Last week, two opinion pieces highlighted solutions to the US’s shameful rates of maternal mortality, and the appalling racial disparities in risk of death during and after childbirth.
This year’s County Health Rankings elevate the intrinsic connections between health and opportunity, underscoring the considerable inequities that put certain communities at greater risk of poor health and disease.
Recent pieces address racism, stress, and mortality; an interview with CDC Director Tom Frieden on Zika; why mocking environmental justice in Cleveland is especially inappropriate; and more.
A study in CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report last week reported that the birth rate for US teens aged 15-19 declined by 41% nationwide from 2006 to 2014. But the persistence of disparities — by geography as well as by race and ethnicity — is still of concern.
It seems obvious that workers with paid sick leave are more likely to stay home and seek out medical care when they or a family member is ill. But it’s always good to confirm a hunch with some solid data.
Another day, another study that finds poverty is linked to adverse and often preventable health outcomes. This time, it’s vision loss.
Low income and poor health tend to go hand in hand — that’s not a particularly surprising or new statement. However, according to family medicine doctor Steven Woolf, we have yet to truly grasp the extent to which income shapes a person’s health and opportunity to live a long life. And if we don’t confront the widening income inequality gap, he says things will only get worse.
Next time someone asks you what exactly public health does, repeat this number: 4.3 million. That’s the number of women — mothers, sisters, wives, aunts, grandmothers, daughters and friends — who might have otherwise gone without timely breast and cervical cancer screenings if it weren’t for public health and its commitment to prevention.
Where you live may be hazardous to your health. This is the conclusion of several new reports including one by the Environmental Justice and Health Alliance for Chemical Reform that shows who lives in US communities most vulnerable to hazardous chemical exposures and the CDC’s latest examination of health disparities.
A few recent pieces worth a look