There is concern, though, that changes in behavior may not last long enough to prevent another big rise in coronavirus cases, said Ajay Sethi, an epidemiologist and associate professor in the Department of Population Health Sciences at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
UW-Madison political science professor Barry Burden said Trump has clearly proven popular in the state, even though he lost this year. “There is a pretty big coalition of voters in Wisconsin who are attracted to Trump’s style and to his messages,” Burden said. “It looks like Johnson is kind of mimicking that style in pursuing these odd or peripheral stories, so maybe it’s possible to assemble that Trump coalition even after Trump’s out of office.”
Alta Charo, a professor of law and bioethics at UW-Madison, said it’s unusual for employers to mandate a vaccine. She thinks they should rely on voluntary compliance. “There’s going to be enough people who have some reason why they can’t necessarily take the vaccine that an employer who issues a mandate on pain of being dismissed from employment is going to wind up having to essentially negotiate with many individual employees about their particular circumstances and have to dance around these very confusing rules,” said Charo. “In many ways it’s much easier for an employer to simply say ‘I’m going to encourage it, I’m going to strongly recommend it. I’m going to make it easy for you’.”
If you’re feeling the weight of quarantine fatigue, here’s something that may help you get through another virtual holiday. This could be our last one, according to Dr. Jeff Pothof, UW-Health’s Chief Quality Officer.
Malia Jones and “Dear Pandemic”: Jones is a researcher who works at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her work centers on infectious disease and social epidemiology, demography and geography, and she is also a creator of the project “Dear Pandemic.”
UW-Madison political science professor Howard Schweber said rules limiting installations like the representatives’ Christmas tree in public spaces are constitutional if content-neutral, allow sufficient alternative avenues for expression and serve a legitimate purpose unrelated to suppressing expression.
Does that mean this particular storm has been fueled by climate change? Jonathan E. Martin, a professor in the department of atmospheric and oceanic sciences at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, cautioned against drawing quick conclusions.
The study is “a major contribution” to our understanding of migration in ancient Mesoamerica and violence following Teotihuacan’s collapse, says Sarah Clayton, an archaeologist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, who was not involved in the research.
College administrators have pointed to declining birth rates in Wisconsin and the Midwest overall as one driver in current and projected enrollment declines. UW-Madison Applied Population Laboratory researcher Sarah Kemp said while high school enrollment data from the 2019-2020 school year shows an average decline of 3 percent the number of 12th grade students was relatively unchanged compared with the previous school year.
“Imagine that the patient, who has some degree of cognitive impairment, says ’yes’ to the vaccine but the surrogate says ’no’ and tells the nursing home, ’How dare you try to do this?” said Alta Charo, a professor of law and bioethics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Law School.
“While all of these people that care about monarchs are doing a lot of positive things, there are a lot of negative things happening at the same time,” said Karen Oberhauser, a conservation biologist at the University of Wisconsin who has studied monarchs since 1985. “We’re running as fast as we can to stay in the same place.”
“Finding a virus in a wild mink but not in other wildlife nearby likely indicates an isolated event, but we should take all such information seriously,” said Tony L. Goldberg of the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Veterinary Medicine. He added, “Controlling viruses in people is ultimately the best way to keep them from spreading to animals.”
There’s also an element of uncertainty about what the monarch numbers collected by surveyors really mean. “The year-to-year fluctuation in monarch numbers makes it difficult to put an exact number on the degree to which monarch populations have declined,” says Karen Oberhauser, a conservation biologist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, who has studied monarchs since 1985. Data from as far back as the 1950s show “it is very clear that monarch butterflies are a very high fluctuation species in terms of their population dynamics,” Agrawal agrees. Populations that crash can recover. Females lay hundreds of eggs, only two of which need to survive for the population to survive. And because four generations occur per year, even if most of the butterflies in Mexico die one year, “there is opportunity for the population to recover.”
“There’s no such thing right now as the national popular vote. It’s just a bunch of 50 state races that get added together,” explained Barry Burden, political science professor and founding director of the Elections Research Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Gutmann said he’s particularly excited about one study, led by Dominick Ciruzzi at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, in which a team attached accelerometers to street trees to measure how much rainfall they intercept on their leaves. The study showed that rainfall bound up in trees reduced the amount of water that reached the ground below. When taken together, thousands of trees in an urban area could be a sustainable tool to mitigate flooding related to heavy rains.
“Research would confirm again and again, when people feel that what’s asked from them is not actually followed by those in power, there’s a sense of betrayal that will occur,” said Dominique Brossard, professor and chair of the Department of Life Sciences Communication at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
“But a lot is happening that’s taking away habitat at the same time,” said Karen Oberhauser, a restoration ecologist and arboretum director at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. “It’s like we’re running fast but staying in the same place.”
University of Wisconsin-Madison professor Barry Burden thinks it’s important that voters know – no matter whom they picked on the ballot – they didn’t get to vote for the president and vice president.
