Does Tom Brady have a face that can stop traffic? Boston P.E. teacher Sam Balto wanted to find out. Balto laminated a photo of Brady to make a street sign. He put the sign in the street to slow drivers and keep students safe as they walked to his 62% Latino school, Ellis Elementary, in the city's Roxbury neighborhood, the Boston Globe reports. Before Brady: Drivers sped up to 55 mph in a 20 mph school zone. Few yielded. Some ran over crosswalk signs. After Brady: Drivers slowed down. Smiled more. “It definitely helped to get cars to slow down," Balto recently told Salud America! via Twitter.
The Brady Experiment
Balto first brought the Brady-as-crosswalk idea to WalkBoston. Brendan Kearney of WalkBoston said they spit-balled the idea on a walk audit. The audit found ...
The White House has proposed changing immigration policy to allow citizenship for up to 1.8 million young people brought into the U.S. as children—in addition to a $25 billion border wall and other security measures, USA Today reports. The proposed bill would blaze a path to citizenship for DREAMers, undocument immigrants who came to the U.S. as children. DREAMers have been in limbo since the Trump Administration rescinded the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, which was created by the Obama Administration to allow undocumented children brought to the U.S. to remain here. The bill, which will be introduced to the House and Senate in the coming weeks, would for the first time provide a clear path to citizenship for 1.8 million undocumented immigrants that ...
A pedestrian is killed by a motor vehicle once a week, on average, in San Antonio. In fact, 219 pedestrians died and 607 were severely injured in nearly 4,000 pedestrian-vehicle collisions from 2011-2015 on San Antonio roadways. That's a worse rate than Austin, Houston, Los Angeles, and many other cities. It's even worse in San Antonio's lower-income areas. In these areas, communities are designed for tires and steel, rather than people. When people don't feel safe to walk for health, recreation, or transportation, it harms their quality of life. They don't have an equitable chance to live healthier lives. San Antonio leaders are working to create safer streets for all. So officials launched a Vision Zero initiative and are continuing to analyze geographical data to ...
Latino and other kids with mental health issues may not understand their feelings. Parents and schools may not know how to deal with children who experience trauma or depression. Sadly, this creates an environment where Latinos—already less likely than their white peers to use mental healthcare services—struggle with suicide and other poor health and academic outcomes. Mental Health America is here to help.
How a Suicide Attempt Started It All
Mental Health America formed more than 100 years ago. In the early 1900s, Clifford Beers was suffering from bipolar disorder after the death of his old brother. Beers attempted to take his own life by jumping off of a three story building. Clifford was severely injured and placed in an institution, where he reported being ...
Did you know eight of every 1,000 Texas kids are victims of child abuse? Sadly, that number is even higher in certain parts of San Antonio. That includes San Antonio's District 5, a largely Latino district on the West Side where families struggle with domestic violence, pregnancy, and other trauma, according to Texas Public Radio. Shirley Gonzales, the City Council representative for District 5, wanted to help. Gonzales teamed with Victoria Salas of Family Service Association to find an innovative way—promotoras—to prevent trends that lead to child abuse.
The Need for Child Abuse Prevention
Across the U.S., 78% of Latino kids suffer at least one adverse childhood experience (ACE), such as poverty, neglect, and child abuse, according to a recent Salud America! ...
A controversial new law could force schools in Kentucky to start sex education in fourth grade, according to Lexington Herald Reader. What would this mean for Latinos? Teen pregnancy? Mental health?
A Big Proposal for Earlier Sex Education Kentucky (3.5% Latino) has the seventh-highest teen birth rate in the United States. Tom Burch, a state representative, introduced House Bill 80 to lower those rates by arming students with more knowledge about their body, according to Lexington Herald Reader. Sex education is not mentioned in some homes because it can be hard to talk about, or embarrassing for parents and kids. Schools thus are sometimes the main path to sex education. Most schools are required to teach sex education. But it's usually to older students starting in ...
After over 100 days of uncertainty since funding expired in September 2017... The Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) has finally received full funding! U.S. Lawmakers voted to fund CHIP for another six years as part of the spending bill which reopened the government on Jan. 22, 2018. The timing could not have been any better, as CHIP temporary funding measures were scheduled to run out, as well. The program has received support both Democrats and Republicans in Congress, according to Vox. However, the program became an unfortunate bargaining tool, which caused widespread concern from both healthcare professionals and families dependent upon CHIP. “This action ends months of anxiety and worry for the hard-working families who rely on CHIP for life-saving health ...
Univision, one of the world's largest multimedia companies, has launched a new campaign to promote better Latino health. Univision Contigo focuses on promoting healthy habits by providing simple, easy, at-home tips and ideas that families can integrate into their everyday lives. The goal is to get people more active and eating healthier. Healthy eating, regular physical activity and balancing the number of calories you eat with those you burn are key to maintaining a healthy weight. “One way Univision [is committed to Latino health] is through Univision Contigo, our award-winning corporate social responsibility and community empowerment platform,” according to a news release. “[The campaign] focuses on three specific verticals, building strong minds from 0-30, promoting ...
Millions of Latino and other families depend on the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) to get healthcare for their children. But CHIP funding ran out in Sept. 30 2017, amid partisan politics. Leaders installed temporary funding to keep the program afloat, but some states are preparing for the worst. What would it cost the government to extend CHIP for five years? $800 million. But if CHIP extends for 10 years, the government would actually save $6 billion, according to the nonprofit Congressional Budget Office, Vox reports. “Extending funding for CHIP for 10 years yields net savings to the federal government because the federal costs of the alternatives to providing coverage through CHIP (primarily Medicaid, subsidized coverage in the marketplaces, and ...
