Environmental and Occupational Health has traditionally offered the Keleti Award at Dean’s Day to recognize the presentation that demonstrated excellence in environmental health. This year’s Keleti winner is RAHEL BIRRU (PhD '18).
This year’s Delta Omega prize was awarded to AMRITA SAHU (EOH ’19), and the Herbert Rosenkranz Prize was given to EMMETT HENDERSON (BCHS ’21).
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR - A proposal by the EPA administrator that aims to limit the scientific research that the agency can use to set rules illustrates a widening rift between republicans and the scientific community. If finalized, the action would limit studies only to those whose data is publicly available. In environmental health research perfect, randomized, double-blind clinical studies aren’t possible, says EOH's BERNARD GOLDSTEIN.
On April 28, 2018, Pitt Public Health celebrated recent graduates with awards given upon the culmination of a degree program. Delta Omega's honor society inductees were announced and outstanding thesis/essay and dissertation awards were conferred. Outstanding Student Awards were also given at both the master's and doctoral level, as well as Dean's Service Awards.
Congratulations to EOH's AARON BARCHOWSKY who received the award for the passion and interest with which he teaches, for always encouraging his students, and his constant work to improve as an instructor. As one nominator put it, "He respects students and he is the best professor I've known."
SALLY E. WENZEL will take over as chair of the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health starting May 1, 2018. As chair, Wenzel will extend her work on airway disease to build a research program that spans clinical, bench, and environmental exposure science, amplifying the exceptional strengths already present in the department.
“It’s not about doing the cool work. It’s about doing the work that is necessary for that community,” says RUTH MODZELEWSKI (HUGEN '96) in a discussion featuring faculty and alumni about their impact on local communities, including collaboration between the private and public sector, the value of community based participatory research, empowering communities with early access to data, and acknowledging the “invisible” Latino community in Pittsbu...
THE WASHINGTON POST - Observers of both the Reagan administration and the current one say there are several reasons to think Pruitt may not share Gorsuch’s fate. Reagan appears to have made a calculation that he needed to tack to the political center on the environment later in his first term, and so replaced Gorsuch. But Trump seems more inclined to double down on deregulation, said EOH's BERNARD GOLDSTEIN.
THE HILL - The European Union's unclear definitions of the Precautionary Principles allows them to ban trade of goods such as beef previously treated with growth hormones and GMO grains without demonstration that such goods cause any health risks. EOH's BERNARD GOLDSTEIN says, "The US is not without unfair trade practices. But, in contrast to the EU, we do not rely on distorting public health science as a means to wrap greed in a green flag."
EPI's JENNIFER ADIBI was a featured speaker for the 2018 One Health One Community Symposium at Phipps Conservatory. The event centered on the theme "Health Impacts: Chemicals of Concern in the Environment," with a special focus on endocrine disruptors.