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Paul Corby needs a new heart. On that there is no dispute. The same rare disease that killed his father at 27 is destroying his left ventricle. While there is no cure or surgery that might repair the damage, a heart transplant could extend his life considerably. But Corby, who lives in Pottsville, Pa., is autistic, suffers from several psychological conditions and takes 19 medications. When he applied to the transplant program at the University of Pennsylvania in 2011, he was rejected because of his “psychiatric issues, autism, the complexity of the process . . . and the unknown and unpredictable effect of steroids on behavior,” according to the denial letter sent to his mother. (Bernstein, 3/4)

Exposure to polluted environments is associated with more than one in four deaths among children younger than 5, according to two World Health Organization reports published Monday. Worldwide, 1.7 million children's deaths are attributable to environmental hazards, such as exposure to contaminated water, indoor and outdoor pollution, and other unsanitary conditions, the reports found. Weaker immune systems make children's health more vulnerable to harmful effects of polluted environments, the report says. (Naqvi, 3/5)

He loves dancing to songs, such as Michael Jackson’s "Beat It" and the "Macarena," but he can't listen to music in the usual way. He laughs whenever someone takes his picture with a camera flash, which is the only intensity of light he can perceive. He loves trying to balance himself, but his legs don't allow him to walk without support. He is one in a million, literally. (Naqvi, 3/5)

Scientists are only beginning to understand the millions of microbes that make up the human microbiome, said UC Davis microbiologist Jonathan Eisen, but researchers are finding that antibiotics, household disinfectants and other sanitizing products are also killing the “good bacteria” that help our bodies fend off disease. Many believe that the shortage of certain microbes explains recent spikes in childhood allergies and asthma. (Caiola, 3/4)

This spring and summer may be a doozy for Lyme disease, at least in parts of the Northeast. "We're anticipating 2017 to be a particularly risky year for Lyme," says Rick Ostfeld, a disease ecologist at the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, New York. Ostfeld has been studying the debilitating tick-borne disease for more than 20 years, and has developed an early warning system based on mice. (Doucleff, 3/6)

For those hoping to shed some wintertime weight gain, research suggests that going vegetarian — or even vegan — can help. When scientists looked at the body mass index of more than 37,000 Britons of all ages in 2003, they found that while the average male meat-eater had BMI of about 24.4, just shy of being overweight, the average vegan had BMI of 22.4. Among women, the patterns were similar. A 2009 study of Seventh-day Adventist church members across North America showed an even more striking difference in BMI: more than five points between those on an omnivorous diet (28.8) and those eating only plant-based foods (23.6). (Zaraska, 3/4)

Every day, in myriad ways, people tapping out their posts on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and other social media may be sending out more information that even they imagine. What if those posts, taken together, constituted a kind of trail not just to their psyches, but to their overall health? What if researchers could use this to find ways to improve health care? That’s the focus of research led by the newly created Penn Medicine Center for Digital Health.  Its goal is to study and understand the vast amounts of information on social media and how it relates to health. (Bauers, 3/4)