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January 2, 2024

Research

UW-Madison researcher shows spike in early births linked to COVID-19 infections declined as more people were vaccinated

Wisconsin Public Radio

At the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, many health experts were concerned about the new disease’s impact on older adults and people who are immunocompromised.

Jenna Nobles, sociology professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, was interested in another potentially vulnerable group – pregnant people.

“We know that emerging infectious diseases can be extremely consequential for pregnancies, both people who are carrying the pregnancies and the infants who are born from them,” Nobles said.

Higher Education/System

Campus life

Tribal leadership weighs in on UW decision to cover tuition for Native students starting next fall

WMTV Channel 15

As 2023 comes to a close, a new chapter is on the horizon for tribal communities in Wisconsin. “What better way to do so by empowering its next generation of leaders to graduate debt free on their traditional homelands,” said Shannon Holsey, president of the Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Mohican Indians and chairwoman of the Great Lakes Inter-Tribal Council.

State news

How did the Dobbs decision affect the birth rate in Wisconsin?

Wisconsin Public Radio

In an opinion column in the Wisconsin State Journal, two University of Wisconsin-Madison professors wrote that the additional births caused harm to Wisconsin communities.

“Dobbs is just the latest abortion restriction to harm Wisconsinites, especially low-income Wisconsinites,” wrote Tiffany Green, associate professor of population health sciences and obstetrics, and gynecology, and Jenny Higgins, director of the Collaborative for Reproductive Equity. “In our role as scientists and public health professionals, we conclude that the evidence is clear: Restrictions and policies in our state that make abortion inaccessible and unaffordable harm the health and well-being of Wisconsin families

PFAS lawsuits involve complex science and law, but settlements can be worth millions

Wisconsin Public Radio

Quoted: “There can be some ability to trace that, because each company would be producing, potentially, different types of PFAS that could be linked back to them,” said Steph Tai, a law professor and associate dean of the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, an expert on environmental law.

Arts & Humanities

Health

Athletics

UW Experts in the News

Harris’s New Year’s resolutions: How she can use 2024 to become a trusted successor to Biden

Washington Examiner

By demonstrating her “unwavering support” for Biden, Harris is amassing “a national network of allies” within the Democratic Party who might back a second presidential campaign of hers in the future, according to University of Wisconsin, Madison political science professor and Elections Research Center Director Barry Burden.

Obituaries

UW-Madison Related

Harvard President Claudine Gay faces six new plagiarism charges: Report

Fox News

The new charges were first reported on by The Washington Free Beacon and included this claim: “In a 2001 article, Gay lifts nearly half a page of material verbatim from another scholar, David Canon, a political science professor at the University of Wisconsin.” The total number of plagiarism allegations against Gay are near 50, or “half of Gay’s published works,” according to the Free Beacon.