Uncertainty surrounds COVID-19 vaccines for children amid conflicting federal guidance
By David Higgins, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus This year, many parents face a question that’s more complicated than usual: Should my child get an updated COVID-19 vaccine, and will I even have that choice? For some,...
Magic mushrooms: Why the popular fad of “microdosing” is causing an uptick in ER visits
By Joshua Kellogg, Assistant Professor of Natural Product Chemistry, Penn State Imagine you purchase a bag of gummies labeled nootropic, a term used to describe substances that claim to enhance mental ability and function, or “smart drugs.” However, within hours of...
Polls show U.S. adults want governmental focus put on child care costs instead of falling birth rates
While the Trump regime explores ways to encourage Americans to have more babies and reverse the United States’ falling birth rate, a new poll finds that relatively few U.S. adults see this as a priority or share the White House’s concerns. Instead,...
Republican policies in the 1920s set the stage for the Great Depression and echo in Trump era economics
In the election of 1920, Americans handed a landslide victory to the Republicans and their presidential candidate Warren G. Harding, giving them control of both Congress and the White House. After the moralizing of the Progressive Era and the horrors of World War I...
The same fear machine driving Republican loyalty to Trump could become the weapon that ends his control
Trump and his people, with all their strut and swagger, want you to think he’s the most powerful man in America and will continue in power indefinitely. Don’t believe it. The reason he’s rushing so hard and fast to spread his secret, masked police across American...
Printing presses once spread witch hunts just as algorithms amplify misinformation at scale today
By Julie Walsh, Whitehead Associate Professor of Critical Thought and Associate Professor of Philosophy, Wellesley College Between 1400 and 1780, an estimated 100,000 people, mostly women, were prosecuted for witchcraft in Europe. About half that number were executed,...
Wisconsin residents echo fears that health care costs will keep rising as Republicans block relief efforts
Most U.S. adults are worried about health care becoming more expensive, according to an P-NORC poll, as they make decisions about next year’s health coverage and a government shutdown keeps future health costs in limbo for millions. About 6 in 10 Americans are...
Millions face hunger in the U.S. as Trump cuts off food aid and funnels $40B to Argentina’s far-right regime
U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, on October 26, condemned Donald Trump for pursuing a $40 billion bailout of Argentina while unlawfully declining to use contingency reserves to pay out federal food aid to Americans during the ongoing government shutdown. “During the...
Why every small town has a haunted house and what Milwaukee’s ghost stories really say about memory
Haunting is how a place remembers. When the people who built a neighborhood disappear, their stories echo through whatever’s left behind. The legends almost always start the same way. A house no one wants to live in, an attic window that flickers at night, a room that...
What belief in angels, witches, crystals, and black cats reveals about culture and identity in America
By Christopher P. Scheitle, Associate Professor of Sociology, West Virginia University; Bernard D. DiGregorio, PhD Candidate in Sociology, West Virginia University; and Katie E. Corcoran, Professor of Sociology, West Virginia University Younger Americans are more...
Scholars trace witch symbols from broomsticks and black cats back to centuries of misogynistic roots
By Mari Ellis Dunning, PhD Candidate, Languages and Literature, Aberystwyth University Whether they’re knocking at your door trick or treating, or hung as decorations in shop windows, witches are rife at this time of year. They’re easy to recognise, wearing tall,...
Ancient legends of the undead reveal how societies tried to explain disease outbreaks before science
By Tom Duszynski, Clinical Assistant Professor of Epidemiology, Indiana University Imagine a city street at dusk, silent save for the rising sound of a collective guttural moan. Suddenly, a horde of ragged, bloodied creatures appear, their feet shuffling along the...
