Seniors
Does diet soda cause cancer? It’s complicated.
Recently, I heard about someone with cancer of the pancreas. When he asked his doctor about the possible cause of his malignancy, his doctor told him,…
Obituaries
Doris Sperber, who became bat mitzvah at 100, dies at 111
San Francisco resident Doris Sperber, at age 111 likely the oldest person in the city if not the state, died on May 9, leaving behind a legacy of kindness…
Seniors
From Bronx to Palo Alto, these nonagenarians walked parallel paths in life
Bernard Marcus and Marty Katz grew up one block away from each other in the South Bronx and attended the same high school. But it was 80 years before they…
Health
There’s a science to empathy, and an art to explaining it
In the middle of an explanation about a band of nerve fibers in our brains, Josh Kornbluth has a question. He grabs his phone. “Siri, do animals have a…
Bay Area
Reutlinger families seek assurances about home’s Jewish character
After the Reutlinger Community announced in March that it planned to affiliate with a nondenominational senior care nonprofit, some family members of…
Seniors
Developing tech to help seniors as Campus for Jewish Living evolves
Imagine a car — not a real car, but something like it — with a front seat, a dashboard, a steering wheel and a computer screen where the windshield would…
Community
80 years later, Palo Alto woman’s story of rescue by Kindertransport
Like most grandmothers, Helga Newman will begin to offer you things when you enter her apartment. First it will be tea (she spent several formative years…
Bay Area
How many local Jews struggle with poverty?
Many stereotypes have a nugget of truth in them, including the notion that Jews have money. A 2016 national Pew study showed that among 25 American…
Art
Nuclear scientist-turned-artist explores Holocaust
Larry Lagin describes working on nuclear fusion like “trying to create a star on Earth.” But when the scientist and engineer left his job in 2014, he knew…