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Every month, Lila Edwards wakes up early for a two-hour road trip with a group of girls that ends with them walking single file through a metal detector. Inside an empty classroom, Lila eagerly and anxiously awaits Inmate 01740964. When the inmate, a woman serving a 40-year sentence for murder, walked in during a recent visit, Lila collapsed into her arms and didn’t let go for more than a minute. These monthly visits at a minimum security prison are the only times that Lila, who is 10 years old and in the fifth grade, touches her mother. (Levin, 12/28)

Last year, when we asked science and health care soothsayers to peek ahead to 2019, they told us that methamphetamine use would rise (it did), tumor organoids would near clinical use for personalizing cancer treatment and better targeting clinical trials (that’s happening), and price transparency wouldn’t bring lower health spending (that’s true, too). But nobody predicted the outbreak of lung injuries tied to vaping, the failure and attempted resurrection of Biogen’s Alzheimer’s drug aducanumab, or the restoration of cellular functions in pig brains after death. We’re back with a new set of predictions for 2020. Let’s see how our experts do this time. (12/30)

Three weeks after his heart transplant, Andrey Jurtschenko still had not woken up. A towering figure at 6 feet, 3 inches, with salt-and-pepper hair and matching mustache, Jurtschenko — known to one and all as Andy — delighted friends and family with his seemingly endless supply of wisecracks and goofball humor. On April 5, 2018, he went into surgery at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center in Newark, New Jersey, for a new heart and what he hoped would be renewed energy. He dreamed of returning to his carpet business and to enjoying New York Mets games on the weekends after years of exhaustion and strain caused by congestive heart failure. (Chen, 12/31)

This year, the germs roared back. Measles tripled. Hepatitis A mushroomed. A rare but deadly mosquito-borne disease increased. And that was just the United States. (12/27)

Over the past year, health crises have sparked fears and dominated headlines across the globe. In Congo, an Ebola crisis that erupted the year before continued to grow, and violence against health workers hindered efforts to control it. (O'Grady, 1/1)

No. 2 from The Washington Post's list of 19 good things that happened in 2019: Another frightful disease may be checked by a new vaccine protecting people from the Ebola virus. The director-general of the World Health Organization called the progress in vaccine development “a triumph for public health, and a testimony to the unprecedented collaboration between scores of experts worldwide.” (12/30)

When Victoria Gray was just 3 months old, her family discovered something was terribly wrong. "My grandma was giving me a bath, and I was crying. So they took me to the emergency room to get me checked out," Gray says. "That's when they found out that I was having my first crisis." It was Gray's first sickle cell crisis. These episodes are one of the worst things about sickle cell disease, a common and often devastating genetic blood disorder. (Stein, 12/25)

Becky Talbot has pledged to go vegan for a month, joining almost 30,000 people across the U.S. who signed up for Veganuary, a campaign encouraging people to do without meat in January. Veganuary—which, like the popular Dry January no-alcohol regimen, also originated in the U.K.—is one take on New Year’s resolutions to cut back on meat because of health, environmental or animal-welfare concerns. (Reddy, 1/1)

Justin Jones got hooked on painkillers after he flipped his truck as a teenager, put his head through the windshield and fractured his wrist and sternum. When doctors would no longer write prescriptions for him, he began buying — and selling — drugs on the streets of Durham and Hillsborough, N.C. His first arrests occurred before he turned 20. (Waters, 12/28)

On low-carb diets, meat and cheese are OK. On low-fat diets, fruit and oatmeal are fine. With the latest diet trend, no foods at all are allowed for long stretches of time. A diet that forbids eating for hours on end might seem doomed in a culture where food is constantly available, but apps and Facebook groups are popping up for people practicing "intermittent fasting." Bri Wyatt, a 32-year-old Tennessee resident, tried it this summer. “At first I was like, there’s no way,” she said. (1/1)

On a humid morning this past summer, three college-age boys walked to their local river to make mud together for an eco-friendly art project. Mixing dirt and water using sticks, and pushing a paint roller back and forth in the slimy liquid, they practiced a skill they want to improve: movement. By filling in stencils, the boys transformed their motions into communication, even though they weren't speaking. (Thornton, 1/2)

Kaiser Health News: Extending ‘Healthspan’: Brain Scientists Tap Into The Secrets Of Living Well Longer

Retired state employees Vickey Benford, 63, and Joan Caldwell, 61, are Golden Rollers, a group of the over-50 set that gets out on assorted bikes — including trikes for adults they call “three wheels of awesome” — for an hour of trail riding and camaraderie. “I love to exercise, and I like to stay fit,” said Caldwell, who tried out a recumbent bike, a low-impact option that can be easier on the back. “It keeps me young.” (Jayson, 1/2)

We've long been taught that helping others helps ourselves. As Charles Dickens wrote, "No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of another." And science has shown that altruistic behaviors -- defined as putting the well-being of others before our own without expecting anything in return -- actually do improve our health. (LaMotte, 12/30)