It can often feel like health-related news is relentlessly negative – and this at a time when, on average, we’ve never been healthier. Certainly, diabetes and mental illness tend to dominate the headlines (healthlines?) these days.

Yet for every gloomy report, there is usually an upside to be found. The numbers of teenagers using online services and apps to cope with their mental health issues has soared in recent years – one app for under-18s has been rolled out to more than half the NHS commissioning services in the UK.

Even in the grim world of chronic drug addiction, there are initiatives that can mitigate. Mattha Busby travelled to Denmark to find out why far fewer continental Europeans die from overdoses than Brits.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest A safer space in Copenhagen. Photograph: Ole Jensen/for the Guardian

Ukraine is one of Europe’s least healthy countries, with obesity and heart disease growing problems for a 50 million-strong population. Joe Wallen found an innovation to address this coming from a very unusual quarter.

Finally, just the very act of reading this article could improve your health – according to the latest research from Southampton Business School. A new study from Dr Denise Baden has found that constructive or solution-based stories instil positive emotions in readers, making them more likely to take action and less likely to succumb to anxiety.

Dr Baden told the Upside:

We found that after reading typical (negative) news stories, respondents reported increases in anxiety, sadness and pessimism, whereas news stories with a solution focus or that were more positively framed gave rise to more positive mental states. But the really important finding was that positive stories gave rise to significantly higher intentions to take action (ie be environmentally friendly, donate to charity, voice opinions) than negative stories.

Happy reading.

What we liked

The Republic of the Congo has officially created its fifth national park, providing protection for the area’s gorillas, elephants and other at-risk species. The Ogooué-Leketi National Park spans 3,500 km2 and comes after three logging concessions in the area were closed down.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest The Mexican tetra fish. Photograph: Getty Images

Scientists from the University of Oxford have found that genes that allow the Mexican tetra fish to repair its heart could be used in humans to remedy the damage caused by heart disease, the Irish Times reported.

What we heard

One of the major problems facing our civilisation is inequality, particularly the huge disparity in income. I would like to see articles that explore practical and creative ideas about how it may be possible to change the current status quo and bring about sustainable equality. A tall order!” James Ward, via email

I’ve just read Utopia for Realists by the Dutch historian Rutger Bregman. His research shows that governments can save money by giving to poor people – when their incomes are boosted, hospital costs decrease, crimes reduce and educational outcomes improve so that government costs decrease by more than the money given away.” Peter Dooley, via email

Where was the Upside?

In September, the Maiwand wrestling club in Kabul, Afghanistan, was forced to close following an Isis bomb attack that killed 30 and left coach Ghulam Abbas without a limb. Abbas stopped the suicide bomber from entering the building by barricading the door with his body. The same persistent defiance has led to his gym reopening two months later to train 100 students from the area, Memphis Barker reported.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Students train at the reopened Maiwand wrestling club, Kabul. Photograph: Andrew Quilty/for the Guardian

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