USA Climbing has announced that the USA Climbing National Team Trials and Paraclimbing National Championships will be combined into one National Team-qualifying event for the Elite and Paraclimbing series for the 2024 season- and they’ll both be held in Gaithersburg, Maryland.

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The Golden Bachelorette has yet to be announced by ABC, but a lot of fans have speculated that it would make a lot of sense after the success of ABC’s Golden Bachelor series. Rockville, MD’s very own Joan Vassos stole bachelor Gerry’s heart during her short time on the show that ended when she made the decision to return home and be with her daughter, who was having a tough time following a difficult pregnancy.

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The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, headquartered in White Oak, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), released data from the 2023 National Youth Tobacco Survey (NYTS) on tobacco product use among U.S. youth. The findings, which were collected between March and June 2023, show that 10% of U.S. middle and high school students (2.8 million youth) reported current use of any tobacco product. Among U.S. high school students, current overall tobacco product use declined during 2022-2023 (16.5% to 12.6%). This decline was primarily attributable to reduced e-cigarette use (14.1% to 10%), which translates to 580,000 fewer high school students who reported current use of e-cigarettes in 2023. Among high school students, declines in current use were also observed during 2022-2023 for cigars and overall combustible tobacco smoking, representing all-time lows.

Per the FDA and CDC: “It’s encouraging to see this substantial decline in e-cigarette use among high schoolers within the past year, which is a win for public health,” said Brian King, Ph.D., M.P.H., director of the FDA’s Center for Tobacco Products. “But we can’t rest on our laurels. There’s more work to be done to build on this progress.” Although a decrease in e-cigarette use was observed among high school students, among middle school students there was an increase in current overall tobacco product use (4.5% to 6.6%) and multiple tobacco product use (1.5% to 2.5%). However, among middle school students overall, no significant change was observed during 2022-2023 for current use of any individual tobacco product type, including e-cigarettes.


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