The “Current Events in Public Health” assignments are designed to help integrate the concepts in each module and then relate them to public health current events. This week the topic is: The distribution, or the WHO of the problem.

You will read and summarize an article and provide a personal viewpoint. Then you will practice looking for epidemiologic information or how your problem is distributed. Your work should give us a “snapshot” of who the problem impacts. It should include race, age, gender and geographic location if there is one,

Key Takeaways:

*Epidemiology looks at the who, where and how many of health problems.

*It is the epidemiologists job to use numbers (biostatistics) and patters to best describe those at risk for certain health problems. Article 1Thousands of cancer diagnoses tied to a poor diet, study finds (if you read this, pick one type of cancer that interests you and do the distribution)

Article 2 Domestic violence incidents rose in the US during pandemic lockdowns, analysis findsLinks to an external site. . (if you choose this article, you will do the distribution of domestic violence)

Article 3: Is exercise or medication better for depression? Experts weigh inLinks to an external site.. (if you read this article, you will provide the distribution for depression or suicide)

You will keep this topic for 2 weeks, so pick one you find interesting. If you want to choose a different topic, find an article and inbox it to me and you can create your own assignment.

1. Choose one of the sources above to find an article that interests you.

2. Read it and write a 3-5 sentence summary.

3. Do some more research. Tell us WHO the problem impacts most and a little about them. Find one more article that supports your topic.

4. Include gender, age, race, and location as your demographics. We will do social factors next so do not include it here.

5.For the reflection paragraph add a personal viewpoint. A personal viewpoint is an opinion, not someone else’s words. Suggestions are “I wonder..” “I believe..” “This impacts me because..” type statements.

6. For the bibliography, cite the article you read and then you must have at least two sources. (the main article and one more that supports your claim)

I read an article on the use of telehealth in the treatment of opioid addiction. With so much technology, using telehealth has proven to be a novel and cost effective way to address opioid use. Patients that used telehealth had significantly better recovery rates (1).

The opioid epidemic is far reaching with 16 million users worldwide and 2.1 million in the US alone (2). Although problems are widespread, the peak age for treatment is 25-35 (2). Men, however, have an overdose death rate of 2.3x greater than women (3). Racially, whites have about 2x the death rate of Blacks and Hispanics combined (4). And although people assume drug use is an urban problem, West Virginia, Ohio, New Hampshire and Maryland have the highest fatal opioid death rate.

Opioid statistics challenge our expectations of “drug addicts” as inner city minorities. In the US, white males in eastern, less populated states are the ones that suffer the most with fatal opioid use. Using telehealth with this population is a focused way to find a population. Many white males have access to and are comfortable on computers and may be more comfortable getting help remotely rather than seeing a doctor. More research should be done to see if this method works well with other populations or efforts should be made to target patients for their needs.

1.Telehealth supports retention in treatment for opioid use disorder | National Institutes of Health (NIH) 10/18/23 Links to an external site.

2. Opioid Use Disorder – StatPearls – NCBI Bookshelf (nih.gov)Links to an external site.

3.Men died of overdose at 2-3 times greater a rate than women in the U.S. in 2020-2021 | National Institutes of Health (NIH)Links to an external site.