October is that time of the year where we start to anticipate cooler weather and pulling out our favorite cozy sweaters. We also get excited to carve pumpkins, decorate the house, and find the perfect Halloween costume. While October is considered the kickoff for many fall activities, it's also Breast Cancer Awareness Month.
Childhood obesity awareness month is not only a time to recognize the health issues linked to obesity in children, but to celebrate our community’s progress in keeping our kids healthy. Spokane Regional Health District (SRHD) provides oversight to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program – Education (we like to call it SNAP-Ed for short) activities for a ten-county region in eastern Washington. Through the hard work of our partnering agencies, SNAP-Ed works to educate and make changes that help kids choose healthy foods and activities. What does that look like in our region? Since school just started, let’s look at some examples in our schools!
The timeline for the COVID-19 vaccine can be unclear to many, but if you want to look at the big picture, research began all the way back to the 1930s with the discovery of the first coronavirus infection in chickens. Decades later in 1965 Dr. June Almeida was able to identify a coronavirus under a microscope.
Over the last year and a half, most of our health education has centered around COVID-19. While the pandemic has certainly affected all of our lives, we want to bring attention to another disease that is quickly spreading around our community—syphilis. Syphilis is a bacterial infection that anyone can contract, so it's important to know what it is and the steps you can take to treat it.
We appreciate all of you who are wearing masks out there. Whether you’re wearing your mask for health, to cover up the spinach in your teeth from lunch, or so you don’t have to wax your lip, we are glad you’re doing it. You are helping to protect the person who just finished their chemo treatments, the medically fragile kid who finally gets to play at the new playground, and everybody else around you. We also know many people still have a lot of questions about masks, so we wanted to answer some questions we’ve been getting lately.