic resources to outsource this care. And behind closed doors, the mirage of equality in the couple continues to take its toll. Although the modern father “helps” more than ever, the “mental load”—the planning, conception, and anticipation of family needs— continues to fall overwhelmingly on women. Researcher Eve Rodsky defines it perfectly: today’s mothers act as “project managers” where their partners are often “kind subordinates” waiting for instructions. The result is a burnout (professional burnout syndrome) applied to parenting. Curiously, this parental hyperpresence, born of anxiety, is also harming the little ones. The so-called “helicopter parents”, who fly over their children’s every movement to avoid frustration, are impeding the neurological development of their prefrontal cortex (in charge of solving problems). As studies warnthis has caused psychiatric admissions of adolescents for anxiety and depression disorders to skyrocket at an alarming rate. The verdict of science If we look for culprits for this epidemic of fatigue, science gives us a key clue. In modern societies, between 10% and 30% of people live with chronic insomnia. But if we look at current hunter-gatherer communities (such as the Hadza, the San or the Tsimane), this problem is practically a myth: it barely touches 2%. University of California (UCLA) researcher Jerome Siegel summed it up very well in the pages of Scientific American: The problem is that we have erased the natural regulators of sleep from the map. By living locked up, we no longer let our body feel the nighttime drop in temperature, an essential biological brake for rest. For his part, David Samson, evolutionary anthropologist interviewed by the BBCargues that it is our rigid expectation of perfect sleep that fatigues us. Samson lived with the Hadza tribe in Tanzania and found that its members consider their sleep “good” despite waking up frequently. Instead of getting up, turning on lights, and looking at the clock, they simply accept waking up as natural. This vision links with the proposal of James McKenna and Lee Gettler, anthropologists at the University of Notre Dame. As they explain in their own studyhave … Read more

the new family operating system that prioritizes mental health over extracurricular activities

