The large and fluid prison population is an often overlooked component of public health in the United States. A newly published commentary paper in the journal Criminal Justice Review, co-authored by MSW students Shaina Clerget, Kate Kelly, Nai Soto, and Nadi Wisseh, suggests that government authorities need better strategies for containing COVID-19 infections among the incarcerated, for the benefit of vulnerable inmates as well as the community at large.  With an average of 650,000 citizens returning home from prison each year in the United States, and thousands of correctio...

Efforts to contain the spread of COVID-19 have been built around minimizing gatherings of people in public places. A new study from Temple University puts real-life data from the early months of the pandemic behind the wisdom of that strategy. The study also suggests a reason why, early in the outbreak, Americans in urban and rural environments may have had different perceptions of the threat that the virus presented.  In an article published in Preventing Chronic Disease, co-authors Abby Rudolph, an infectious disease and social epidemiologist in the College of Public Health,...

While COVID-19 has challenged every organization and population, its effects have disproportionately affected more vulnerable groups, such as individuals with substance use disorder (SUD). More than 23 million Americans experience SUD, but even in the absence of a pandemic only around 10 percent receive treatment. They are more likely to be unstably housed, have chronic health conditions, and may not have easy access to bathrooms or other resources with running water to wash hands. They may have few financial resources to obtain masks and sanitizers.  The facilities that offer...