What we engineer and build impacts public health, safety, and welfare. However, transportation engineering prioritizes convenience for people driving over safety for people walking or biking. This makes streets more dangerous for everyone, including drivers. Now is our opportunity to change all that. Public comments are wanted on revisions to one of transportation engineering’s “bibles,” the 700-page Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices for Streets and Highways (MUTCD). The MUTCD, which was last rewritten 50 years ago from the point of view of expediting vehicle movement, is full of assumptions, restrictions, and contradictions that hinder efforts to improve safety and create vibrant, welcoming streets. Submit one of three Salud America! model comments to tell ...
Financial literacy can help us understand wealth and the economic opportunities available to us. Latinos face many barriers to economic opportunity, like systemic and historic discrimination, generations of inequity and wealth gaps, and a lack of access to resources on financial literacy. One business is stepping up to help teach younger Latinos about financial literacy. SUMA Wealth, a financial services company focused on Latinos, announced a multi-platform financial education initiative called SUMA Academy to empower Latino youth to break generations of wealth inequity. “Empowering young Latinos with financial knowledge is the key to reducing the wealth gap,” said Beatríz Acevedo, CEO and co-founder of SUMA Wealth, according to a press release. “They share their learning with ...
About 19 million Americans lack access to broadband services, according to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). Of those 19 million, the majority are in low-income and rural communities and communities of color. This “digital divide” is problematic, especially as students and families have needed to rely on the internet for online learning and telehealth during the COVID-19 pandemic. Thankfully, businesses and the federal government are stepping up to help these areas by expanding broadband access. In his $2.3 trillion infrastructure plan, President Joe Biden proposed expanding broadband services to low income, rural areas. Comcast also recently announced their decision to invest in low-income areas to close the digital divide. Together, initiatives like ...
Cancer affects different people differently. For Latinos, the cancer survivorship journey is shaped by cultural and spiritual beliefs. Latinos also face struggles with barriers to care, screening, clinical trial participation, and patient-doctor communication. This is the focus of a new Spanish-language Facebook Live event, “Supervivencia: Viviendo a través y más allá del cáncer," set for 6-7:30 p.m. CST Monday, May 19, 2021. The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society (LLS) South Texas Chapter is sponsoring the event. Salud America! at UT Health San Antonio will host the event on its Facebook page. Register here for the Facebook Live event. The event will feature: Dr. José Cruz, MD, is a hematology and oncology expert with the Methodist Healthcare's Adult Blood and Marrow ...
Many people know secondhand smoke is a danger to health. However, most people, including many health professionals, don't realize just how dangerous it is, especially inside multifamily housing like apartment buildings.
Why is Secondhand Smoke a Big Threat to Health?
According to the American Lung Association: Secondhand smoke causes approximately 7,330 deaths from lung cancer and 33,950 deaths from heart disease each year.
Between 1964 and 2014, 2.5 million people died from exposure to secondhand smoke, according to the 2014 report from the U.S. Surgeon General. The report also concluded that secondhand smoke is a definitive cause of stroke.
There is no risk-free level of exposure to secondhand smoke.
Secondhand smoke contains hundreds of chemicals known to be toxic or ...
The number of Latino or Hispanic-serving colleges and universities has risen 94% in the past 10 years, from 293 in 2010 to 569 in 2020, according to a new data report by Excelencia in Education. A “Hispanic-Serving Institution” (HSI) has 25% or more undergraduate full-time equivalent Latino enrollment. HSIs now constitute 18% of all colleges and universities. This is up from 17% in 2018. On top of that, Latino enrollment in higher education is expected to exceed 4.4 million students by 2025, far surpassing the growth rate of any other racial-ethnic group, according to the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities. "Educating Latino students is now a necessity. More has to be done to achieve the institutional transformation that intentionally serves Latinos, who are ...
With over 30 years of working in mental health and disparities research, Margarita Alegría is what you might call an expert in the field. Alegría is the Chief of the Disparities Research Unit at the Massachusetts General Hospital and a professor in Harvard Medical School’s departments of medicine and psychiatry. Last summer, she was named Harry G. Lehnert, Jr. and Lucille F. Cyr Lehnert Endowed MGH Research Institute Chair. Alegría has decades worth of experience in studying public health, mental health, substance abuse, and the social determinants of health. She’s conducted countless studies on how to improve the lives of ethnic and racial minority groups and people with disabilities. Now she wants to make her research more accessible to the general public. Alegría ...
One of the most dangerous forms of cancer is bladder cancer. This is especially true for Latinos, who experience lower rates of bladder cancer, but worse survival rates due to many factors, according to a new study led by UT Health San Antonio. “Latinos are vulnerable to poverty-related health conditions and may lack health insurance or financial means to pay for quality health care and use fewer preventive care services than other ethnic groups, which may be related to worse [bladder cancer] survival rates in Latinos,” according to Dr. Shenghui Wu of the Department of Population Health Sciences, who led the study along with Salud America! Director Dr. Amelie G. Ramirez and other researchers in the Department of Urology, the Mays Cancer Center, and the Institute for Health ...
Everyone should have a fair and just opportunity for the best possible health and well-being. That’s health equity. And that’s the mission of the Health Opportunity and Equity (HOPE) Initiative. The HOPE Initiative is led by the National Collaborative for Health Equity and Texas Health Institute in partnership with Virginia Commonwealth University’s Center on Society and Health. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation provides funding. The HOPE Initiative tracks data on 27 indicators related to social and economic factors, community & safety, physical environment, access to healthcare, and health outcomes. “Our unique analyses use an opportunity framework to set aspirational but achievable goals to improve life outcomes—especially populations of color most affected ...