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A drawer full of tupperware mismatched that threatens to overflow when opened. A costume from the school function forgotten for weeks in the back seat of the car. A mother laughing out loud with her children in the middle of a living room where the cushions serve as a military fort, blatantly ignoring the fluff in the hallway. It might seem like a portrait of an overwhelmed family, but it is, in reality, the image of a silent revolution. For the past two decades, the gold standard of parenting seemed to have a name: Mother Tiger. Inspired in Amy Chua’s controversial book In 2011, this model required parents—especially women—to act as CEOs of their children’s future. The ultimate goal was to optimize their success through packed schedules, tutoring, fluency in three languages, and an immaculate diet. But the mothers have said enough. Faced with unsustainable levels of exhaustion, a new generation is deciding to get off the wheel. They claim their right to live with dirty dishes in the sink and to accept that a grade of “Good” (a B) on the report card is more than enough. The Beta Motherand this new family operating system is showing that, sometimes, the best way to protect your children’s future is to simply leave them alone. The rebellion of the imperfect As stated an extensive report on The Wall Street Journalthese acts of daily “renunciation” are adding forces to become a “discreet feminist revolution.” The American newspaper illustrates this paradigm shift through women like Sophie Jaffe, a mother from Los Angeles who allows her 13-year-old son to do parkour around the city or set your own schedules, as long as you respect the curfew. “I see what happens to children who are overly controlled,” Jaffe tells the newspaper. “I’d rather them be out making memories than sitting in front of a video game.” In internet culture and popular psychology, this profile has been called a “Type B” mother. The magazine TODAY includes the explanations of psychotherapist Colette Brownwho defines these mothers as “relaxed, very patient, women who don’t mind chaos.” According to Brown, the rise of this profile on social networks is a direct response and a frontal rejection of pressure from the tradwives (traditional wives) and the toxic perfectionism of Instagram. Mothers like Katie Ziemer summarize this philosophy with a lapidary phrase: “I’m Type B, of course my house doesn’t look like a museum. I prefer my children to have fun playing in the mud rather than watching television.” The spectrum, however, has nuances. For those women unable to let go of control completely, the publication The Bump marks the emergence of a middle ground: the “Type C” mother. Coined by content creator Ashleigh Surratt, it defines “recovering perfectionists.” They are women who maintain non-negotiable structures (such as sleep schedules or medical appointments), but who apply strategic neglect to the rest. As one of them relates: “They have their shirts clean, even if they are not hanging in the closet; I know exactly which pile they are in.” This rebellion towards the imperfect is not born of whim, but of absolute collapse. Sociological data show that the demands on parents have multiplied exponentially. Recently in Xataka we documented how parents millennials Today they dedicate four times more time to their children than the generation of the baby boom. And the economist Corinne Low confirms in WSJ that, paradoxically, after the massive entry of women into the labor market, the time they dedicate to children’s tasks has skyrocketed (from 14 minutes a week of help with homework in 1975 to more than an hour today). Globally, the family scaffolding is creaking. A study published in the scientific journal Healthcare reveals alarming rates of burnout (burnout syndrome) applied to motherhood and fatherhood: it affects 8.9% of fathers in the US, 9.8% in Belgium or 9.6% in Poland. And they bear the worst part. Although in countries like Spain leave has been equalized to 19 weeks, recent studies indicate that 78% of mothers declare themselves overloaded, assuming the invisible weight of the “mental load.” As researcher Eve Rodsky warnsmen today “help”, but women continue to be the directors of the project, managing their partners as if they were kind subordinates. Science dictates sentence But this maternal collapse is not the only collateral damage. If all this enormous sacrifice had guaranteed the well-being of the minors, the story would be different. But scientific evidence has shown exactly the opposite. Parenting under the “helicopter” model—flying over children to spare them any frustration or failure—is destroying them. Academic journals are blunt. A meta-analysis published in the Journal of Adult Development, which reviewed 53 independent studiesshowed that paternal overprotection is directly associated with an increase in internalizing problems (such as anxiety and depression) and a sharp decline in self-efficacy and academic performance of young people. Along these lines, an investigation of Journal of Youth and Adolescence showed that excessive parental control directly threatens the satisfaction of adolescents’ basic psychological needs, especially their sense of autonomy. The real-life result is a drastic increase in adolescent psychiatric admissions and alarming rates of suicidal ideation linked to the inability to manage frustration. Preventing a child from tripping deprives him or her of the neurological development necessary (specifically in the prefrontal cortex) to learn to stand up. However, we must take a broader look. How it contributes The Conversationthe phenomenon of hyperparenting is the psychologization of an enormous social problem. In other words, it is easy to criticize the mother who calls the university to review her child’s exam, but we ignore the macroeconomic context. Parents subject children to academic training programs almost from preschool because they perceive a wild and stagnant job market. When you compete with millions of graduates to obtain a halfway decent job, the anguish of ensuring the child’s future becomes a suffocating control. Furthermore, getting off the wheel has a high emotional cost. The publication Bolde documents the “B side” of being a Beta mother. These … Read more

While the hantavirus from the MV Hondius cruise makes headlines, the closest health risk is 10 km from any Mediterranean city

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When the MV Hondius left Ushuaia heading to Antarctica on March 20, no one could imagine the hell they were about to live: 150 people of 23 different nationalities, a relatively small ship and a virus that has already caused the death of three passengers. The Dutch shipping company Oceanwide Expeditions consider now docking in the Canary Islandswhich guarantees extra media attention. And yet, the health risk is minimal. In fact, the true health risk for Spain lies elsewhere: much closer. “Risk”? Yes, ‘risk’ is the word and the best example is Andalusia. March 2, 2026 the Board announced that its Strategic Plan for Surveillance and Comprehensive Vector Control until now limited to the West Nile virus will incorporate (for the first time) the monitoring of dengue, chikungunya and Zika. It seems somewhat anecdotal, but what it hides is a profound epidemiological change: not only Andalusia, but the entire Spanish Mediterranean is becoming the perfect ‘breeding ground’ for the mosquitoes that spread all these diseases. What’s more, all this coincides temporally not only with the largest dengue epidemic ever recorded in the Americas (12.6 million cases)but with the historical record of indigenous chikungunya in continental Europe. Dengue in Spain. It is worth stopping at this because, according to data from the National Center for EpidemiologySpain reported 1,119 cases of dengue in 2024 (compared to 615 in 2023, 503 in 2022 and 50 in 2021). It is true that the majority are imported, but indigenous cases are growing. It is not a minor issue: before 2018 We had gone almost a century without indigenous cases in Spain. What changes for someone who lives in Spain? Today, 66% of the Spanish population already lives in municipalities with confirmed presence of tiger mosquitoes. This means that the individual risk of contracting diseases such as dengue, chikungunya or Zika remains low and localized (without having left the country), but it is certainly on the table. As Pamela Rendi-Wagner, director of the ECDC, pointed out last year, we have entered a new normal. And we have to learn that this situation is not fought with headlines but by eliminating stagnant water in patios and terraces. It is worth remembering that the (immense) majority of epidemics in the last 40 years have not been due to unknown diseasesbut to known diseases that went beyond their usual niche. That’s what we’re about to see: a bunch of diseases moving across a continent that has no recent experience managing them. Image | Mithil Girish In Xataka | Mosquitoes attack me in summer and I tried these TikTok tricks to get rid of them

