The Workup

Nearly 20 percent of Connecticut children live in homes that are food insecure, according to a study by the Connecticut Food Bank and Feeding America. Those children are at higher risk of obesity than their peers. That’s because their families rely on cheap but unhealthy food to fill their grocery carts, because they live in places that don’t offer good opportunities for physical activity, and it is also because their parents are working so many hours, that fast food becomes a major player in the family diet.

Summer in Connecticut – and you feel like you’re surrounded by bugs. Because you are. But don’t blame the mild winter for the influx of disease carrying ticks in your backyard. They love it here pretty much every year.

The water crisis in Flint, Michigan has thrown a spotlight on lead poisoning, a problem that many people thought had gone away. But lead poisoning is very much with us in Connecticut. The state’s most recent data shows that 2,275 children under age 6 had lead poisoning in 2013.

Dr. Hilda Slivka directs the Regional Lead Treatment Center at Connecticut Children’s Medical Center, where she sees lead-poisoned children weekly.

For more CT health stories, visit http://c-hit.org/.

Gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender youth are at much higher risk than their peers for all the behaviors that he

describes. While LGBT youth may be especially in need of good medical care, it can be hard to find. National surveys report high rates of LGBT people being turned away or treated disrespectfully by health care providers.

This is The Workup, an occasional series of podcasts exploring health issues that concern you. Today we’re talking about kids, migraines and difficulty they sometimes have getting taken seriously.