Environmental influences

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• A difference-in-difference analysis of health, safety, and greening vacant urban space
  Charles C. Branas, Rose A. Cheney, John M MacDonald, Vicky W. Tam, Tara D. Jackson, and Thomas R. Ten Have. AJE 2011(Dec 1);174(11):1296-1306. Greening of vacant lots in Philadelphia was associated with reductions in gun assaults, vandalism, and resident-reported stress.
• Intrauterine exposure to tobacco and executive functioning in high school
  Ruth Rose-Jacobs et al. Drug and Alcohol Dependence.1 July 2017;176:169–175. Highlights: High School teachers masked to study objectives rated executive functioning (EF). Intrauterine tobacco exposure associated with less optimal behavioral regulation. <0.5 pack tobacco exposure resulted in 2–3 times greater odds executive dysfunction. Neither other intrauterine nor environmental exposures predicted less optimal EF. Prenatal counseling should emphasize all legal and illegal substance abstinence.
• Seal Meat, Gold Mining: How Lower-Income Women Are Exposed To Mercury
  Greta Jochem, Goats and Soda - Stories of Life in a Changing World, NPR, Oct 3, 2017 ... "Mercury in Women of Childbearing Age in 25 Countries," from IPEN, a nonprofit devoted to issues of global health and toxic chemicals, and Biodiversity Research Institute, an ecology research organization. The groups studied 1,044 women from lower-income countries and found that 42 percent had average mercury levels exceeding the EPA reference dose in their hair samples. The potential harm to the development of the fetal brain is of special concern, says Joseph Graziano, professor of environmental health sciences and pharmacology at Columbia University. "You get just once chance," he says. "When the damage is done, the damage is done and there's no going back."
• Show 1102: How Do Endocrine Disruptors Affect Your Health? (55 min)
  The guest on the December 2, 2017 People's Pharmacy with Joe and Terry Graedon was Andrea C. Gore, PhD, professor of pharmacology who holds the Vacek Chair of Pharmacology at The University of Texas at Austin. Dr. Gore is Editor-in-Chief of the journal Endocrinology. https://academic.oup.com/endo Some everyday compounds can interfere with the proper function of our hormones. Such endocrine disruptors can have profound impacts on health.
• The Spreading of Disorder
  Kees Keizer, Siegwart Lindenberg, Linda Steg. Science 12 Dec 2008;322(5908):1681-1685. Abstract: Imagine that the neighborhood you are living in is covered with graffiti, litter, and unreturned shopping carts. Would this reality cause you to litter more, trespass, or even steal? A thesis known as the broken windows theory suggests that signs of disorderly and petty criminal behavior trigger more disorderly and petty criminal behavior, thus causing the behavior to spread. This may cause neighborhoods to decay and the quality of life of its inhabitants to deteriorate. For a city government, this may be a vital policy issue. But does disorder really spread in neighborhoods? So far there has not been strong empirical support, and it is not clear what constitutes disorder and what may make it spread. We generated hypotheses about the spread of disorder and tested them in six field experiments. We found that, when people observe that others violated a certain social norm or legitimate rule, they are more likely to violate other norms or rules, which causes disorder to spread.
• Urban Blight Remediation as a Cost-Beneficial Solution to Firearm Violence. American Journal of Public Health
  Charles C. Branas, Michelle C. Kondo, Sean M. Murphy, Eugenia C. South, Daniel Polsky, and John M. MacDonald. : AJPH December 2016, Vol. 106, No. 12, pp. 2158-2164. Abstract excerpt: Methods. We performed quasi-experimental analyses of the impacts and economic returns on investment of urban blight remediation programs involving 5112 abandoned buildings and vacant lots on the occurrence of firearm and nonfirearm violence in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from 1999 to 2013. We adjusted before–after percent changes and returns on investment in treated versus control groups for sociodemographic factors. Results. Abandoned building remediation significantly reduced firearm violence −39% (95% confidence interval [CI] = −28%, −50%; P < .05) as did vacant lot remediation (−4.6%; 95% CI = −4.2%, −5.0%; P < .001). Neither program significantly affected nonfirearm violence. Respectively, taxpayer and societal returns on investment for the prevention of firearm violence were $5 and $79 for every dollar spent on abandoned building remediation and $26 and $333 for every dollar spent on vacant lot remediation. Conclusions. Abandoned buildings and vacant lots are blighted structures seen daily by urban residents that may create physical opportunities for violence by sheltering illegal activity and illegal firearms. Urban blight remediation programs can be cost-beneficial strategies that significantly and sustainably reduce firearm violence.