We knew that mobile phones had an impact on children’s mental health. A study has defined the border: 16 years

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Today, we live in a time of great debate around Instagram, TikTok or X, wondering if they really negatively affect our minors, with several governments promoting the possibility of banning them, including Spanish. Now, a new study longitudinal has shed light on the true impact that using social networks can have on mental health, pointing to a much more complex scenario than we think. The study. It has been a team from the Miguel Hernández University that has decided to put the focus precisely on social networks at a time when research paints a very worrying picture. But in this case wanted to put the focus in the nuances that should really matter to us: age, gender and mental health status prior to entering the world of social networks. And its conclusions change the classical conception. It’s not how much, but how. Until recently, the most classic concept to measure danger was “screen time.” In this way, different reviews suggested that spending more hours in front of the cell phone was equivalent to having a worse well-being. But the UMH research goes a step further and focuses on how networks interfere with daily life, sleep or personal relationships. Here the most striking finding that the research team saw was that the impact of this problematic use on depressive symptoms has a very clear boundary: 16 years. But it fades. Although researchers have observed that increased depressive symptoms It is much more acute in those under 16 years of age, it has also been seen that around this age the effect diminishes. The reason that marks 16 years as a true frontier is precisely the greater capacity for emotional and cognitive self-regulation that adolescents have as they mature little by little. In this way, young people from the age of 16 become less vulnerable to the negative impacts of the digital environment, something pointed out by other external studies that already warned that early pre-adolescence is the true critical period of exposure to social networks as they are more sensitive. A gender gap. Another worrying point raised by science is how digital popularity affects depending on whether the teenager is a boy or a girl. And right now we live in the era of followers where anything is done to see how our accounts have more and more followers. And while it may seem like having more followers is a positive reinforcement for any teen, the data says otherwise. The researchers point out here that having a greater number of followers is associated with a greater number of depressive symptoms, and especially in girls. The reasons lie in the pressure to maintain a perfect image, the fear of being analyzed down to the last detail and, logically, the cybervictimization. A set of factors that act as a toxic cocktail towards mental health. In the boys. Here, having many followers has a neutral or even somewhat protective effect, operating as a status enhancer within a group of friends, for example. That is, the complete opposite of girls, marking a gender gap that has also been investigated by other third-party studies that already warned that the mental health of minors is much more susceptible to the dynamics of online validation. Previous vulnerability. Do social networks depress you or were teenagers already depressed? This is the question we can ask ourselves when addressing this complex issue, and science indicates that adolescents who already suffered from a previous vulnerability before using the networks are the most susceptible. In this way, if a young person already presents depressive symptoms, their evolution will be significantly worse if they develop problematic use of networks. In these cases, the screen becomes a true refuge that ends up worsening the original picture when exposed to a large number of people or by consuming negative content. What should we do? The great conclusion that can be drawn here is that We must protect preteens as they are the most vulnerable, and also give priority attention to girls because they suffer much greater aesthetic and validation pressure. This is where governments come in with the regulations that are already being put on the table to prevent these most vulnerable young people from being exposed to something that can be so harmful. Images | Johnny Cohen In Xataka | We say we are “depressed” beyond our means: where does the illness end and where does the illness begin?

Apple has been setting up a health system parallel to public health for years. The question is whether public health will do something about it.

