The Role of Functional Urban Areas in the Spread of COVID-19 Omicron (Northern Spain)
This study focuses on the space-time patterns of the COVID-19 Omicron wave at a regional scale, using municipal data. We analyze the Basque Country and Cantabria, two adjacent regions in the north of Spain, which between them numbered 491,816 confirmed cases in their 358 municipalities from 15th November 2021 to 31st March 2022. The study seeks to determine the role of functional urban areas (FUAs) in the spread of the Omicron variant of the virus, using ESRI Technology (ArcGIS Pro) and applying intelligence location methods such as 3D-bins and emerging hot spots. Those methods help identify trends and types of problem are...
Source: Journal of Urban Health - February 24, 2023 Category: Health Management Source Type: research
Violent Crime, Physical Inactivity, and Obesity: Examining Spatial Relationships by Racial/Ethnic Composition of Community Residents
AbstractViolence is a public health issue that disproportionately affects communities of color in urban centers. There is limited understanding of how violent crime is associated with adult physical inactivity and obesity prevalence given the racial/ethnic composition of community residents. This research aimed to address this gap by examining census tract-level data in Chicago, IL. Ecological data gathered from a variety of sources were analyzed in 2020. Violent crime rat e represented the number of police-reported incidents of homicide, aggravated assault, and armed robbery per 1,000 residents. Spatial error and ordina...
Source: Journal of Urban Health - February 16, 2023 Category: Health Management Source Type: research
The Relationship between Youth Police Stops and Depression among Fathers
AbstractResearch shows youth police contact —a stressor experienced by more than one-quarter of urban-born youth by age 15—has deleterious mental health consequences for both youth and their mothers. Less is known about how youth’s fathers respond to this police contact, despite differences in how men and women respond to stress and rel ate to their children. I use data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study to investigate the association between youth police stops and depression among youth’s fathers. Results show that fathers of youth stopped by the police, compared to fathers of youth not stopped by...
Source: Journal of Urban Health - February 15, 2023 Category: Health Management Source Type: research
Urban –Rural Disparity in Birth Cohort Effects on Breast Cancer Incidence
AbstractBreast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer among women worldwide. Studies have reported minimal birth cohort effects on the incidence rates of breast cancer in Western countries but have reported notable birth cohort effects in some Asian countries. The risks of breast cancer may also vary within a country. In the present study, we abstracted female invasive breast cancer data from the Taiwan Cancer Registry for the period 1997 –2016. We used the age–period–cohort model to compare birth cohort effects on breast cancer incidence rates between urban and rural regions in Taiwan. We identified a notable ...
Source: Journal of Urban Health - February 13, 2023 Category: Health Management Source Type: research
New York City ’s Stop, Question, and Frisk Policy and Psychiatric Emergencies among Black Americans
We examined whether police stops of Black Americans during SQF correspond positively with psychiatric emergency department (ED) visits among Black residents in NYC. We utilized as the exposure all police stops, stops including frisking, and stops including use of force among Black Americans in NYC between 2006 and 2015 from the New York City Police Department ’s New York City—Stop, Question, and Frisk database. We examined 938,356 outpatient psychiatric ED visits among Black Americans in NYC between 2006 and 2015 from the Statewide Emergency Department Database (SEDD). We applied Box-Jenkins time-series methods to cont...
Source: Journal of Urban Health - February 10, 2023 Category: Health Management Source Type: research
Extreme Heat and COVID-19 in New York City: An Evaluation of a Large Air Conditioner Distribution Program to Address Compounded Public Health Risks in Summer 2020
AbstractIn summer 2020, New York City (NYC) implemented a free air conditioner (AC) distribution program in response to the threats of extreme heat and COVID-19. The program distributed and installed ACs in the homes of nearly 73,000 older, low-income residents of public and private housing. To evaluate the program ’s impact, survey data were collected from October 2020 to February 2021 via mail and online from 1447 program participants and 902 non-participating low-income NYC adults without AC as a comparison group. Data were examined by calculating frequencies, proportions, and logistic regression models. Participants ...
Source: Journal of Urban Health - February 9, 2023 Category: Health Management Source Type: research
Exploring the Relationship between Debt and Health after Incarceration: a Survey Study
Abstract
Financial debt and incarceration are both independently associated with poor health, but there is limited research on the association between debt and health for those leaving incarceration. This exploratory study surveyed 75 people with a chronic health condition and recent incarceration to examine debt burden, financial well-being, and possible associations with self-reported health. Eighty-four percent of participants owed at least one debt, with non-legal debt being more common than legal debt. High financial stress was associated with poor self-reported health and the number of debts owed. Owing specific f...
Source: Journal of Urban Health - February 1, 2023 Category: Health Management Source Type: research
The Effects of Time Window-Averaged Mobility on Effective Reproduction Number of COVID-19 Viral Variants in Urban Cities
AbstractDuring epidemics, the estimation of the effective reproduction number (ERN) associated with infectious disease is a challenging topic for policy development and medical resource management. The emergence of new viral variants is common in widespread pandemics including the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). A simple approach is required toward an appropriate and timely policy decision for understanding the potential ERN of new variants is required for policy revision. We investigated time-averaged mobility at transit stations as a surrogate to correlate with the ERN using the data from th...
Source: Journal of Urban Health - February 1, 2023 Category: Health Management Source Type: research
Food Vendors and the Obesogenic Food Environment of an Informal Settlement in Nairobi, Kenya: a Descriptive and Spatial Analysis
The objective of this study was to characterize the food environment of a densely-populated informal settlement in Nairobi, Kenya according to the obesogenic properties and spatial distribution of its food vendors. In July –August 2019, we identified food vendors in the settlement and classified them into obesogenic risk categories based on the types of food that they sold. We calculated descriptive statistics and assessed clustering according to obesogenic risk using Ripley’s K function. Foods most commonly sold among the 456 vendors in the analytic sample were sweets/confectionary (29% of vendors), raw vegetables (28...
Source: Journal of Urban Health - February 1, 2023 Category: Health Management Source Type: research
Associations Between Built Environment Factors and SARS-CoV-2 Infections at the Neighbourhood Level in a Metropolitan Area in Germany
This study examined the association between built environment factors and SARS-CoV-2 infections in a metropolitan area in Germany. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infections of 7866 citizens of Essen between March 2020 and May 2021 were analysed, aggregated at the neighbourhood level. We performed spatial regression analyses to investigate associations between the cumulative number of SARS-CoV-2 infections per 1000 inhabitants (cum. SARS-CoV-2 infections) up to 31.05.2021 and built environment factors. The cum. SARS-CoV-2 infections in neighbourhoods (median: 11.5, IQR: 8.1 –16.9) followed a marked s...
Source: Journal of Urban Health - February 1, 2023 Category: Health Management Source Type: research
