Health Equity

Seattle city officials are vowing to increase access to COVID-19 vaccines among people of color, immigrants and other groups disproportionately left out of vaccination efforts.

For many farmworkers across Washington state, the risks of working on the front lines during the pandemic have been compounded by an “infodemic.”

Read the full report here

In a year like no other, DEOHS faculty, students and staff quickly pivoted to tackle new threats posed by the pandemic. We contributed to Washington state's COVID-19 response, showed the effectiveness of self-sampling for the virus and assessed impacts on essential workers—not to mention our furry friends.

About 30% of households in Washington state experienced food insecurity last summer, according to a survey by researchers at the University of Washington and their partners at Washington State University and Tacoma Community College.

Elizabeth Torres with El Proyecto Bienestar. Even before COVID-19 showed up on Pacific Northwest farms last spring, some farmers and farmworker advocates were rushing to get ready for it.

As smoke from wildfires on the West Coast makes its way across the US, it’s becoming clear that our future will involve coexistence with fire.

Oceans affect every human life — no matter how far away from a coastline a community may be. Oceans supply fresh water and oxygen, regulate the climate, influence the weather and affect human health. People rely on these large bodies of water for food, income, transportation and recreation. In turn, human activities can impact oceans and the systems they support.

Editor's note: Natalie Peterson is a UW senior completing her BS in Environmental Health. Her JRCOSTEP internship was recently featured by the Indian Health Service on its website.  

The University of Washington Population Health Initiative has awarded COVID-19 population health equity research grants to three projects involving partnerships between UW Department of Environmental & Occupational Health Sciences (DEOHS) and community leaders.

Editor's note: In January 2022, Anna Humphreys and colleagues, including DEOHS Assistant Professor Nicole Errett, published a paper in BMC Public Health on the impacts of rural wildfire smoke on mental health and well-being, and opportunities for adaptation.

 

  Frederick Law Olmsted, who designed New York’s Central Park, once called trees the lungs of the city. Trees and shrubs filter a variety of air pollutants, including nitrogen dioxide, ozone and particulate matter. But could they also benefit communities near airports by absorbing harmful ultrafine particles from aircraft exhaust?

Early in his career, Noah Seixas spent six months working on the assembly line of a rifle manufacturer in Massachusetts “to see what life was like on the line in a dirty, crappy factory.”

Given the extraordinary challenges of this year’s pandemic, the students of the UW Department of Environmental & Occupational Health Sciences (DEOHS) needed a superhero.Watch a student video honoring Nicole Errett

This spring, the first group of undergraduates to complete the UW Nutritional Sciences Program’s Food Systems, Nutrition and Health major are taking the knowledge they’ve acquired and applying it to help their communities.

Magali Blanco and Gabino Abarca from the University of Washington School of Public Health were selected to take part in the inaugural Latino Center for Health Student Scholars Fellowship program.

 

Sumaya Aden BS, Environmental Health Hometown Federal Way, WA Future plans Going to medical school after graduation in 2021 “I like seeing how things happen and why and the data behind it.” - Sumaya Aden

Each spring, seasonal farmworkers arrive in the Pacific Northwest for the planting season. This year, they’ve been met with a public health emergency.

Women who experience high employment precarity prior to or during pregnancy have a 48% higher risk of delivering low-birth-weight infants than women with low employment precarity, according to a study from researchers at the University of Washington School of Public Health.

Ola i ka Wai. Water is life. Tyler Gerken MS, Environmental Health Hometown: Kea’au, Hawai’i Island, HI Future plans: A career in the US Public Health Service, perhaps as an environmental health officer for the National Park Service or the Indian Health Service

Read the news release about Baker's study

Ensuring that all people have access to healthy food is a challenge in the best of times, but it has become even more daunting during the current pandemic.

Water is essential for life, but in communities with inadequate sanitation, it can also spread diseases like polio, typhoid and hepatitis A. By monitoring wastewater and water sources contaminated by wastewater for pathogens in fecal matter, researchers and public health workers can help stop waterborne illnesses in their tracks.

How did Esther Min, a graduate student in the UW Department of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences (DEOHS), end up at a six-hour-long dinner in Kyrgyzstan?

Rural children with asthma whose homes have an indoor air cleaner are 72% less likely to have an unplanned clinic or hospital visit than children in homes with no air cleaners, according to a study from the University of Washington and partners in the Yakima Valley.

Read more about the School of Public Health’s role with the Population Health Initiative in the new UW Public Health magazine.