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How to Travel With Babies and Toddlers

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How to Travel With Babies and Toddlers

Traveling with a baby or a toddler can be fun, frustrating, even revelatory. Planning is key, and so is your willingness to tailor the trip to the youngest traveler. As Dr. Elizabeth Barnett, the director of the pediatric travel program at Boston Medical Center, advises, “If you take a young child, it’s all about the child.”

This is not the time for a “nine European capitals in seven days” trip. Think about picking one place or splitting your trip between two destinations. That will allow you to settle in and get the sleep schedule sorted out. Most small children thrive on routines. If you find the right playground or bakery, your child will enjoy returning.

Airports, airplanes, long drives, train rides: They all loom large, depending on your child’s disposition. Get ready to distract, soothe, sing, nurse — whatever helps. For toddlers, pediatricians agree that travel is the perfect occasion to forget screen time rules and embrace devices and programming that will help pass the time.

For babies, sucking something aboard an airplane can help with painful air pressure changes in the ears, so pack a pacifier and a bottle, and if you’re breastfeeding, dress for comfortable semipublic nursing. Don’t give your baby medication to promote sleep unless you’ve discussed it with your pediatrician — and if you get clearance, try it at home first in case there are negative reactions. Healthychildren.org, from the American Academy of Pediatrics, is a good source for tips on air travel with babies.

Keep in mind that if an infant car seat is going to be used on an airplane, it should say on the label that it is certified for use on aircraft.

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Some children behave perfectly on long flights, while others lose it completely. But every child is capable of both. It’s up to you to bring along equipment and diversions, snacks, changes of clothing and a friendly, apologetic smile in case your child interferes with other passengers’ comfort.

Many people with young children prefer vacation rentals with kitchens. Hotels, however, can work well — breakfast buffets and housekeeping services are always helpful — but check online comments to see whether guests with babies and toddlers have had good experiences.

When it comes to cribs, alert your hotel, and inquire in advance about availability. Airbnb has a filter for those looking for cribs. Many hosts will specify any additional equipment, including baby monitors. Your best bet, though, is to be in touch with the host. Remember that “child-friendly” does not mean “childproof” so look at the details and be particularly vigilant about staircases, fireplaces, pools and hot tubs.

Sleep schedules vary widely in children. Some babies can sleep anywhere and through anything, and others need a quiet, dark room. Be flexible: In this, as in so much else, you’re more likely to have a successful trip if you follow the child’s schedule than if you insist on an adult schedule with a sleepy, cranky child.

Don’t go for fancy, do go for friendly, and try going at off-peak hours. Your ideal restaurant is a place where families come to eat and relax. One delightful aspect of travel in Spain and Italy, for example, is that if you find yourself setting out for a late dinner with an active baby or a toddler, everyone will take it for granted. And whatever the hour, if you find a place that works — and dishes your toddler appreciates — be prepared to go back.

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You may love to visit every church and art collection, but not on this trip. Choose one or two things you would most like to do, consider whether a baby carrier or stroller would work best, and be prepared to shorten or scrub the mission. Start out with limited expectations, and you may be surprised by your child’s adaptability.

Yes, you need a folding stroller, and yes, you need a car seat. A portable crib guarantees you a safe sleep surface and may also give you a playpen in a strange room. There are also portable high chairs, which clip on to the edge of a table. Wirecutter has a summary of everything from portable cribs to blackout curtains to sound machines.

Well before leaving, check in with your child’s pediatrician. Make sure immunizations are up-to-date, and discuss whether additional shots are needed. The measles vaccine, usually administered at age 1, can be given earlier if you’re going somewhere where measles might be a problem. Hepatitis A vaccines can also be given early. For remote areas, consider seeing a travel medicine expert, and discuss special immunizations and antimalarial drugs.

Bring medication your child regularly takes, and ask your pediatrician how to communicate if problems arise. You can also check in advance with rental hosts or concierges about local doctors and hospitals, with particular reference to pediatrics.

If your child does get sick while traveling, “the first thing is to do what you would do if you were at home,” Dr. Barnett said. Consider packing liquid acetaminophen or ibuprofen. A child with vomiting or diarrhea needs liquids immediately to prevent dehydration, and the younger the baby, the more important it is to seek local medical attention.

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In an area without safe water, breastfeeding is one way to keep your baby safe; for a child drinking anything else, be rigorous about using boiled or bottled water, and stick to cooked foods and peelable fruits.

Wherever you are, prioritize sun safety. Bring sunscreen and hats, and keep young children covered up in the bright sun. If you need both sunscreen and insect repellent, apply the sunscreen first.

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Pope Francis Has Bilateral Pneumonia

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Pope Francis Has Bilateral Pneumonia

Pope Francis, who remains hospitalized, has bilateral pneumonia, the Vatican said on Tuesday.

