Week of February 10, 2014

The Roundup contains information about all of the latest news, commentary, reports, surveys, issue briefs, charts, and fact sheets related to boys' issues collected by our staff during the preceding week.

News Clips

  • Common Ground: Men needed to instill joys of reading
    A unique literacy program is aiming to help young boys avoid the pitfalls of crime by encouraging them to pick up a book, dream and challenge themselves. Boys to Books Not Bars is heading up efforts in the Baton Rouge area next month to pair mentors and tutors with boys in pre-kindergarten through third grade.
    The Advocate
    February 12, 2014

  • How Caffeinated Are Our Kids? Coffee Consumption Jumps
    new report, published in the journal Pediatrics, finds that 17- and 18-year-olds are consuming almost double the amount of caffeine from coffee compared with a decade earlier. And increasingly, younger tweens and teens, ages 12-16, are getting more caffeine from coffee, too.
    NPR
    February 11, 2014

  • President Obama to launch major new effort to help young minority men
    The "My Brother's Keeper" initiative will bring foundations and companies together to test a range of strategies to support such young men, taking steps to keep them in school and out of the criminal justice system, a White House official said. Obama will also announce a more vigorous program to evaluate policies and publicize results to school systems around the country.
    Washington Post
    February 11, 2014

  • Report from Cancer Panel to Obama: Accelerating HPV Vaccine Uptake: Urgency for Action to Prevent Cancer
    According to the report, based on data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in 2012 only about one-third of 13- to 17-year-old girls in the U.S. received all three recommended doses of HPV vaccine. These rates fall considerably short of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Healthy People 2020 goal of having 80 percent of 13- to 15-year-old girls fully vaccinated against HPV. Immunization rates for boys are even lower - less than 7 percent of boys ages 13-17
    completed the vaccine series in 2012 (although the vaccine was approved for males more recently than for females).
    National Institutes of Health
    February 11, 2014

  • Single-Sex Education's Benefits Challenged in Study
    Students in co-educational schools get the same quality of education as those in girls- or boys-only schools, a new review shows. The findings challenge claims by supporters of single-sex schools that separating boys and girls boosts their academic interest and performance, the researchers said.
    Health Day
    February 7, 2014

  • News Is Mixed on Teenagers and Substance Use
    Though an annual report on the prevalence of teenage substance use revealed some positive findings regarding alcohol and tobacco use, it also raised concerns regarding use by U.S. adolescents of other substances�at a level pointing to the need for major intervention.
    Psychiatric News
    February 6, 2014

  • Veteran's Post: Suicide on the rise for young veterans
    The January 2014 Suicide Data Update has been released by the Department of Veterans Affairs, and the news is not good. Suicides are up in two groups of veterans who utilized the VA health system: young males (ages 18-24) and women.
    Winter Park Observer
    February 5, 2014

  • 1 in 4 College Students Suffer from an Eating Disorder, Media to Blame?
    The National Institute of Mental Health has reported 25 percent of all college students struggle with an eating disorder and a National Eating Disorders Association study has shown these disorders have increased on college campuses as of 2013. 
    The Arkansas Traveler
    February 5, 2014

  • Do Sports Help Boys Become Men or Bullies?
    There's another side of sports, a side that rewards unnecessary violence and even suggests athletes are outside the law.
    The Good Men Project
    February 5, 2014

  • Are Gay Men the New Face of Body Dysmorphia?
    We are shown so many different images of male models with rock solid bodies that we feel we need to live up to that type. We are also in the world of the Smart Phone, where each app comes with its own sort of judgement.
    The Good Men Project
    February 5, 2014

  • Many Young Americans With HIV Delay Treatment: Study
    A troubling new study finds that one-third to nearly half of American teens and young adults with HIV delay treatment until their infection is advanced, putting them at risk for serious health problems. These findings are especially disturbing as evidence increasingly suggests that starting HIV treatment as soon as possible helps keep the virus under control and can prevent the heart, kidney and neurological harm that occurs in patients with poorly controlled HIV infection, the researchers noted.
    Healthfinder.gov
    February 4, 2014

  • theGrio's 100 History Makers in the Making: Dr. David Bell, fighting for young men's health
    NOTE: Dr. Bell is co-chair of The Boys Initiative's project, The Partnership for Male Youth, which recently launched the Health Provider Toolkit for Adolescent and Young Adult Males
    Dr. David Bell, 51, is an adolescent medicine physician who serves as the medical director and chief physician of the Young Men's Clinic in New York City. He is also director of a school-based program treating students at three middle schools and two high schools in upper Manhattan. He's on the faculty of Pediatrics and Public Health at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health.
    The Grio
    January 31, 2014

International News

UK

  • Drug use starts in boys as young as 12, says expert
    Boys as young as 12 are getting hooked on illicit substances, according to a rehabilitation expert. Dr Ali Hassan Al Marzooqi, Director of Public Health and Research at the National Rehabilitation Centre (NRC), said presentation age of drug abuse "starts at 12-13 years and mostly males". He noted, however, that the number of "first start" use is declining.
    Khaleejtimes.com
    February 11, 2014

UK

  • Drive to raise male awareness on sexual health
    With sexually transmitted infections (STIs) on the rise here, a new campaign called #TakeTheTest has been launched to encourage men to get tested. Latest statistics show that from 2000 to 2011 new diagnoses at GUM clinics increased by 28%, with gonorrhoea, syphilis and chlamydia all on the rise.
    Belfast Telegraph
    February 11, 2014

  • Thousands of kids aged 10 and under treated for depression
    Experts blame 'toxic culture' of online bullying and stress of modern life
    A 'toxic climate' of online bullying is causing thousands of children aged 10 and younger to become so depressed that they require medical treatment. Campaigners say up to 10 per cent of schoolchildren are affected by some form of mental illness, leading them to being treated in hospitals and other NHS centres.
    Parent Dish
    February 11, 2014

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The Boys Initiative is a groundbreaking national nonprofit campaign to shed light on documented trends in recent years pertaining to boys' underachievement and young men's failure to launch. For more information about The Boys Initiative, visit www.theboysinitiative.org.