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I haven’t worn a watch of any kind on my wrist for years. Partly for convenience, partly for not having another device to distract myself with. The paradox is that I find it more and more advisable to wear or give a smartwatch, precisely because of the leap they have made in monitoring our health in recent years. The other day, Dr. Miguel Ángel Cobos Gil, a prestigious Spanish cardiologist, told us at a press event that “the Apple Watch provides more parameters than anyone admitted to a coronary unit.” It made me think: we already have very reliable medical technology in our pockets, on our wrists and even in our ears. And now what? A parallel system to saturated healthcare Healthcare in Spain has just concluded a few days of strike in which they demand improvements in a system with problems: saturated primary care, insufficient personnel, underfinancing or territorial fragmentation are just a few. Spain is not the only one like this. Countries like the United Kingdom, Canada, Italy or Portugal are struggling with similar situations, and if we look at Latin America or Asia the photo even it gets more complicated. Doctor Miguel Ángel Cobos Gil at an Apple Health event in Madrid. It is no coincidence that Apple has spent years setting up a whole parallel health system through its best-selling devices. You can now take a medically approved EKG with Apple Watch In a few minutes, the iPhone notifies you if you have risk of falling when analyzing how you walkand AirPods are increasingly looking more like a smart sonotone. Apple is the one that is taking the most solid and visible steps, but it is not the only one. Samsung integrates teleconsultations, a game to detect Alzheimer’sbooking diagnostic tests and ordering medications at Samsung Health —starting with Indiawhich is no coincidence—; Huawei gives you ten health parameters in a single gesture with its Watch 5; Google bets on a medical coach with AI on top of Fitbit and Pixel Watch data. Almost the entire tech sector is looking at the same place. Useful technology to help us with our health is already here. The problem is how to make all that data that our devices give us use for something in a collapsed public system. Your doctor doesn’t have time to look at the data on your watch And now we have been in this house for ten years: We have a lot of information about preventing diseases and devices that can help us do so. However, there is still no effective system to address it. Cobos Gil summed it up bluntly: “urgent care works.” When something really goes wrong, the system responds. The problem is before, in that period of time where an asymptomatic disease could be detected and treated with a change in habits or a simple medication, but where the family doctor cannot dedicate fifteen minutes to you if he does not see something serious or actionable. Hypertension doesn’t hurt. Atrial fibrillation does not warn. Apple Watch possible hypertension alert system And this is exactly where technology comes in—or should come in—. A smartwatch does not sleep, has no waiting list and does not need you to go see it: it passively monitors whenever you wear it, accumulates months of data and notifies you when it detects an anomaly. Cobos Gil mentioned something that illustrates the difference well: a conventional cardiac holter monitor must be taken for about 24 or 48 hours, and many times it does not capture anything because the arrhythmia does not appear in that time window. With three months of data from the Apple Watch, he says he’s gotten diagnostic information he otherwise wouldn’t have had, and has even “had to anticoagulate patients who were cleared by a Holter monitor.” This gap is especially relevant for the older population, especially if they live alone. Spain is aging fast and a silent heart attack, a fall, or an arrhythmia that is accelerating are situations in which the time between the event and medical attention is everything, and in which not having a family member or caregiver nearby—the child in another city, the grandchildren in another country—creates a very vulnerable situation for these people. These are situations that happen. In Applesfera we have just told the case of a lady who suffered a fall due to an epileptic attack in Torremolinos and his Apple Watch helped everything end in a scare. The striking thing about this is that hospitals already do this type of monitoring in extreme cases. When a modern pacemaker or defibrillator is implanted, the hospital monitors the patient remotely and can intervene if something goes wrong. A watch like the Watch takes that logic from the hospital to home: it allows a son in Madrid to see in real time if his mother’s heart in a town in Teruel is beating strangely, or to receive an alert if she has fallen and hasn’t gotten up. It is not medicine of the future. It is medicine of the present waiting for the system to learn to incorporate it. The limit that no one has set Tim Cook at WWDC 24 What Apple, Samsung, Huawei or Google have built so far is the beginning. Apple has been working for years on non-invasive blood glucose monitoring —without being punctured, through optical spectroscopy—and the most solid rumors suggest that could come to the Apple Watch in 2027 or 2028. Before that, I’m pretty sure we’ll see an AI-powered medical assistant built into the Health app — known internally as Mulberry Project— trained with your real clinical data. Tim Cook has been repeating for years that the Apple’s greatest contribution to humanity will be in healthcare. What it doesn’t say is exactly how far. Because the question that these devices do not answer is one that seems very important to me: Where do they set the limit for themselves, and who sets it for them from the outside? Early detection of … Read more