The term simply means pneumonia in both lungs, said Dr. James Musser, director of the center for infectious diseases at the Houston Methodist Research Institute. He added that, without examining a patient, he could not say anything specific about his condition.

In general, pneumonia is an infection of the small airways of the lungs. As the body mounts an inflammatory response, small pockets in the lungs fill with immune cells; symptoms can include fever, cough and shaking chills. To diagnose the illness, a doctor typically asks the patient to say a long “e,” as if the person were singing. Through a stethoscope, the “e” of a pneumonia patient sounds like an “a,” said Dr. Paul Pottinger, a professor of infectious diseases at the University of Washington.

Most people with pneumonia recover well at home and do not need to be hospitalized. But for older people, pneumonia can be “a deadly situation,” infectious disease experts said.

Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, professor of medicine and infectious diseases at the University of California, San Francisco, added that “the mortality rate goes up after age 85.” The pope is 88, and is missing part of one lung after pulmonary surgery in 1957.

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The most likely cause of pneumonia is an infection caused by a bacterium, Streptococcus pneumoniae, according to Dr. Chin-Hong. “The No. 1, 2 and 3 cause of pneumonia is strep pneumonia,” he said.

The illness can respond to antibiotics, but bacteria can sometimes spill out of the lungs and into the rest of the body, resulting in sepsis, a dangerous situation. A vaccine can help mitigate this sepsis risk but does not prevent the condition, Dr. Chin-Hong said.

Dr. Pottinger noted that, although strep pneumonia can involve both lungs, it usually is confined to one lobe of one lung. Most bilateral pneumonia, he said, is caused by viruses, including influenza, or other bacteria. Other causes include respiratory syncytial virus, or R.S.V., Legionella, mycoplasma and chlamydia, Dr. Pottinger said.

He agreed with Dr. Chin-Hong about the likely gravity of the pope’s condition.

“It is a very scary situation,” Dr. Pottinger said.

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Minnesota declares state of emergency as diseases cripple Midwestern farms

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Minnesota declares state of emergency as diseases cripple Midwestern farms

Minnesota has declared a state of emergency as multiple strains of bird flu have ravaged farms.

The Minnesota Department of Agriculture (MDA) stated in a press release that the Minnesota Department of Agriculture’s Rural Finance Authority (RFA) Board established the emergency following three outbreaks.

Those included avian metapneumovirus (aMPV), highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI), and the H5N1 flu virus.

NEW BIRD FLU STRAIN DETECTED IN NEVADA DAIRY WORKER, CDC SAYS

The state of emergency allows Minnesota farmers who have experienced livestock losses to access funds through zero-interest disaster recovery loans, according to the above source.

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Fran Miron feeds his cows at his farm on Sept. 5, 2019, in Hugo, Minnesota. Minnesota has declared a state of emergency as multiple strains of bird flu have ravaged farms. (Salwan Georges/The Washington Post via Getty Images)

An MDA spokesperson confirmed with Fox News Digital that this declaration is a “formality the Rural Finance Authority Board must take in order to open up the Disaster Recovery Loan Program to farmers.” 

“The declaration has no impact beyond that and affects no other funding or programs.”

The loan program provides funds for expenses not covered by insurance, according to the MDA, including replacement of flocks or livestock, building improvements, or loss of revenue due to animal disease outbreaks.

BIRD FLU UPTICK IN US HAS CDC ON ALERT FOR PANDEMIC ‘RED FLAGS’: REPORT

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Minnesota Agriculture Commissioner Thom Petersen wrote in a statement that this is an “important step in helping Minnesota farmers affected by these three animal health diseases.” 

“I encourage those who have faced livestock losses to explore these zero-interest loans,” he added.

avian metapneumovirus (aMPV) is a “highly infectious respiratory disease” that affects poultry and can cause “significant immunosuppression” in birds, as well as secondary infections and high mortality, according to the MDA.

bird flu outbreak on minnesota farm

USDA workers disinfect a work crew at a Jennie-O turkey farm in Eden Valley, Minnesota, on April 30, 2015, amid a bird flu outbreak. (Glen Stubbe/Star Tribune via Getty Images)

Since April 2024, Minnesota has reported 871 aMPV positive tests, which is “likely an undercount,” health officials said.

HPAI — which is a contagious, viral and fatal disease — has also posed a “major threat” to the poultry industry, MDA reported.

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In Minnesota, there have been 185 cases of HPAI confirmed since March 2022, affecting 9.1 million domestic birds, mostly turkeys.

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H5N1, also known as avian influenza or bird flu, causes the same virus in poultry as HPAI, but can also affect dairy cows and other animals.

Bird flu strains have also spread to humans, including a dairy worker in Nevada who was infected by a new type (D1.1) last week, as Fox News Digital previously reported.

