Latest Work
Black Patients Less Likely to Receive Targeted Radiation
Study finds racial disparities in the use of proton beam therapy, a focused cancer treatment that can reduce side effects.
Need Transplant, Will Travel
An innovative surgery pioneered at the University of Minnesota gave Julie Meek a new chance at life—and now she’s giving back.
CDC Internship, Fellowship Program Enlightens Mentors and Mentees Alike
The first cohort of interns, fellows, and mentors in the Entomological Society of America/CDC’s Public Health Entomology for All program are learning from each other and looking at public health entomology in a new light.
How a CDC Internship Set One Student’s Sights on Entomology
Through the Entomological Society of America/CDC’s Public Health Entomology for All program, Tess Brown gained hands-on experience working with mosquitoes and learning about vector-borne disease research at the CDC Division of Vector-Borne Diseases in Fort Collins, Colorado. The senior at Southern University and A&M College now plans to pursue insect science in grad school.
Upcoming articles:
After following 6,000 participants over 20 years, the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA) has contributed key findings to understanding the characteristics of subclinical cardiovascular disease (disease detected non-invasively before it has produced clinical signs and symptoms) and the risk factors that predict its progression.
It’s getting harder to craft public health policies without polarizing political interference and the influence of anti-science attitudes and beliefs. What are some answers to that quandary?
Should foresters rule out urban soils for planting native trees? New research says no, finding that 80% of the native seedlings planted in a New York City urban soil blend survived.
Researchers at the USDA Northern Research Station have found that a native fungus, verticillium, can help managers curtail the sprawl of invasive Ailanthus (Tree of Heaven).
Recent Reads
Books
The Overstory
by Richard Powers
3/5 Hamelas
This book won the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction, so please take my review of it with a huge grain (boulder?) of salt. That said, I was bored. I think in a former life—steeped in the pursuit of an English degree—a quirky professor might have assigned this book. And I’m sure our class would have had lively, thought-provoking discussions as we sailed through its many pages, which likely would have helped me love it more. But reading this on my own nearly a decade after receiving said English degree was a different experience altogether.
Getting through this book took time, patience, and perseverance for me, which is not how I like to read recreationally as a busy, burnt-out adult who is desperate to recharge and escape. Powers is undeniably brilliant, though. He structures a winding, complex plot masterfully. And while I was perpetually impressed with both his story architecture and prose, I spent most of this book waiting for it all to connect. And when it finally did, I felt the tied-up loose ends weren’t satisfying enough to make up for all the time I spent waiting for the story to wrap up.
I LOVED Bewilderment. I cannot recall being so emotionally moved by a book, maybe ever. It’s also a fraction of the length…
My favorite line in The Overstory, however, was: “This is what people do—solve their own problems in others’ lives.” So, my problem is needing a faster-paced story with more immediate rewards. And I won’t try to solve that in your life. Read anything by Powers and decide for yourself! He’s worth it.
Currently reading
We Do This ’Til We Free Us by Mariame Kaba
The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R Tolkien
What are you reading?
Tell me what you read recently and what you felt about it and I’ll feature it in my next issue. Email me at carolynbernhardt11@gmail.com.
Exclusive Ham Content
Spot the Ham-shaped throw pillow:
Tip Jar: The People’s Housing Project
This month’s tip jar funds are going to The People’s Housing Project, a local grassroots organization that builds emergency shelters for and with members of the houseless community—a group so severely underserved by the city of Portland that often, it feels more like they are actively targeted rather than just ignored. If you read something you liked, please throw some money PHP’s way:
PHP combines efforts to build shelters with implementing support services like toilets, needle disposal bins, and trash pickup. And most importantly, they empower members of the unhoused community to help lead their organization and make key decisions. Their grassroots framework and the work I have seen them do is why I throw my full support behind PHP. Since moving to Portland, I have seen how cold, sterile, and antagonistic housed folks are toward the unhoused. PHP is a bright spot in that sea of darkness.
As their website says, “By avoiding corporate money, we can always put our principles ahead of any donor’s profits. By avoiding government money, we can move faster than any American bureaucracy. By being funded exclusively by our members and individual donors, we remain accountable only to you and the houseless folks we’re in coalition with.”