Tag Archives: health

Philadelphia fighting food deserts through fresh fruits and vegetables at corner stores

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Philadelphia is launching a new initiative to fight food deserts through existing corner stores:

The $900,000 investment in better health depends on apples and oranges, chips and candy, $1,200 fridges and green plastic baskets. The results could steer the course of American food policy.

Philadelphia is trying to turn corner stores into greengrocers. For a small shop, it’s a risky business proposition. Vegetables have a limited shelf life, so a store owner must know how much will sell quickly — or watch profits rot away. He also lacks the buying power of large supermarkets and is often unable to meet the minimum orders required by the cheaper wholesalers that grocery stores use.

With shelf space at a premium, shop owners must pick and choose the products they think will sell best. Chips and candy and soda are a sure bet. Eggplant? It’s hard to know…

The city has recruited 632 corner stores — of 2,500 overall — to its Get Healthy Philly initiative. Of those, 122 have gotten more intensive support, been supplied with new fridges to store produce and connected with wholesalers from whom they can buy at lower prices. It is also working with schools to improve nutrition and helping neighborhoods launch farmers markets, a multifaceted approach officials hope will improve public health.

As the article suggests, there is a lot riding on this project. It will be interesting to see if this could (1) substantively help improve health and (2) be profitable.

The advantage here seems to be that the stores are already established in neighborhoods and probably already have an established clientele. This program then puts healthier food in front of people who may already be visiting these stores. Working with existing infrastructure sounds like it would be more effective as well as cheaper in the long run.

Participating in culturally elite activities related to lower BMI?

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A new sociological study suggests there is a relationship between participating in certain cultural activities and having a lower BMI:

The study uses survey data from 17 nations, most of which are in Europe. In each country, a representative sample of the population was asked not only about height and weight, but also about time spent in a variety of activities. These included reading, going to cultural events, socializing with family and friends, attending sporting events, watching TV, going shopping, and exercising.A scale that measures interest in ideas, art, and knowledge—by surveying the amount of time spent reading, attending cultural events, going to movies, and using the Internet—is associated as strongly as exercise with a lower body-mass index, or BMI (a measure of weight relative to height). In other words, reading and exercise appear similarly beneficial in terms of BMI.

In contrast, people participating in other activities such as watching TV, socializing, playing cards, attending sporting events, and shopping have higher average BMI. Although time spent reading and time spent watching TV both expend few calories, one is associated with lower weight, and the other with higher weight…

So why might reading and related cultural activities be associated with thinness? The social meaning of the activity rather than the activity itself must be important for weight control. Leisure-time activities involve more than the calories burned; they also reflect differences across social groups in motives and means for good health.

These sound like interesting findings but I wonder if this is a classic example of “correlation does not imply causation.” Since these cultural activities might be related to social class, how do these findings line up with current statistics about weight (and health) by social class?

It takes time to fight the effects of inequality

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A new sociology study suggests that the health effects of inequality in the United States aren’t felt immediately but rather take several years to develop:

Higher levels of U.S. income inequality lead to more deaths in the country long-term, an Ohio State University sociologist suggests.

Study author Hui Zheng said the findings suggested income inequality at any one point doesn’t work instantaneously — it begins to increase mortality rates five years later, and its influence peaks after seven years, before fading after 12 years.

Zheng used data from the U.S. National Health Interview Survey from 1986 to 2004 with mortality follow-up data from 1986 to 2006. His final sample involved more than 700,000 people age 30 and older…

The study, published in the journal Social Science and Medicine, found a 0.01 unit rise in the Gini coefficient increased the cumulative odds of death by 122 percent in the following 12 years.

“This finding is striking and it supports the argument that income inequality is a public health concern,” Zheng said in a statement. “For the first time, we can clearly capture the long-term effect of income inequality on health.”

While I don’t study health outcomes, I like a conceptual path a study like this offers: we need to think about and discuss the longer-term effects of inequality. In other words, decisions made now for better or worse will have extended effects down the road. In terms of all public policy, we don’t want to be at a place where one or several decades have passed and we haven’t thought through where public policies have led us.

On the flip side, it is common for critics of sociology to argue that certain changes can be made in public policy and magically two groups will be on equal footing. For example, housing discrimination was made illegal in the 1960s – doesn’t this mean that everyone is now on equal in the marketplace? Here is how I describe this in class: you have a graph with two upward curves, one with a steeper rise representing a more privileged (income, education, etc.) and one with a slower rise. If after fifty years there is a wide gap between the two groups but a policy is changed to help level the playing field, this does not mean that automatically that gap disappears. In terms of the housing example, there are still plenty of examples of disparities and discrimination even though certain actions are clearly illegal. It takes time to reverse social inequality and the social world is not easy to change. Thus, if inequality today leads to health disparities down the road, it will take more time to reverse that trend and get us back to the same starting point, let alone make things more equal in the long run.

Sociologist explains that one type of mass hysteria is behind cases in upstate New York

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A recent set of odd medical cases in one New York town has prompted news sources to look for explanations. One sociologist suggests the high school students are experiencing one type of mass hysteria:

Most doctors and experts believe that the students are suffering from mass sociogenic illness, also known as mass hysteria. In these cases, psychological symptoms manifest as physical conditions.