Science knows that rain is ruining our health

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We carry a great spell of rain and overcast skies in much of Spain, and this also translates into a strange sensation in our body when we feel stuck in the chair, depressed and even taciturn. And it’s not that we’ve suddenly become lazier or sadderbut it is pure and simple biology that has humidity, microbiology and brain chemistry as triggers. Our ideal humidity. To understand why we can feel so bad, we have to understand what our body needs. Here science already pointed out many years ago that our body is designed to ‘function’ in a narrow range in terms of relative humidity.: between 40 and 60%. In this case, when we are outside this range for a long time, which is typical with these rains where the humidity shoots above 70%, it is when everything changes. And above all it affects those people who are not used to so much humidity and who have not adapted to it, such as those who live in areas that are traditionally very dry. What happens. In these cases, when we are in a situation of very high humidity, science suggests that the defenses let their guard down. Above all, it affects the mucous membranes, which are our body’s first defense barrier, which is compromised. In this case, while very dry air can crack the mucous membranes that require a certain humidity, when you have air with a lot of accumulated humidity, a ‘party’ is organized for the pathogens. The scientific reviews point here that excessive humidity favors the survival of bacteria and viruses, increasing the environmental viral load. The effects at home. If we suddenly feel short of breath or that the asthma that had been controlled has returned, the fault lies precisely in what we do not see. The WHO itself and the CDC have established direct links, since they suggest that structural and environmental humidity turns the house into an incubator. The attack of mold and mites. One of the most important points is in the miteswhich are microscopic organisms that do not drink water, but rather absorb moisture from the air. In cases where humidity exceeds 70%, their population explodes and, according to evidence, this can trigger allergic exacerbations in those more sensitive people. Mold is also one of the main protagonists in these cases, and you just have to see how easily it can appear in bathrooms without ventilation. And even if black spots are not seen, the spores can be in the rooms of the house. The science here is clear: exposure to moisture and mold in the home increases the risk of developing asthma by 30-50%. The effect on the brain. But what we notice most every day is that feeling of being “moody” or “stuck.” And here the person responsible is the lack of light due to being cloudy all day. The neurochemistry here is quite important, since without bright light to tell your brain “it’s daytime”, your body continues to produce melatonin, which is the sleep hormone, during the day. The result here is in fatigue throughout the day and apathy that makes us not want to leave the couch. There are also deficits. But in addition to melatonin, the lack of sunlight in those areas where it is not usual produces a decrease in the production of serotonin, which is one of the neurotransmitters responsible for mood. Less light equals less “fuel” to feel good. AND We must not forget about vitamin D either.which depends on sunlight to maintain optimal levels. Although supplementation has mixed results, observational studies are clear: there is a direct correlation between rainy months, low vitamin D and irritability or depressive symptomsknown as Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD). What can we do? Although it may seem counterintuitive, the European Lung Foundation point because you always have to ventilate the house a little even if it is raining. The accumulation of internal humidity from our own activities such as cooking, breathing or showering, added to the external humidity, creates a toxic environment. That is why maintaining air circulation and, if possible, using dehumidifiers to try to return your home to that sacred 40-60% range, is the only way to mitigate the impact on some part. Images | Adrian Swancar In Xataka | We say we are “depressed” beyond our means: where does the illness end and where does the illness begin?

The measles outbreak is close to 8,500 cases and puts the health status of the country in check

