CNN Health

Strangers have called them monsters, trolled them on social media and said their living children should be taken away. Their darkest moments are judged and politicized by figures who know nothing about them. They feel like involuntary pawns in an ugly, vicious game they didn't ask to play.

The subjects likely to surface at Tuesday's Senate hearings -- high drug prices and profits, limited price transparency, aggressive marketing, alleged patent abuse and mediocre, "me-too" drugs -- are identical to the issues senators investigated decades ago.

Gun laws in the state of Illinois are among the strictest in the United States. But people on both sides of the gun control debate say it takes more than policy to prevent tragedies like the recent deadly shooting in a manufacturing plant in Aurora.

Looking at the plain, one-story wooden shacks that dot the countryside in Cuba's vuelta abajo region, one would never guess that the farmers here grow one of the island's most valuable natural resources: cigar tobacco.

The US Department of Health and Human Services issued its draft final rule to revise the Title X family planning program Friday, jeopardizing a decades-old program that serves millions of low-income people, critics say.

The idea of paid paternity leave has hit the national stage as focus shifts from new moms to the whole family unit when a child is born. As companies decide to offer the added benefit to new parents, one company is offering a grant to dads who do not have access to paid paternity leave.

Political action committees, or PACs, that are tied to physicians' groups in the United States have contributed more money to politicians who oppose certain gun control laws than to those in support of such policies -- even though many physicians' groups have called for stricter gun control, a new study shows.

There's no end in sight for one of the largest prescription drug recalls in recent memory. The US Food and Drug Administration is continuing an investigation and recall of a class of drugs used by millions that began last summer, yet there's still "more to find," an agency director says.

While there's early evidence that the explosive rate of opioid deaths has started to slow, opioids killed more than 49,000 people in the United States in 2017, according to preliminary data. A new study reveals which part of the country has been affected the most by the ongoing epidemic.

A drop in global biodiversity is putting our ability to produce food at risk, a new United Nations report warns.

It looks like something out of a ninja movie. The extreme sport known as parkour involves vaulting high obstacles, leaping from rooftop to rooftop and literally bouncing off the walls.

After strapping on all the required safety gear like helmets and crampons for our boots, Margo Talbot gives one last piece of advice before she starts climbing a wall of ice.

The US Food and Drug Administration is proposing new regulations on over-the-counter sunscreens in an effort to keep up with the latest scientific and safety information.

Everyone lies. But some falsehoods have graver consequences than others, such as lying to police about being a crime victim.

People who live near current or former military installations in eight states will have their blood and urine examined by government officials. They want to understand the extent of residents' exposure to manmade chemicals known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, a division of the US Department of Health and Human Services.

As a mother of two young girls, one of the things I care about most is staying in tune with my daughters' day-to-day social interactions, worries and concerns. My daughters attend a school in New York City where social and emotional health is a top priority, and I've learned a lot about how feeling confident and secure on the inside is a prerequisite not only for happiness but for academic success.

Bhanu Patel couldn't believe the news. The medication that allows her to move shot up to $375,000. Fearful of becoming a financial burden to her family, she's begun rationing the medication she currently has -- taking two pills a day, instead of four. "The words that I can use is I can't believe this is happening," she said.

More than 8 million tons of plastic ends up in our oceans each year, killing marine life and damaging ecosystems. But the same seas might also hold the key to reducing plastic pollution.

The number of phone calls to US poison control centers about kratom exposures increased from 13 in 2011 to 682 in 2017, often for serious unanticipated effects of the supplement, according to a study published Thursday in the journal Clinical Toxicology.

Leprosy is a disease most people think ended in the Middle Ages, but a new study shows that it's not a thing of the past.