Sociologist Robert Bartholomew, author of several books on mass hysteria including The Martians Have Landed: A History of Media-Driven Panics and Hoaxes, explained to Discovery News that “there are two main types of contagious conversion disorder. The most common in Western countries is triggered by extreme, sudden stress; usually a bad smell. Symptoms typically include dizziness, headaches, fainting and over-breathing, and resolve within about a day.”

In contrast, Bartholomew said, “The LeRoy students are experiencing the rarer, more serious type affecting muscle motor function and commonly involves twitching, shaking, facial tics, difficulty communicating and trance states. Symptoms appear slowly over weeks or months under exposure to longstanding stress, and typically take weeks or months to subside.”

Mass hysteria cases are more common than people realize and have been reported all over the world for centuries.

Read the rest of the story for four more interesting stories of mass hysteria. These sorts of stories pop up every once in a while: a few people claim to be ill from smelling something but authorities can’t find any issue.

I’ve seen Bartholomew quoted in a few news stories about this mystery illness. I would be interested to hear how he thinks you can defuse this situation; how do you stop mass hysteria? Is it best to focus on reducing the stress of the people experiencing the illness or is it better to split up the group of those experiencing the illness to try to limit the “mass” part of the condition?

Also, do we have any studies of what takes place within a community that is experiencing this as opposed to studying the situations afterward? What is it like for the other students and their families in this high school?

Third, what kind of stress sets this off?

Fourth, is there something about the social networks between those who are ill that matter or the particular institutional setting that people are in (i.e., close quarters for long hours)?

63% of the elderly claim to have experienced discrimination

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Discrimination is typically associated with issues that arise involving race and ethnicity and gender. But a recent study suggests a majority of the elderly also say they have recently experienced discrimination:

A startling proportion of older people report that they’ve experienced discrimination: 63 percent, in a study recently published in Research on Aging. The most commonly cited cause? “Thirty percent report being mistreated because of their age,” said the lead author Ye Luo, a Clemson University sociologist. Perceived discrimination because of gender, race or ancestry, disabilities or appearance followed in smaller proportions…

Dr. Luo and her colleagues used national data from the federal Health and Retirement Study to measure what nearly 6,400 people — all older than age 53 when the study began in 2006 – thought about discriminatory behavior. Dr. Luo wasn’t surprised by the high proportion of people who said they had encountered it. That was consistent, she says, with previous studies.

As the researchers had expected, some people were more likely to report discrimination than others. Blacks, those who were separated or divorced or widowed, and those with fewer household assets had higher levels of perceived discrimination, as measured by questionnaires. It was less commonly perceived by whites, by the married or partnered, and by those with more assets…

Interestingly, the discrimination effect was stronger for everyday slights and suspicions (including whether people felt harassed or threatened, or whether they felt others were afraid of them) than for more dramatic events like being denied a job or promotion or being unfairly detained or questioned by police.

The study also suggests the experiences of discrimination are related to poorer health outcomes.

So if this is a common experience, what could society do differently to limit this? Public service announcements? Lessons in elementary school? How much of this is related to a youth-obsessed culture?

I wonder if these issues will only grow as Americans live longer. Also, what might happen if there is more generational conflict over debt, paying into social security, and the differences in wealth between the young and old?

Better educated people more able to adjust to new health research

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This finding from a study in the December issue of American Sociological Review has been getting a lot of attention: despite efforts to even out the effect more education has on health, higher levels of education still lead to better health outcomes. Here’s why:

Professor Richard Miech of the University of Colorado Denver and colleagues said data have showed for decades middle-aged adults with low education levels — high school or less — are twice as likely to die as those with higher education levels.

Miech’s study, published in the American Sociological Review, provides new understanding as to why death rates for less educated middle-aged adults are much higher than for their more educated peers, despite increased awareness and treatments aimed at reducing health disparities.

The researchers found as new causes of death emerge, people with lower education levels are slower to respond with behavioral changes, creating a moving target that often remains a step ahead of prevention efforts.

Despite efforts to reduce education-based mortality disparities, the gap remains because new health disparities counteract the efforts to reduce the death rates for those with less education — the causes of death have changed, rates have not, Miech said.

Translation: the world continues to change and certain groups are better positioned in society to take advantage.

Sociologist argues carers need more support

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In the high-stakes discussions taking place in a number of countries, a British sociologist argues countries should support one group more: carers.

Some 6.4 million people in the UK care for sick, disabled or frail friends and relatives – and they’re often punished for doing so. Many of them pay a “triple penalty”: damage to their health; a poorer financial situation; and restrictions in everyday life. The intrinsic unfairness of this situation is made all the more remarkable by the fact their work and effort saves the public purse £119bn a year – more than the whole budget of the NHS. But in the current climate of public sector cuts, how can we make their lives better without costing the earth, and support those who wish to care without giving up paid work?…

Our report New Approaches to Supporting Carers’ Health and Well-being: evidence from the National Carers’ Strategy Demonstrator Sites Programme highlights ideas that work to help carers stay well and healthy, to get a short break or chance to meet their own needs. For carers struggling to make ends meet, small investments in gym memberships, laptops or short holidays make a real difference, yet cost only a fraction of what needs to be spent if their care breaks down or cannot be sustained.

