The Feed

Aspiring doctors in Cincinnati whose studies were interrupted by the coronavirus outbreak have morphed their mission into taking care of people who are especially vulnerable to the pandemic’s dangers. ABC News highlighted the UC medical students who started a “COVID-19 match” program that’s being replicated around the country in which volunteers grocery shop, pick up prescriptions and perform other errands or just send cards and check in. Read more.

Smithsonian magazine examined UC research that found evidence of toxic water pollution in reservoirs in the ancient Maya city of Tikal. A multidisciplinary team of biologists, chemists, geographers and anthropologists discovered toxic levels of mercury and blue-green algae that likely would have made people who drank the water sick. The water pollution coincided with a time of severe droughts in the ninth century shortly before the city’s population began to decline sharply. Read more.

The COVID-19 era is casting light back more than a half century to the time when former UC virologist Albert Sabin developed the live oral polio vaccine. The mass immunization techniques that Sabin pioneered with his associates effectively eradicated polio in Cincinnati. Worldwide media covered the health care hero’s work, including The New York Times.

Nicole Ausmer, PhD, created “Hey Black Child: The Podcast” to fill a void that her 10-year-old daughter, Avery, noticed when searching for Black history podcasts geared toward young people. The UC director of Student Activities and Leadership Development was featured on “Good Morning America” with Avery and her 7-year-old brother, Jackson, the stars of the podcast.

InStyle magazine highlighted health care heroes in all 50 states. Representing Ohio is Trisha Wise-Draper, medical director of the UC Cancer Center’s Clinical Trials Office and associate professor of medicine. Wise-Draper leads two clinical trials to monitor the effects of COVID-19 on patients with cancer. She hopes the studies will help oncologists everywhere better understand how to treat infected patients with compromised immune systems. 

During nationwide protests on police brutality, a study co-led by UC about the militarization of police forces continues to be cited in major media outlets such as The Atlantic and The Washington Post. Law enforcement agencies with increased military tools have higher rates of police-involved killings, according to the 2017 research study co-authored by Jack Mewhirter, UC assistant professor of political science.