4/22
Public Health
Study links air pollution, heat, carbon dioxide, and noise to reduced sleep
Researchers from Penn Medicine find a drop in sleep efficiency from high exposures to these environmental factors.
Running and walking for oral cancer awareness
In a student-led effort, the School of Dental Medicine hosted the Oral Cancer Walk & 5K. The event has been an annual tradition since 2009, offering both a community celebration and a venue for discussing oral cancer prevention and detection.
A community social worker balancing gun violence prevention and trauma recovery
Denise Johnson has two roles in Penn’s gun violence prevention efforts as program manager for the Penn Presbyterian Medical Center-based Penn Trauma Violence Recovery Program and the Penn Community Violence Prevention team.
The care they need, where they are
A team of undergrads and physicians are partnering with community clinics and other organizations as part of a Projects for Progress-supported program to offer medical care to people experiencing homelessness and other vulnerable populations.
To protect children online, researchers call for cross-disciplinary collaboration
A team of neuroscientists and legal experts, including Gideon Nave of the Wharton School, published a perspective in Science drawing attention to the need to develop science-backed policies that take into account children’s vulnerabilities in the digital world.
From outbreaks to breakthroughs: Tackling infectious and zoonotic diseases
Penn Vet’s Institute for Infectious and Zoonotic Diseases inaugural academic symposium welcomes keynote speaker Katherine J. Wu of The Atlantic.
In a warming world, chief heat officers help adapt, prepare, and protect
In advance of Perry World House’s Global Shifts Colloquium on extreme heat in urban areas, Penn Today spoke with chief heat officers about their role in influencing public awareness, preparedness, and policy.
States with high COVID-19 death rates also saw high mortality from other causes
Research from Penn, Boston University, and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation shows that between March 2020 and February 2021 non-COVID deaths accounted for some 20% of excess mortality.
What can network theory offer public health?
Penn Engineering’s Shirin Saeedi Bidokhti and Saswati Sarkar have produced a suite of studies that apply techniques from network and information theory to pandemic control and prevention.
Bringing Ukraine to Penn
On the one-year anniversary of the Russian invasion of the Ukraine, displaced and visiting scholars and students from Ukraine share their experience at Penn.
In the News
UPenn hosts free online panel for LGBTQ+ workplace inclusion
The Eidos LGBTQ+ Health Initiative, led by José Bauermeister and Jessica Halem of the School of Nursing, will host a free online panel in April on the integration of LGBTQ+ people in the workforce.
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Mayor Parker’s plan to ‘remove the presence of drug users’ from Kensington raises new questions
Shoshana Aronowitz of the School of Nursing and Ashish Thakrar of the Perelman School of Medicine comment on the lack of specificity in Philadelphia’s plan to remove drug users from Kensington and on the current state of drug treatment in the city.
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Posts mislead about COVID-19 vaccine safety with out-of-context clip of FDA official
Jeffrey S. Morris of the Perelman School of Medicine says that many adverse medical events, even those clearly unrelated to vaccines, have been reported an order of magnitude more for COVID vaccines during the pandemic than any time before.
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Philadelphians hope a cleaner city will reduce gun violence. Will Oh or Parker make it a reality?
A $3 million blight reduction project in Philadelphia is informed by Penn research showing that cleaning up trash and revitalizing vacant lots can reduce gun violence rates by as much as 29%.
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Universal basic income is working—even in red states
Researchers at Penn concluded that a basic income program in Stockton, California, could have profound positive impacts on local public health.
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NJ’s Camden County deploying virtual reality to teach students about naloxone
Penn partnered with New Jersey’s Camden County to create a virtual reality training video for administering the opioid-reversing drug Narcan.
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