Special health and wellbeing checks spotted many physical and mental conditions, including diabetes, depression and cancer, which – as carers often put their own needs second to those of others – were previously undiagnosed. When GPs or hospitals work together with social services and voluntary agencies in their area, support for carers can really improve at a comparatively small cost…

Circle researchers have consistently made the case for better carer support. Our work has informed policy developments under both Labour and coalition governments. Unsupported, carers risk exhaustion, isolation and stress – yet when valued and offered flexible services, many see caring as among the most rewarding and important things they have ever done.

In the debates over health care costs in the United States, I haven’t heard much about carers. I wonder if some might argue that these caring duties shouldn’t be rewarded by the government but rather are familial or relational duties. But, if health care costs are a public problem, might it not make sense to invest here?

I wonder how millennials feel about this. Frankly, it probably hasn’t entered their minds much.

If sociologists have some interest in concepts like the sick role, do we have notable scholarly works addressing the role of carers?

In order to deal with issues like health, don’t focus on race but place and residential segregation

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Researchers examined health in two Baltimore neighborhoods and argue that it is not race that leads to different health outcomes but rather the places themselves:

LaVeist and several colleagues tested this idea by examining the counterfactual: If society weren’t segregated, would health disparities still exist? They identified a low-income community in Southwest Baltimore, spanning two census tracts, that is fairly equally divided between black and white residents (out of deference to the neighborhood, LaVeist doesn’t name it). The median household income in the area was less than $25,000 during the 2000 census. It has no pharmacy, no practicing physicians or dentists, no supermarkets, and no banks.

Within this integrated community, the researchers found that health disparities all but disappear. There was no significant difference in diabetes rates, or obesity rates among young women (a metric on which large gaps exist nationally). There did remain a difference in hypertension rates, albeit it a much narrower one than national data shows. The lone exception: Whites in this community smoked at a significantly higher rate than blacks.

This suggests that what the national statistics are really telling us is that minorities live in much higher numbers in unhealthy neighborhoods. And that means that in trying to address health disparities nationally, we’ve been looking for the answers to the wrong question. We should be asking what’s going on in these communities, not what’s going on within minority populations.

“Solutions to health disparities are likely to be found in broader societal policy and policy that is not necessarily what we would think of as health policy,” LaVeist says. “It’s housing policy, zoning policy, it’s policy that shapes the characteristics of communities.”

While this sounds like interesting research (though it only covers two neighborhoods?), haven’t sociologists been talking about this for years? In fact, Massey and Denton made just this point in American Apartheid back in the early 1990s:

Our research indicates that racial residential segregation is the principal structural feature of American society responsible for the perpetuation of urban poverty and represents a primary cause of racial inequality in the United States.

If as a country we really wanted to deal with disparities in education, jobs, opportunities, health, and more, then the problem of residential segregation is the one that needs to be tackled. Local decisions about zoning and resource allocation also matter. Simply dealing with the health concerns without addressing the whole neighborhood can only get us so far.

How a long commute harms you

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The Infrastructurist has a round-up of recent studies that show the negative effects of long commutes: higher rates of divorce plus “low happiness, high stress levels, and loneliness; they even makes us physically unhealthy.”

As they note, enough Americans seem willing to make the trade-off between a better house for a long commute. Is this because people simply don’t know or think about the social costs of long commutes? If not, what sort of organization would or could make this more known?

How being multiracial affects self-reported health

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It is only in the last 11 years or so that official forms (like the Census) have allowed individuals in America to identify as being from more than one race. A couple of sociologists argue that this multiracial identification impacts self-reported health:

Bratter and Bridget Gorman, associate professor of sociology at Rice, studied nearly 1.8 million cases, including data from more than 27,000 multiracial adults, from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) questionnaire…

The new study found that only 13.5 percent of whites report their health as fair to poor, whereas most other single-race or multiracial groups were more likely to report those health conditions: 24 percent of American Indians, 19.9 percent of blacks and 18.4 percent of others. Single-race Asians were the least likely to report fair-to-poor health – only 8.7 percent did so.

While differences in self-rated health exist between single-race whites and multiracial whites, the percentage of single-race blacks who rated their health as fair to poor is nearly identical to that of multiracial blacks. The same is true for single-race and multiracial Asians.

“Our findings highlight the need for new approaches in understanding how race operates in a landscape where racial categories are no longer mutually exclusive yet racial inequality still exists,” said Bratter, director of Race Scholars at Rice, a program within the Kinder Institute for Urban Research. “This extends beyond health data to other measurements of well-being, income, poverty and so much else.”

The key question here seems to be whether multiracial individuals experience the same health outcomes as single race individuals.  From this description, it sounds like this study suggests that being multiracial and white has different health outcomes compared to whites while being black or multiracial black has the same health outcomes. This would make sense given what we know about health differentials by race (more than genetics and extending to areas like life expectancy).

(I searched the journal Demography for more information about the conclusions of this study but it must not be listed yet.)