What we can learn from prohibition

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What Prohibition Can Teach Us About Drug and Alcohol Policy Today By Oliver Staley Editor I love when science and history collide, and a recently published paper that looks at the effect of repealing prohibition on lifelong health is a great example of how the past can inform today. After prohibition was lifted in 1933, lots of people started drinking, including pregnant women who didn’t know the impact it would have on their babies. By comparing the causes of death for babies born in wet and dry counties between 1935 and 1941, the study’s authors found maternal drinking was linked to a 3.3% greater chance of death, mostly from heart disease or stroke, between 1990 and 2004. The findings suggest it’s time to ramp up efforts to eliminate drinking while pregnant, which leads to about 119,000 babies born annually with fetal alcohol syndrome, a condition associated with a wide range of physical, behavioral and cognitive issues. It also suggests policy makers should recognize there may be long-term unintended consequences of a major public policy shift that is the prohibition repeal of our era: the legalization of marijuana. READ MORE

What Else to Read The Best Mattresses for Side Sleepers: Which Is Right for You? Read More » 4 Ways Exercise Helps Fight Aging By Liz Seegert Physical activity is one of the best things you can do to protect your body as it ages. Here's how it helps. (Originally published in 2021.) Read More » No, Coffee and Tea Aren’t Actually Dehydrating. Here’s Why By Jamie Ducharme Instead, it's quite the opposite. (Originally published in 2018.) Read More » Why You’re Grinding Your Teeth—And How to Stop By Haley Weiss Bruxism, or teeth-grinding, has increased during the pandemic because of stress, anxiety, and more. Read More » Here’s How the Stunning Supermoon Looked Around the World By Jeffrey Kluger Photos of the Aug. 1 Sturgeon Supermoon—from Boston to Brazil. Read More »

ONE LAST READ Why everyone is talking about trauma Why is everyone talking about their trauma these days? Thank Bessel van der Kolk, the Dutch psychiatrist who wrote the bestselling book The Body Keeps the Score—and, as covered by New York, made a once-fringe academic theory a cornerstone of modern pop psychology. Read More »

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