Interdisciplinary research on global health problems through the lenses of economics, nutrition and politics.
Research Spotlight
Tackling the Health of Women and Children in Global Conflict Settings
A new four-paper series in The Lancet exposes the far-reaching effects of modern warfare on women’s and children’s health. Stanford researchers, including SHP's Paul Wise and Eran Bendavid, have joined other academics and health-care experts in calling for an international commitment from humanitarian actors and donors to confront political and security challenges.
Many countries have taken digital epidemiology to the next level in responding to COVID-19. Focusing on core public health functions of case detection, contact tracing, and isolation and quarantine, the authors explore ethical concerns raised by digital technologies and new data sources in public health surveillance during epidemics.
Does Diversity Matter for Health? Experimental Evidence from Oakland
African-American men have the lowest life expectancy of any major demographic group in
the United States and live on average 4.5 fewer years than non-Hispanic white men. This paper finds that the mortality disparity is partly related to underutilized preventive
healthcare services.
Generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools have made it easy to create realistic disinformation that is hard to detect by humans and may undermine public trust. Some approaches used for assessing the reliability of online information may no longer work in the AI age. We offer suggestions for how research can help to tackle the threats of AI-generated disinformation.
Objective To investigate factors that differentiate elderly adults in rural China who accept free vision screening and cataract surgery from those who could benefit from vision care but refuse it when offered.
Design We conducted a population-based, cross-sectional study between October and December 2016. Logistic regression models were used to examine the predictors of accepting free vision screening and cataract surgery.
Setting Rural communities in Handan, China.
Participants Adults aged 50 years or older, with presenting visual acuity ≤6/18 in the better seeing eye, suspected by examining ophthalmologist to be due to cataract.
Results Among 613 persons with cataract identified on a population basis, 596 (97.2%) completed the household survey (mean (SD) age, 71.5 (10.0) years; 79.8% female). A total of 214 persons (35.9%) refused participation, while 382 (64.1%) took part in the vision screening. A total of 193 (50.5%) participants were found eligible for surgery, while 189 (49.5%) were not. Among 99 randomly selected participants who were offered immediate free surgery, surgery was accepted by 77 participants (77.8%) and refused by 22 (22.2%). In the multivariate model, being engaged in income-generating activities (p<0.01), self-reported better physical capacity (p<0.001) and having had a recent physical examination (p=0.01) were significantly associated with acceptance of vision screening. The only variable significantly associated with acceptance of surgery was presenting visual acuity, with better vision inversely associated with acceptance of surgery (p<0.05) models.
Conclusion Our results suggest that refusal of basic eye examinations may be at least as important a determinant of low surgical rates in rural China as lack of acceptance of surgery itself.
At SCCEI, we aim to shed some light on what actually is happening in China, and exactly how these happenings might affect the rest of the world. This year has been one of unprecedented growth for SCCEI, take a look at our 2022-23 Annual Report to see all of the incredible work and accomplishments we have achieved together. Download your copy or read it online.
In low- and middle-income countries, urbanization has spurred the expansion of peri-urban communities, or urban communities of formerly rural residents with low socioeconomic status. The growth of these communities offers researchers an opportunity to measure the associations between the level of urbanization and the home language environment (HLE) among otherwise similar populations. Data were collected in 2019 using Language Environment Analysis observational assessment technology from 158 peri-urban and rural households with Han Chinese children (92 males, 66 females) aged 18–24 months in China. Peri-urban children scored lower than rural children in measures of the HLE and language development. In both samples, child age, gender, maternal employment, and sibling number were positively correlated with the HLE, which was in turn correlated with language development.
As the U.S., EU and China are taking divergent leads in new AI regulations, a new framework for AI diplomacy is emerging, all under the shadow of strategic technological competition.
Renée DiResta is the technical research manager at Stanford Internet Observatory. Dave Willner is a Non-Resident Fellow in the Program on Governance of Emerging Technologies at Stanford Cyber Policy Center.
