New recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention regarding hepatitis C testing received a significant amount of coverage, mostly online, as well as on one of last night’s national news broadcasts. CDC Director Dr. Thomas Frieden and Dr. John Ward, who runs the CDC’s viral hepatitis division, were quoted in multiple articles. NBC Nightly News (8/16, story 5, 1:30, Williams) reported that the government has a “health warning…for an entire American generation” regarding hepatitis C.

The AP (8/17, Stobbe) reports, “All baby boomers should get a one-time blood test to learn if they have the liver-destroying hepatitis C virus, US health officials said.” Dr. Frieden, during a call with reporters, said, “Unless we take action, we project deaths will increase substantially.”

Related Links:

— “CDC to baby boomers: Get tested for hepatitis C, “Mike Stobbe, Associated Press, August 17, 2012.

MedWire (8/17, Cowen) reports that according to a study published online Aug. 9 in the Journal of Affective Disorders, “only a small proportion of depressed adolescents with hypomania spectrum episodes will develop bipolar disorder in adulthood.” In the “study of 64 individuals aged 16-17 years who screened positive for depression symptoms and lifetime hypomania spectrum symptoms, only six had experienced another hypomanic episode, or an episode or mania, by the age of 30-33 years.” These “come from a community-based study of 2300 adolescents who were screened for depression and hypomania between 1991 and 1993.”

Related Links:

— “Adolescent hypomania does not predict bipolar disorder, “Mark Cowen, MedWire News, August 17, 2012.

MedPage Today (8/16, Petrochko) reports, “Students who started drinking and getting drunk at an early age were more likely to engage in frequent heavy drinking and associated problems by senior year of college,” according to a study published online Aug. 15 in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research. “A longitudinal analysis of incoming college freshmen showed a significant association not only between younger drinking age and heavy drinking, but also with difficulties in work and school, blackouts, vomiting, and other problems by senior year (P<0.001 for all)," researchers reported. "Those who started drinking and getting drunk at a later age were at a lower risk for heavy drinking and problems overall, but had significantly steeper increases in heavy drinking and associated problems over time (P<0.001 for both)," the study of 1,160 incoming university freshmen found. Related Links:

— “Young Drinking Tied to Drinking Problems Later, “Cole Petrochko, MedPage Today, August 15, 2012.

Bloomberg News (8/14, Lopatto) reports, “Men in rural areas may be prone to suicide during times of drought,” according to a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. After analyzing nearly 40 years of Australian rainfall records, researchers found that “in addition to the financial stress of failed crops, environmental degradation caused by extended dry spells also can be psychologically harmful.” In “men ages 30 to 49 who live in farming communities, droughts were associated with a 15 percent increase in the relative risk of suicide, the” study found.

Related Links:

— “Drought Increases Suicides For Rural Men, Researchers Say, “Elizabeth Lopatto, Bloomberg, August 13, 2012.

The Arizona Republic (8/12, Ortega) noted that although it “can seem all but impossible to understand why anyone would commit a mass murder” as James Holmes is “accused of doing” in Aurora, Colorado in July, “forensic psychologists and other behavioral scientists are increasingly identifying reasons that can predispose someone to commit mass violence, and ‘warning behaviors,’ such as a fast-growing fascination with weapons and violence, that should signal the need for intervention.” J. Reid Meloy, a “forensic psychologist and professor of clinical psychiatry at the University of California-San Diego” said it’s often “possible to identify people who fall into high-risk groups and to take some action to intervene — from requiring counseling to restricting someone’s access to weapons to seeking involuntary commitment, or many other steps in between.”

Physicians Want Gun Violence Treated As A “Social Disease.” The AP (8/11, Marchione) reported that some public health experts want gun violence to be treated as a “social disease” that requires a public health approach. They give examples from past public health problems addressed with “highway safety measures, product changes and driving laws that slashed deaths from car crashes decades ago.” The CDC estimates that some 73,000 visits to emergency rooms in 2010 stemmed from firearms, and recent mass shootings have led one expert, Dr. Stephen Hargarten of the Medical College of Wisconsin’s Injury Research Center, to ask whether “we have a public health issue to discuss.” The AP cites other experts and lists some examples of how a public health approach would work.

Related Links:

— “Psychologists look for ‘warning behaviors’ to stop killings,”Bob Ortega, USA Today, August 12, 2012.