Opinion: Expedite ‘test-to-stay’ and stop quarantining healthy students
Since the school year began, more than 2,700 students in Portland Public Schools have had to quarantine for exposure to a confirmed or presumptive COVID-19 case, according to PPS’ COVID-19 dashboard.…
Opinion: State’s overcautious COVID stance hurts students and their education
On June 30, Gov. Kate Brown dropped most COVID-19 restrictions in Oregon because she recognized the importance for Oregonians of returning to normalcy. At least for adults.
Colleges Violate Their Promises to Vaccinated Students
Students who got the shots to help others are ordered to wear masks outside and stay out of restaurants
The Pandemic’s Toll on Teen Mental Health
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released a report last week warning that adolescent hospitalizations due to Covid-19 were on the rise. The media picked up the message and ran with…
As Omicron Hits, COVID-19 Case Counts Don’t Mean What They Used To
America has begun the gradual process of accepting that COVID-19 is going to be endemic—meaning it will always be present in the population to some degree—due to inherent properties of…
Unknowable Harms
As states, counties, and school districts across the country drop mask mandates, it’s becoming more acceptable to note the weakness of the evidence that cloth and surgical masks prevent Covid-19…
It’s Madness to Quarantine Schoolchildren
Portland, Ore. An Oregon high school ordered all 2,680 of its students to stay home for a week and a half in September—two days of complete shutdown, followed by a…
Why Hospitalizations Are Now a Better Indicator of Covid’s Impact
The world has a new Covid variant, Omicron, that’s expected to drive up cases if it becomes the dominant strain in the coming months. Much remains unknown, including how quickly…
The Case Against Masks At School
Districts should rethink imposing on millions of children an intervention that provides little discernible benefit.
The Reassuring Data on the Delta Variant
You read the same alarming headlines every few months, now with Greek letters. As the virus that causes Covid-19 evolves and mutates, the same concerns pop up about whether the…
Opinion: State’s school reopening guidance still keeps too many students at home
In her executive order mandating schools reopen for in-person instruction, Oregon Gov. Kate Brown directed the Oregon Health Authority and the Oregon Department of Education to revise the state’s safety guidance…
School Closures Aren’t Just For Covid Anymore
How to Fix Our Broken Relationship With COVID Math
Throughout the pandemic, Americans have grappled with, and largely failed to make sense of, COVID-19 statistics. One major reason for this failure is that the public has found itself at…
STAT | Real-world data, not predictions, should drive decisions on Covid-19 and school opening
The United States has exceeded 31 million Covid-19 infections (a messy data point) and is approaching 570,000 Covid-19 deaths (a more robust data point). Yet despite the abundance of data…
Contributions Made by Undergraduates to Research Projects: Using the CREDIT Taxonomy to Assess Undergraduate Research Experiences
The authors developed a novel tool, the CREDIT URE, to define and measure roles performed by undergraduate students working in research placements. Derived from an open-source taxonomy for determining authorship…
Society of Research Administrators International
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) considers increasing diversity of the U.S. biomedical workforce to be of such paramount importance that, in 2013, NIH leadership allocated 240 million dollars from…
Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment – Storm Brews in India over Coastal Regulations
Recent coastal disasters, and the presence of 2.3 billion people (forecast to grow to 3.2 billion by 2025) living within 100 km of the coast, have made “sustainable” coastal management…
EcoHealth – The Buffalo Jump Called Chugwater
O moment, Time’s diamond—I am all trifles and wretched cares outside your gate. I was always baffled by those words, written by the French Symbolist poet Paul Valery, who died…
Orion – Keep All the Parts
In fighting infectious diseases, conservation is the best medicine THE PALM CIVET, an Asia native that resembles a mix of housecat, mongoose, and opossum, would merit a spot on anyone’s…
Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment – Chinese Fireworks Spark Pollution Controversy
Recent coastal disasters, and the presence of 2.3 billion people (forecast to grow to 3.2 billion by 2025) living within 100 km of the coast, have made “sustainable” coastal management…
Open Spaces – The Future Gazers: Will Scientists Ever Be Able to Reliably Avert Infectious Disease Outbreaks?
The Mary Valley Cattle Station, a ramshackle collection of buildings and trailers on the Cape York Peninsula about 100 miles inland from the Queensland coast, is home to one of…
EcoHealth – All Hands on Deck: Transdisciplinary Approaches to Emerging Infectious Disease
Abstract: The increasing burden of emerging infectious diseases worldwide confronts us with numerous challenges, including the imperative to design research and responses that are commensurate to understanding the complex social…
Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment – Nigerian Communities Demand End to Gas Flaring
Environmental Rights Action (ERA)/Friends of the Earth Nigeria has released a report, co-drafted by the Climate Justice Program, calling for an end to gas flaring in Nigeria. Several communities across…
Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment – Deforestation and Disease
New research suggests that deforestation in Mexico probably helped a strain of Venezuelan equine encephalitis virus, VEE subtype IE, make its way into a new mosquito, Ochlerotatus taeniorhynchus. Culex (Melanoconion)…
Conservation in Practice – Informed Decisions: Conservation Corridors and the Spread of Disease
THE IDEA THAT HUMAN travel and migration play a crucial role in spreading infectious diseases has, finally and permanently, set up shop in our modern consciousness. Numerous books—The Coming Plague,…
FRONTIERS IN ECOLOGY AND THE ENVIRONMENT – Applying an ecosystem approach to brucellosis control: can an old conflict between wildlife and agriculture be successfully managed?
Brucellosis is a hotly debated topic in the western United States. For decades, this disease has pitted conservationists against ranchers, as well as against federal and state government agencies, particularly…
Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment – New Antifouling Solutions Sail into View
Biofouling – the buildup of organisms on surfaces immersed in water – has been a problem for thousands of years. Greeks and Romans covered boat hulls with metal sheathing, nails,…
Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment – Bats Suspected in Disease Outbreak
An outbreak of human encephalitis in February 2004 in Bangladesh has so far caused 17 deaths. The US Centers for Disease Control (Atlanta, GA) has confirmed that these and 22…