A remedy for existential angst

If thinking about your own death freaks you out, there may be over-the-counter solution. A new study shows that the main ingredient in Tylenol, acetaminophen, can help calm existential dread in the same way it reduces the physical pain of a headache. To get volunteers worried about their own mortality, University of British Columbia researchers asked them to watch scenes […]

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A deadly fever spreads

A devastating disease caused by airborne fungal spores is colonizing the Southwest in what the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention calls “a silent epidemic.” The disease, coccidioidomycosis, or valley fever, strikes more than 20,000 people per year in the region, 10 times the number it did 15 years ago. The spores live in the soil until wind lifts them […]

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