Health Sciences In The Media

Arizona has one of the highest COVID-19 death rates in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "Certainly we can look to Texas and Florida and go, gosh, how did we beat them?" said Joe Gerald, MD, PhD, associate professor at the Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health.

The Arizona Department of Health Services wants to know who has the desire and credentials to do human studies on whether marijuana can treat health conditions such as autism. Tally Largent-Milnes, PhD, assistant professor of pharmacology in the College of Medicine – Tucson, wants to someday learn if cannabis can treat migraines. “Until we are able to run these clinical trials in a well-thought out manner, we’re never going to know the answer,” she said.

The coronavirus vaccine made by Pfizer-BioNTech is much less effective in preventing infection in children ages 5 to 11 years than in older adolescents or adults, according to a large new set of data collected by health officials in New York. Deepta Bhattacharya, PhD, associate professor of medicine at the UArizona College of Medicine – Tucson, is quoted.

Harmful bacteria on a dirty yoga mat can put you at risk for a skin infection. Kelly Reynolds, MSPH, PhD, professor at the University of Arizona Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health, is quoted.

As states across the country are lifting COVID-19 precautions such as mask mandates and some churches have dropped online services, the immunocompromised are weighing their risk of possible exposure in worship services. And some are finding their fellow parishioners and church leaders aren't taking measures to protect them. Deepta Bhattacharya, PhD, associate professor of medicine at the UArizona College of Medicine – Tucson, is quoted.

Michael Grandner, PhD, director of the Sleep and Heath Research Program at the College of Medicine – Tucson, provides his top three ways to train your brain to fall asleep.

Elizabeth Jacobs, PhD, a professor of epidemiology at the Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health, is quoted. She joined 400 public health researchers, practitioners, physicians and educators in signing an open letter encouraging elected officials to reevaluate ending mask mandates for schools.

It has been two decades since the publication of Unequal Treatment, the first major report to point to longstanding systemic racism as the primary reason for the nation’s deeply entrenched health disparities. Jennie Joe, PhD, MPH, a professor emerita of family and community medicine at the College of Medicine – Tucson and interim director of the UArizona Wassaja Carlos Montezuma Center for Native American Health, is quoted.

Opinion piece by Geoffrey Boyce, PhD, academic director of the Earlham College Border Studies Program in Tucson and Sam Chambers, PhD, a researcher in the Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health.

University of Arizona Health Sciences researchers were awarded a $6.6 million National Institutes of Health grant to develop the Center of Excellence in Addiction Studies to improve addiction research and develop therapies that can stem the opioid epidemic and impact other substance abuse disorders.