Former slaveholding counties show slowest decline in heart disease among blacks

A new study found a potential link between U.S. counties with a history of slavery and slower rates of decline in heart disease mortality. The researchers, led by Michael Kramer, associate professor of epidemiology, found that while heart disease has decreased by approximately 60 percent in the past 50 years nationwide, the pace of decline was slower for blacks compared with whites and slower in counties that had higher levels of slaveholding in 1860.

"A challenge for public health professionals is understanding the reasons for racial and geographic differences in the pace of progress in fighting heart disease," says Kramer. "Work by historians and sociologists suggests that the legacy of slavery persists today in the local institutions and norms of southern counties— enlarging racial disparities in educational attainment, poverty, and employment. We wondered whether this legacy also impacts the rate of decline in heart disease mortality."

Kramer and his colleagues found that the slower declines in heart disease in counties with a slaveholding past was partly explained by the racial gaps in education and economic opportunity. "Public health action needs to go beyond simple individual messaging around heart health and engage with the historical legacy of places and their institutions to identify barriers to future progress," says Kramer. n

Insecticide resistance in some Zika mosquitoes

One of the most common insecticides used in the battle against the Aedes aegypti mosquito—which carries the viruses that cause Zika, dengue fever, and yellow fever—has no measurable impact when applied in communities where the mosquito has built up resistance to it, a new study finds.

The study is the first to show how vital insecticide-resistance monitoring is to controling the Aedes mosquito. “The results are striking,” says lead author Gonzalo Vazquez-Prokopec, a disease ecologist in Emory’s Department of Environmental Sciences and assistant professor in environmental health at Rollins. “If you use the insecticide deltamethrin in an area with high-deltamethrin resistance, it’s the same as if you didn’t spray at all.”

The results of the randomized, controlled trial are important because some public health departments in places where Zika and dengue viruses are endemic do not necessarily monitor for insecticide resistance.

CFAR gets $10 million NIH renewal

The Center for AIDS Research at Emory (CFAR) received a five-year $10 million renewal from the NIH. Having CFAR at Emory has been critical to growing HIV/ AIDS research funding at the university. When Emory received its first funding in 1997, the university had $11.3 million in HIV/AIDS research funding and ranked No. 23 in the nation. Now, Emory ranks sixth in the country for HIV/AIDS NIH funding, with $63.8 million in HIV/AIDS research support. Additionally, 20 percent of Emory's total NIH funding is HIV/AIDS-related funding, contributing to a 63 percent growth in research funding since 2010.

CFAR at Emory University is co-directed by Carlos del Rio, Hubert Professor and chair of the Department of Global Health, Dean James Curran, and Eric Hunter, professor of pathology and laboratory medicine at Emory University School of Medicine. n