More than 115 cases of eye damage reported in Ontario after solar eclipse
More than 115 people who viewed the solar eclipse in Ontario earlier this month experienced eye damage after the event, according to eye doctors in the province.
A new Canadian-led study has found that feeling depressed, along with living in a disadvantaged neighbourhood, may lead to premature aging.
The peer-reviewed study, published on Monday in The Journals of Gerontology, Series A: Biological Sciences and Medical Sciences, points to how depression and living in an urban environment – with greater material and social inequities – can influence how a person ages.
Led by researchers at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ont., the study's authors say this may occur "even after accounting for individual-level health and behavioural risk factors, such as chronic conditions and poor health behaviours."
"This adds to the growing body of evidence that living in urban areas with higher levels of neighbourhood deprivation and having depression symptoms are both associated with premature biological aging," team lead Parminder Raina, a professor in the Department of Health Research Methods, Evidence, and Impact at McMaster University, said in a news release.
The researchers used epigenetic data from 1,445 people enrolled in the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging, a long-term study that follows about 50,000 participants between the ages of 45 and 85 for at least 20 years.
The study is described as examining how changing biological, medical, psychological, social, lifestyle and economic factors impact a person's health as they age.
Epigenetics is the study of how behavior and environment can influence how a person's genes work.
The researchers measured depression symptoms using a standardized 10-item scale.
They say a one-point increase in the score accelerated a person's risk of death by one month, with the theory being that emotional distress caused by depression could lead to "more biological wear and tear and dysregulation of physiological systems."
In order to measure "neighbourhood material and social deprivation," the researchers used a pair of indices, based on the 2011 census, from the Canadian Urban Environmental Health Research Consortium.
They described material deprivation as a person's inability to obtain resources such as adequate housing, nutritious food, a vehicle, high-speed internet or recreational facilities, while social deprivation refers to family and community connections.
The researchers say greater neighbourhood deprivation increased a person's "risk of death by almost one year," but did not worsen the effect that depression had on aging.
In other words, both were independently associated with premature aging.
"Our results showed that the effect of neighbourhood deprivation on epigenetic age acceleration was similar regardless of depression symptoms, suggesting that depression influences epigenetic age acceleration through mechanisms unrelated to neighbourhood deprivation," Divya Joshi, first author of the study and a research associate at McMaster University, said.
The research team also included members from the Netherlands, Norway and Switzerland.
More than 115 people who viewed the solar eclipse in Ontario earlier this month experienced eye damage after the event, according to eye doctors in the province.
The B.C. NDP has asked the federal government to recriminalize public drug use, marking a major shift in the province's approach to addressing the deadly overdose crisis.
George Mallory is renowned for being one of the first British mountaineers to attempt to scale the dizzying heights of Mount Everest during the 1920s. Nearly a century later, newly digitized letters shed light on Mallory’s hopes and fears about ascending Everest.
An orca whale calf that has been stranded in a B.C. lagoon for weeks after her pregnant mother died swam out on her own early Friday morning.
Sophie Gregoire Trudeau says there is 'still so much love' between her and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, as they navigate their post-separation relationship co-parenting their three children.
An Ontario man who took out a loan to pay for auto repairs said his car was repossessed after he missed two payments.
Devastating tornadoes tore across parts of eastern Nebraska and northeast Texas Friday as a multi-day severe thunderstorm event ramped up in the central United States.
A Sherwood Park family says their new house is uninhabitable. The McNaughton's say they were forced to leave the house after living there for only a week because contaminants inside made it difficult to breathe.
Donald Trump's defence team attacked the credibility Friday of the prosecution's first witness in his hush money case, seeking to discredit testimony detailing a scheme between Trump and a tabloid to bury negative stories to protect the Republican's 2016 presidential campaign.
Mounties in Nanaimo, B.C., say two late-night revellers are lucky their allegedly drunken antics weren't reported to police after security cameras captured the men trying to steal a heavy sign from a downtown business.
A property tax bill is perplexing a small townhouse community in Fergus, Ont.
When identical twin sisters Kim and Michelle Krezonoski were invited to compete against some of the world’s most elite female runners at last week’s Boston Marathon, they were in disbelief.
The giant stone statues guarding the Lions Gate Bridge have been dressed in custom Vancouver Canucks jerseys as the NHL playoffs get underway.
A local Oilers fan is hoping to see his team cut through the postseason, so he can cut his hair.
A family from Laval, Que. is looking for answers... and their father's body. He died on vacation in Cuba and authorities sent someone else's body back to Canada.
A former educational assistant is calling attention to the rising violence in Alberta's classrooms.
The federal government says its plan to increase taxes on capital gains is aimed at wealthy Canadians to achieve “tax fairness.”
At 6'8" and 350 pounds, there is nothing typical about UBC offensive lineman Giovanni Manu, who was born in Tonga and went to high school in Pitt Meadows.