For more Health articles, visit www.foxnews.com/health

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Sam Scarpino, director of AI and life sciences and professor of health sciences at Northeastern University in Boston, previously said that he considers the ongoing U.S. bird flu outbreak as “serious.”

Blood collection tubes H5N1 in front of chicken

Bird flu cases have risen across the U.S. and have infected some humans. (iStock)

“We now have at least two distinct H5N1 strains (akin to variants if we were discussing COVID-19) that have infected dairy cattle, poultry and humans,” he told Fox News Digital. “The H5N1 situation in the U.S. continues to get worse, not better.”

Scarpino shared his approval of the recent choice of Dr. Gerald Parker to run the White House Office of Pandemic Preparedness and Response Policy. 

“His appointment signals that the federal government is giving the H5N1 situation the attention it needs,” he said.

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“From the perspective of both the building agricultural costs and continued risk of human infection, we have to bring this H5N1 outbreak under control.”

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An Invisible Medical Shortage: Oxygen

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An Invisible Medical Shortage: Oxygen

At the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, millions of people in poor nations died literally gasping for breath, even in hospitals. What they lacked was medical oxygen, which is in short supply in much of the world.

On Monday, a panel of experts published a comprehensive report on the shortage. Each year, the report noted, more than 370 million people worldwide need oxygen as part of their medical care, but fewer than 1 in 3 receive it, jeopardizing the health and lives of those who do not. Access to safe and affordable medical oxygen is especially limited in low- and middle-income nations.

“The need is very urgent,” said Dr. Hamish Graham, a pediatrician and a lead author of the report. “We know that there’s more epidemics coming, and there’ll be another pandemic, probably like Covid, within the next 15 to 20 years.”

The report, published in The Lancet Global Health, comes just weeks after the Trump administration froze foreign aid programs, including some that could improve access to oxygen.

Boosting the availability of medical oxygen would require an investment of about $6.8 billion, the report noted. “Within the current climate, that’s obviously going to become a bit more of a challenge,” said Carina King, an infectious disease epidemiologist at the Karolinska Institute and a lead author of the report.

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Still, she said, governments and funding organizations should prioritize medical oxygen because of its importance across health care. People of all ages may need oxygen for pneumonia and other respiratory conditions, for severe infections including malaria and sepsis, for surgeries and for chronic lung conditions.

“We’re not pitting oxygen against other priorities, but rather that it should be embedded within all of those programs and within those priorities,” Dr. King said. “It’s completely fundamental to a functioning health system.”

Medical oxygen has been used for more than 100 years, often for treating patients with pneumonia. But it was added to the World Health Organization’s Essential Medicines List only in 2017.

Early in the Covid-19 pandemic, Every Breath Counts, a coalition of more than 50 organizations, pushed for increased access to medical oxygen. By the end of 2022, an emergency task force had mobilized more than $1 billion worth of medical oxygen equipment and supplies to more than 100 countries.

One country that has made substantial investment in improving oxygen access is Nigeria, which had taken steps in that direction even before Covid.

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Nigeria has set up about 20 cost-effective plants for generating oxygen on-site for hospitals, and is exploring liquid oxygen plants that can supply large swaths of urban areas, said Dr. Muhammad Ali Pate, the country’s minister of health and social welfare.

Many hospitals do not have systems that can deliver oxygen reliably, “so that is sort of a design and a legacy issue that we have to deal with,” he said. “There’s more that needs to be done.”

Modifying hospital systems to deliver oxygen can pose engineering and market issues, and delivering oxygen requires infrastructure that can transport heavy oxygen tanks for long distances.

Even once oxygen supply is assured, the equipment to deliver the oxygen directly to patients must be routinely maintained and cleaned, and spare parts may take months to be delivered. Health care workers must be trained to use the equipment effectively.

“We’ve seen so much investment in equipment, but very little investment in how to operationalize that equipment sustainably,” Dr. King said.

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Health care facilities also require pulse oximeters to screen and monitor blood oxygen levels during treatment. But in low- and middle-income countries, pulse oximetry is used in fewer than 1 in 5 patients in general hospitals, and it’s almost never used at primary health care facilities, according to the report.

The panel included testimonials from patients, families and health care workers who have struggled with the oxygen shortage. In Sierra Leone, before the Covid-19 pandemic, only one public hospital in the entire country had a functioning oxygen plant, resulting in thousands of avoidable deaths. In Pakistan, a man with a chronic lung condition said that he stayed indoors and avoided stairs to prevent his lungs from rupturing under the strain. He had to borrow money from friends and family to pay the $18,000 cost of treatment at home.

In Ethiopia, a doctor was forced to take oxygen away from one patient to treat another who was more desperately ill. “It was very heartbreaking trying to decide who lives and who dies,” he said.

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