"Health & Medical News"

A study by a British market-research firm found that people in their 30s and 40s were more likely to admit drinking too much alcohol than those in their 20s, the BBC reported Dec. 20.

The YouGov survey found that one in three people ages 30-50 said that they had a night ruined by excessive drinking within the past year, and 44 percent said they still don’t make a habit of following moderate-drinking recommendations. The former finding may partly be explained by the fact that the body copes more poorly with alcohol consumption as it ages.

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Young adults who have recently battled depression are at increased risk of starting to smoke cigarettes or initiating alcohol and other drug use, according to a report from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA).

SAMHSA, drawing on data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, said that youths ages 18 to 25 who reported a major depressive episode in the past year were 60 percent more likely than their peers to have started smoking, 35 percent more likely to have started drinking, twice as likely to have begun misusing prescription pain medication, and twice as likely to have started using illicit drugs.

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Washington — A sizeable number of lung cancers are diagnosed among women who never used tobacco, according to new findings. Two recent examples illustrate this point. The disease caused the death this year of opera legend Beverly Sills and last year of Dana Reeve, wife of actor Christopher Reeve. Neither was ever a smoker.

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