Publications A review of media effects: implications for media coverage of air pollution and cancer Air pollution is responsible for 7 million global deaths annually, including from non-communicable diseases such as cancer. Given the media’s vital role in social and policy change, this article reviewed the existing literature on how the media portrays air pollution and the implications this coverage has on (1) perceived links between air pollution and cancer and (2) global action for cleaner air.
Publications Improving coverage of civil registration and vital statistics, Bangladesh In 2016, the government of Bangladesh introduced a pilot project to create an effective system for registering deaths and determining their causes. Training community-based health workers, physicians, and coders were successful approaches to improve death registration completeness and availability of cause-of-death data.
Publications Legal and policy changes urgently needed to increase access to opioid agonist therapy in the United States The U.S. faces a public health crisis of opioid-related harm, the effects of which could be dramatically reduced through increased access to opioid agonist therapy with the medications methadone and buprenorphine. This commentary outlines immediate, concrete steps that federal, state, and local governments can take to change law from barrier to facilitator of evidence-based treatment for opioid use disorder.
Publications Urban Health More than half the world's population now lives in cities. That is expected to grow to two-thirds by 2030. As global populations rapidly consolidate around urban centers, the scientific understanding of what this means for human health faces a new and greater urgency.
Publications A systematic review of vital events tracking by community health agents Creating a programmatic norm of integrating into national civil registration and vital statistics systems the vital events information collected from existing community health programs has the potential to provide governments with information essential for public health decision-making.
Publications National health information systems for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals Achieving the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals will require data-driven public health action. Given the need to develop these systems, this study summarized their current status in low-income and middle-income countries.
Publications Raw and real: an innovative communication approach to smokeless tobacco control messaging in low and middle-income countries
Publications Integrating community-based verbal autopsy into civil registration and vital statistics (CRVS): system-level considerations Reliable and representative cause of death (COD) statistics are essential to inform public health policy, respond to emerging health needs, and document progress towards Sustainable Development Goals. However, less than one-third of deaths worldwide are assigned a cause.
Publications Smoking prevalence and attributable disease burden in 195 countries and territories, 1990–2015: a systematic analysis from the Global Burden of Disease Study 2015 The scale-up of tobacco control, especially after the adoption of the Framework Convention for Tobacco Control, is a major public health success story. Nonetheless, smoking remains a leading risk for early death and disability worldwide, and therefore continues to require sustained political commitment.