As soon as Boran Bumovich Hignio’s bare feet touch the sand on the beach, he spreads his arms like a helicopter and happily says, “Let's go surfing!” The 7-year-old, wearing a black wetsuit, is followed by a dozen other kids who skip their way into the blue waves of the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Peru's capital, Lima.

Boran gets help with his wetsuit from Diego Villarán, who founded the local surf school. This Peruvian surf school is part of a wave of community-based projects around the world that use a perhaps surprising method to help kids: surf therapy (疗法).

The idea is not only about catching waves to make use of the proven mental health benefits of physical exercise. The wider goal is to create a space for young children to express themselves freely, to help teach them how to process their emotions and to create positive social connections.

Lima's surf therapy project is run by Alto Peru, a local nonprofit named after the neighborhood in the south of the city where Villardn-its 41-year-old founder-and all of the trainee surfers come from. Many of the children in the Alto Peru program face challenging situations. Some parents are addicted to alcohol. One of the boys has even turned up for lessons with a black eye a couple of times.

Half of all mental health disorders begin before the age of 14 and up to a fifth of teenagers globally experience mental health conditions, according to the World Mental Health Survey Initiative, which conducted face-to-face interviews in 17 countries across Africa, Asia, the Americas and Europe.

Surf therapy, which covers projects from Sierra Leone to California and Trinidad, is seen by advocates as a convincing solution to helping address mental health issues among young people. “It has changed my life,” says Omarion Butler, 19, who began surfing with Alto Peru two years ago. “When my parents put me down in the past, it was hard for me to express my feelings. But surfing makes me more confident. It helps me to take time for myself.”

Statements (He/She wants to persuade people that...)

We all want to live longer and healthier lives, but taking pills to rescue us from our self-abusive lifestyle only masks real problems and ends up costing us billions of dollars a year. We ought to be investing at least as much in trying to discover why millions of us behave in ways that are not in our best interest — smoking, drinking, overworking, under-exercising and generally doing things that are bad for our health.

The cost of poor health is shocking and goes well beyond dollars. But the approach that offers the best solution, reduces risk, cuts demand and gets people healthy and fit is prevention. The U.S. is a nation of chronic diseases. It will get much worse, because we never deal with the causes. Individual Americans need to bring this issue to a boil and keep it there until we get a health-care system based on prevention.

While I applaud the research being done in the field of medicine, I am also aware that good things can go bad in an instant. I have heart disease, and I had a negative reaction to a new treatment: the result was a long hospital stay. We should remember that caution has to be applied when being treated with a new medicine. Nothing will replace the human element that must be present in a caring medical community.

Paris Baker is a 30-year-old mother who has two daughters, Kallie, nine, and Harper, five.

One day, the three were playing at home. Harper was playing mom, feeding her mother, then her teddy bear and finally herself. Suddenly, Paris started choking on a piece of cookie. Soon, the cookie was at the back of her throat. The two girls started hitting her back at once. After about a minute of hitting her back, Kallie went to call an ambulance as she started to worry. As she did this the other girl carried on doing what she had been doing and thankfully the cookie finally came up.

Paris was diagnosed (诊断) with motor neurone disease (MND) in 2017, and was told she had five years to live. The condition will gradually paralyse (使……瘫痪) her, leaving her trapped inside her body.

Due to her condition, she’s more likely to fall and has received serious injuries. She felt it was very important to teach her girls what to do in a dangerous situation she might be in. This included applying pressure to a bleeding wound, what to do if someone is choking and how to call emergency services.

The girls know that if their dad isn’t home and an emergency happens there are three steps. Step one is to ring 999, ask for an ambulance and give their address. Step two is to put their dogs in the garden, and step three is to open the front door for the emergency services.

After the accident, Paris was so grateful that she had taught her daughters what to do in such a situation. But accidents like that can happen to anyone. So if your kid hasn’t learned first aid skills yet, it’s time to do that now.