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Measles has ceased to be a latent threat and has become a worrying statistical reality in Mexicoas the latest consolidated data from February 2026 have pointed out. These leave no doubt that the country is going through its most complex outbreak in decades, accumulating 8,459 confirmed cases since the start of the crisis in 2025. It’s already worrying. The situation has escalated to such a point that the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) has issued a clear warning: If the chain of transmission is not cut in the coming weeks, Mexico could lose its status as a measles-free country. X-ray of the outbreak. The figures are compelling and draw a map of active transmission in the 32 states of the republic. Although the problem is national, the intensity is not homogeneous, since there are points where positive cases are much more evident. This is something that can be seen in the reports of the Ministry of Health (SSA) of Mexico, which indicates that so far in 2026, 2,143 cases have been reported. But the current epicenter is in Jaliscowhich is where 1,245 cases have been concentrated, representing almost 60% of the reports this entire year. Historical accumulated. Since February 2025, the state of Chihuahua leads the accumulated total with more than 4,400 cases, now followed by the rebound in the west of the country. But the most tragic thing is undoubtedly the human losses, since they have already been confirmed 27 deaths since the beginning of the outbreak in February 2025, with two recent deaths recorded in Tlaxcala and Michoacán This is in addition to the fact that the most vulnerable population is the youngest children, who are between one and four years old. Something that also makes it act as the perfect vector to infect the older population and those at greater risk of suffering from a more serious disease. The root of the problem. Experts point out that it is necessary to have a herd immunity to be able to apply containment to this serious health problem. And for such a contagious virus, at least 95% of the population is required to be vaccinated, something very similar to what was noted in the Covid pandemic in our environment. And the problem is precisely in low vaccination coverage that exists in these regions, causing many to not reach this percentage. And, despite the fact that the SSA reports the application of more than 11.8 million vaccinesthe spread of the virus suggests that there are still susceptible population groups, especially those where there are a greater number of cases right now. Use of face masks. As already happened in the COVID pandemic, there are some states such as Jalisco or Nuevo León that are evaluating the use of masks or face coveringsespecially in closed spaces and with a large influx of people. This is a simple containment barrier to prevent spread while the population finishes its vaccination schedule. The ultimatum. On the technical side, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) has launched an extension until April to evaluate whether Mexico has achieved endemic transmission of this virus. This is something that is achieved when there is no continuous circulation of the virus in a territory for 12 months. Mexico has been fighting this outbreak since February 2025, and if transmission continues uninterrupted beyond the calendar year, measles will once again be considered endemic (typical of the region) and not an imported case. In addition to this, PAHO has confirmed that Mexico currently accounts for 71% of the cases on the entire American continent, a figure that forces health authorities to rethink the containment strategy to prevent its spread to the rest of the neighboring countries. What’s coming The next PAHO meeting in April will be critical in this regard. The decision that Mexico lose “measles-free” status It is not just a diplomatic label, but it implies greater costs in epidemiological surveillance, potential barriers in tourism and the confirmation of a major setback in the country’s public health status. Intensive campaigns are underway, but with the virus present in all states and active community transmission, the Mexican health system faces its most important test of the post-COVID era. A global problem. Although the news focuses on the many cases in Mexico in this case, the reality is that In other parts of the planet cases have also increased. One of the clearest examples is in the United States, where the CDC has raised alarm bells after observing how cases are multiplying in a matter of months. In Spain Official data also indicate that, while in 2023 only 14 cases were recorded, in 2024 they increased to 229 cases and in 2025 the forecast points to almost 400. Images | NIH Ed Us In Xataka | The myth of 37º: it is increasingly clear to us that there is no “normal” body temperature

the minimum dose of exercise that science points to changing the health of those over 60 years of age

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In the 1980s, gerontologist Robert N. Butler launched a phrase that has become in a mantra of modern medicine: “if exercise and physical activity could be packaged as a pill it would be the most widely prescribed and beneficial medication for the population.” Forty years later, science has stopped treating that phrase as a metaphor and turned it into a mathematical calculation. The ROI of the force. Until now, we knew that sport was healthy, but data on its direct clinical profitability were lacking. The GENUD research group, led by José Antonio Casajús, published in Experimental Gerontology at the end of 2025 one of the strongest evidence to date. The essay, carried out with 123 people over 80 years oldprescribed a treatment of three weekly supervised exercise sessions for six months. The clinical results were clear: improvements in functional capacity, reduction in frailty and increase in quality of life. But the data that has aroused the interest of health managers is economic. The conclusion here was that while the cost of the intervention was only 164 euros per person, The savings to the system exceeded 1,000 euros. The clinical squat. If exercise is the ideal drug, clinical evidence points to the squat being the most important active ingredient here. Many studies have precisely validated this movement, which can mean the world to some people, not as a gym exercise but as a diagnostic and treatment tool. Biomechanics is key. Why is the squat so important to medicine? First of all because it is an exercise that demands more on the hip extensorsvital for an elderly person to be able to get up from a chair or bed without help. But in addition, it also activates the quadriceps and plantar flexors more. At the metabolic and cardiovascular level, the impact is systemic. The venous compression that occurs during the squat increases venous return and cardiac output, acting as a natural pump that combats orthostatic hypotension. Even in post-stroke patients, fast squats have been shown to activate the injured rectus femoris, correcting asymmetries and improving postural control. How long. You don’t have to work hard, since a recent study showed that a program of just one minute a day, that is, about thirty seconds of squats and thirty seconds of push-ups, is enough. This is something that was seen with prescription by primary care physicians, improving physical performance in patients over 60 years of age with excellent adherence at 24 weeks. Anti-cancer effect. Beyond the effect on adults, important implications of physical exercises in pediatric cancer have also been seen. This was evidenced by Carmen Fiuza-Luces, from the Physical Exercise and Pediatric Cancer group, who directs the “La Aceleradora” project of the Unoentrecienmil Foundation. And contrary to the belief of having “absolute rest” when you have cancer, the evidence shows that exercise during treatment of pediatric solid tumors It achieves what no drug can. For example, it reduces the side effects of chemotherapy, protects the heart from the toxicity of the treatment or prevents atrophy in sick children. The problem is not the drug. The problem with prescribing exercise in consultation is lack of knowledge about the ‘dose’ that should be given. Just as a doctor does not say ‘take an antibiotic’ without a clear duration and frequency, the same thing happens with sports. You can’t say ‘do sports’. In these cases, exercise requires a dose in the form of frequency and duration, the intensity that must be personalized to each patient and, above all, monitoring with adaptation to the patient’s pathology. Looking for the front door. The Health and Sports Working Group of the Collegiate Medical Organization, coordinated by José Ramón Pallás, is pushing for integrate exercise into the National Health System as a therapy equivalent to drugs. The goal is for the “3 sets of 10 squats” recipe to be as official and binding as any blood pressure pill. In this way, science has done the numbers and all that remains is for the administration to make a move. Images | Victor Freitas In Xataka | Neither 10,000 steps a day nor killing yourself in the gym: the “sweet spot” of exercise according to science is 30 minutes

