The People's Pharmacy: How much Pepto-Bismol prevents traveler's diarrhea?

Airbnb says it’s making its party ban permanent. The short-term-rental company said Tuesday that the temporary ban it put into effect in 2020 is working, so it decided to make it permanent. The company says reports of parties at listed properties have dropped 44% from a year ago. Airbnb has been trying to crack down on parties since late 2019, after a fatal shooting at a rented house in California. While making the ban permanent, Airbnb is lifting a capacity limit on some rentals. Airbnb says some property owners want to eliminate the limit of 16 people at large properties.

An inability to stand on one leg for 10 seconds in later life is linked to nearly double the risk of death from any cause within the next decade, according to a new study.

After two years of pandemic restrictions, travel demand is back, but airlines and airports that slashed jobs during the depths of the COVID-19 crisis are struggling to keep up. With the busy summer tourism season underway in Europe, passengers are encountering chaotic scenes at airports, including lengthy delays, canceled flights and headaches over lost luggage. The head of Europe’s biggest airline warned the turmoil would last all summer. Data from aviation consultancy Cirium says that nearly 2,000 flights from major continental European airports were canceled during one week this month. It’s a similar story in the United States, where airlines canceled thousands of flights over two days last week because of bad weather just as crowds of summer tourists grow.

Tens of thousands of suburban swing voters who helped fuel the Democratic Party’s gains of recent years are suddenly becoming Republicans. Overall, more than 1 million voters across 43 states have switched to the Republican Party over the last year. That's according to voter registration data analyzed by The Associated Press. They include both former Democrats and those previously unaffiliated with either major party. The phenomenon is playing out in virtually every region of the country — red states, blue states, in cities and in small towns — in the months since President Joe Biden replaced former President Donald Trump.

You and your best friend may have your noses to thank in helping bring you together, a new study suggests.

The U.S. Supreme Court has overturned Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that had provided a constitutional right to abortion. The June 24 ruling is expected to lead to abortion bans in roughly half the states. In anticipation of the decision, several states led by Democrats have taken steps to protect abortion access. The decision also sets up the potential for legal fights between the states over whether providers and those who help women obtain abortions can be sued or prosecuted.

Advisers to the U.S. government are recommending that COVID-19 booster shots used this fall be modified to better match more recent variants of the coronavirus. A final decision from the Food and Drug Administration is expected within days, and it will have to set the exact recipe for the change. Pfizer and Moderna tested shots updated against the omicron mutant that surged last winter. But those shots are already somewhat outdated, with relatives of omicron now the main threat. Advisers said they have no crystal ball for what might spread this fall.

Some large drug store chains are limiting purchases of emergency contraception to three pills per customer following the Supreme Court's ruling on abortion.