Dean Burke addressed the U.S. Congress last Monday during the ASPPH Opioid Briefing. As one of five public health deans invited by the Association of Schools and Programs of Public Health, Burke presented expert testimony about the drastic need for more research data to confront the abuse epidemic.
While at AcademyHealth’s Annual Research Meeting, HPM’s MARIAN JARLENSKI was interviewed regarding her maternal and child research on Medicaid’s funding of medically-necessary abortion and the resulting 15 percent risk reduction in severe maternal morbidity. While in New Orleans, Jarlenski also made sure to get in an early-morning exercise run through the Big Easy's iconic French quarter.
U.S. CONGRESS - On June 20, 2017, emeritus dean and professor BERNARD GOLDSTEIN called on lawmakers to support a research agenda to mitigate global climate change during special D.C. hearing. As an expert environmental toxicologist, he emphasized the need to address conservatives’ reasons for not trusting climate science in order to get bipartisan support for research. He concluded that fighting over the issue is potentially disastrous to societ...
On Monday, June 19, 2017, Dean Burke joined four other public health deans from Appalachian universities to speak at a U.S. congressional hearing on the national opioid epidemic. Addressing the standing-room-only crowd, he spoke about the epidemiology of the crisis and the need for better info on costs. “Billions [of dollars] are needed, and we don't have a good handle on the magnitude of the epidemic. We need data.”
ESPN - There was something about showing a movie of your hometown that people relate to,” said DON BURKE, dean of Pitt's Graduate School of Public Health. It was his idea to break the data modeling down by county.The FRED platform allowed researchers to build a simulation of human interaction dynamics, said MARK ROBERTS (Public Health Dynamics Lab director and HPM chair) wherein virtual people in 116 million households across the country live, wo...
A round-table was held today with some amazing minds on the issue of polio eradication: Jennifer Jones, director of Rotary International; PETER SALK, IDM visiting professor and son of research pioneer Jonas Salk; and DONALD BURKE, school dean and University associate vice chancellor of global health. Rotary has been raising awareness that "We are this close to ending polio!" While all were in Pittsburgh, they shared amazing conversation about the...
Amber Chaudry, an MPH student in Pitt's Department of Behavioral and Community Health Sciences, shares some of her passion for a career in public health and how helping those around her is integral to her own vision of success.
Rosa De Ferrari, an MPH student in Pitt's Department of Behavioral and Community Health Sciences, describes her "viviencias" (life experiences) in Ecuador and Nicaragua. She soon realized that immigrants in this country long for the kinds of social support inherent to their native communities. As she continues her journey at Pitt Public Health, she most appreciates the ready accessibility of faculty and the variety of research areas she can choo...
DIETRICH STEPHAN and SUSANNE GOLLIN of our Department of Human Genetics are featured in a video about their work to connect genetic technologies to address development and growth of breast cancer tumors. Hear about their personal motivations and their strategies for attacking cancer today and into the future.
NPR - For most of human history, we had a lot of bad ideas about how we were getting sick and how to prevent it. Things started changing only about 200 years ago when an English doctor invented vaccination, our first safe and effective way to fight disease. So what did that do for us? Consider that in 1900, the average person lived only about 30 years. Today, most of us live to seventy. Have we closed the book on infectious disease? If only!
NPR - Ten thousand years ago, at the dawn of the agricultural revolution, many of our deadly human diseases didn't exist. What changed? For the first time in history, humans were living in close contact with domesticated animals - milking them, taking care of them, living with them and eating them. All that touching and sharing gave animal germs plenty of chances to get inside of us.
NPR - Humans get along pretty well with most microbes. Which is lucky, because there are a lot more of them in the world than there are of us. This is a series is about where germs come from. In this first of three episodes, we see what our early encounters with germs may have been like, and how germs initially got an upper hand.
A senior telephonic health coach for UPMC Health Plan, ELANA R. BARKOWITZ (BCHS ’11) also works part-time as an interviewer for the Pittsburgh Girls Study. She previously moonlighted as a paraprofessional counselor at Planned Parenthood of Western PA. Barkowitz is certified in public health (CPH) and credentialed as a Certified Health Education Specialist. She is happy to be growing her career in her hometown.
As community engagement coordinator for Pitt's Clinical and Translational Science Institute, JENNIFER JONES (BCHS ’11) bridges community and academia to build capacity and solidify partnerships. After working at public health non-profit in Washington, D.C., she realized she wanted to earn her own Master of Public Health--Pitt was her number-one choice! While an MPH student, Jones completed the community-based participatory research and practice c...
MELISSA KNORR (BCHS ’16) is the operations manager at The Open Door, Inc., where she first interned in 2014. During her time at Pitt, Melissa was an Evans Fellow, pursuing the joint MPH/masters in social work. She also served as an administrative intern for Bridging the Gaps and a board member of the Global Health Student Association. Previously, Knorr served in the Peace Corps in Zambia, Belize, and Costa Rica in the health, education, and youth...
Even before completing her MPH and global health studies, TAYLORDAPHNE MORSILLO (BCHS ’16) began working on the Plan for a Healthier Allegheny at the Allegheny County Health Department where she also supports the epidemiologist and manager of special projects. Previously, she served as a U.S. Peace Corps volunteer in Mozambique where her assignment focused on community and local hospital health presentations and direct work with an I-NGO, a provi...
Vice president for education, KATHARINE HOROWITZ (BCHS ’12) has been with Planned Parenthood of Western PA for nearly five years. She is a born-and-bred Pittsburgher, driven to improve sexual and reproductive health outcomes for everyone in the dynamic communities that make up our city. Horowitz has worked in youth development for eight years, having started her career leading summer trail crews with the Student Conservation Association. While pu...
MARA LEFF (BCHS ’15) is a program associate for the Jewish Healthcare Foundation working on planning and implementation across projects, including support for the foundation’s Aging Agenda. Previously, she worked on an NIH-funded childhood obesity prevention campaign at Ogilvy Public Relations, a global marketing and communications firm in Washington, D.C. While an MPH student, she conducted practicum research in India, informing her thesis, “Th...
YOU TUBE - In a short documentary for the Integrated Design Lab, RICHARD GARLAND, director of the BCHS Center for Health Equity's Violence Prevention Project, shares his thoughts on community violence.
WTAE ACTION NEWS -- It is a heartbreaking statistic. Every 25 minutes in the United States, a baby is born suffering from opioid withdrawal. Gov. Tom Wolf joined in the fight Friday by leading a roundtable discussion on how to combat the opioid abuse epidemic. "It should be treated as the public health issue that it is," said volunteer Faith Cotter. "Addiction affects the whole family, and I think we should withhold judgement."
Change the st...