We have been avoiding aged cheese for years for health reasons. Massive study suggests we were wrong

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For decades, nutritional guides and specific diets focused on ensuring brain health, such as the famous MIND diethave had a common enemy: saturated fats of dairy origin. However, science has now given a turn of the wheel to show us that we were completely wrong. New evidence. A new and comprehensive study published in the magazine Neurology You just turned this belief upside down. After following almost 28,000 people for a quarter of a century, researchers at Lund University have found a surprising association: regular consumption of high-fat cheese and cream not only does not increase the risk of dementia, but seems to reduce it significantly. The Swedish diet. The researchers conducted a median follow-up of 25 years until 2020, cross-referencing dietary data with the Swedish National Patient Registry. The result was that during this type 3,208 were identified cases of dementiaand from here we began to see what these people ate. In this case, those who consumed 50 grams or more of high-fat cheese per day showed a reduced risk of dementia of between 13% and 19% compared to those who did not consume it. Furthermore, consumption of high-fat cream was associated with a 16% reduction in the risk of having full-blown dementia. But there is more. The most curious thing about the finding was the specificity, since similar benefits were not found in low-fat dairy products, nor in regular milk or butter. In this way, you can see that there is something specific in the nutritional matrix of cheese and fermented cream that plays in favor of our brain. Why this cheese. Emily Sonestedt, co-author of the study, She was surprised by the resultsalthough he points out that they have biological logic. While traditional diets limit cheese due to its calorie and saturated fat content, this food is rich in medium chain fatty acids, vitamin K2calcium and high quality proteins. In addition to all this, the fact that it is a fermented food can positively influence the intestinal microbiota, and we know more and more about the direct connection between the intestine and the brain. In this way, maintaining a good microbiota again indicates that it guarantees us having better brain health. You have to be cautious. Before running to the supermarket to buy all the types of cheese on the shelves, it is necessary to put on the usual handbrake in science, since we are talking about an observational study. This means that science points out that two things happen at the same time, but it does not prove 100% that one causes the other. And in this case, lifestyle may be interfering, such as the fact that people who eat cheese in Sweden have other lifestyle habits such as greater physical activity that protect them, although the researchers tried to adjust the variables. The verdict. The idea that “all saturated fat is bad for the brain” is losing steam in the face of evidence that certain complex foods, such as aged cheese or cream, have properties that go beyond their basic nutritional label. As is often the case in nutrition, the key does not seem to be eliminating food groups, but rather understanding the quality and source of what we eat. Images | Aliona Gumeniuk Robina Weermeijer In Xataka | Forgetting things is not a bug, it is a feature of your brain: how not remembering things makes us think better

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