Noted: The new Harris Poll was commissioned by DailyPay, the Bipartisan Policy Center Funding Our Future campaign, and The Center for Financial Security at the University of Wisconsin. The survey was conducted online from Nov. 17-19 and surveyed 2,075 U.S. adults ages 18 and older, among whom 593 are millennials between the ages 24-39.
“This data shows the resilience of younger generations in the face of the second major economic shock of their financial lives,” added J. Michael Collins of the Center for Financial Security, referring to this year’s pandemic and the Great Recession of 2007-2009.
Quoted: “Research would confirm again and again, when people feel that what’s asked from them is not actually followed by those in power, there’s a sense of betrayal that will occur,” said Dominique Brossard, professor and chair of the Department of Life Sciences Communication at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Much-anticipated COVID-19 vaccines are being distributed across Wisconsin starting in mid-December. Though widespread availability of the vaccine is still months away, we know you may have questions.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has assembled a panel of experts from the University of Wisconsin to help answer questions from readers.
Kenneth Mayer, professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin Madison, said Cicchetti’s approach is “ludicrous.”“The analysis assumes that votes are all independently and randomly distributed,” he said in an email. “This is going to be used in undergraduate statistics classes as a canonical example of how not to do statistics.”
Panelists included Dr. Darrick Hamilton, professor of economics and urban policy at The New School; Dr. Fenaba Addo, professor of consumer science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison; Dr. Tom Shapiro, professor of law and social policy at Brandeis University; Hilary Shelton, senior vice president for advocacy and policy at the NAACP; and Ashley Harrington, director of federal advocacy at CRL.
Research from the Carnivore Coexistence Lab at the University of Wisconsin Madison has shown that killing gray wolves actually leads to three times more livestock attacks, a finding supported by behavioral studies elsewhere. “The wolf pack is a family,” says Adrian Treves, who runs the lab. They cooperate to defend territory and raise pups. When one is killed, the destabilizing effect ripples through the pack. Reproductive age goes down, and naive juvenile attacks on livestock go up, according to Colleen St. Clair, a biologist at the University of Alberta.
Bob Jeanne, a wasp expert at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, says the authors are “correct in calling this the first example of tool use by a honeybee… I think they’re applying a reasonable definition.”
“We haven’t harnessed that enough, the great creativity of our students,” said Dominique Brossard, chair of the department of life sciences communication at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, who examined student behavior for the National Academies. “This is the age where individuals want to be socially active, want to act for good, are aware of the needs of community.”
The new fusion road map identifies technological gaps and nearer-term facilities to fill them (see partial list, below). “By identifying [a power plant] as a goal, that can trigger more research in those areas that support that mission,” says Stephanie Diem, a fusion physicist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. For example, in a fusion power plant a barrage of energetic neutrons would degrade materials, so the report calls for developing a particle-accelerator–based neutron source to test new ones.
University of Wisconsin-Madison economist Steve Deller said the shortage continues to be a problem in Wisconsin. Deller pointed to a mismatch between the industries and positions that have seen large job losses during the pandemic, and those that are in need of workers.
“This is a short-lived nuclide that only exists in the early solar system,” says Noriko Kita, an expert in meteorite aging from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. That advanced vintage makes chondrules the second-oldest recognizable objects in our solar system, after calcium-aluminum-rich inclusions (CAIs), specks of white in meteorites that are thought to have formed one to three million years earlier by condensing out of the gas that surrounded our young sun.
The average age of onset of Huntington’s disease is 39 years old, said Jane Paulsen, a research faculty member at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Neurology Department who is leading a study to determine if the disease can be prevented or delayed. Paulsen said she has seen cases of Huntington’s in people as young as 2 and as old as 82.
As President-elect Joe Biden continues his transition to the White House, House Democratic progressives and centrists are fighting over how to frame the party’s agenda for the public. For instance, progressive Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) said “I can’t be silent” and will continue speaking about policy goals ranging from defunding police departments to passing the Green New Deal. But centrist Democrat Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-Va.) argues that if party members keep using such language, Democrats will get “torn apart in 2022.”
-Jianing Li, Mike Wagner, Lew Friedland, Dhavan Shah
“Baltimore never really wrestled with the demons of segregation,” said Lawrence Brown, a visiting sociology professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison
“I am always a bit suspicious of silver bullets in public health,” Michael Fiore, one of the country’s leading experts on tobacco use and smoking cessation, told me. “Things are rarely silver bullets. But reducing the nicotine in cigarettes to near-zero is as close to a silver bullet as you get.”
Four years later, those divisions are as solid as ever, and a pandemic has shown us how deadly they can turn. Cramer, a political science professor at University of Wisconsin-Madison, watched the virus hit the state’s cities first. Amid a tornado of misinformation and political polarization, many people in more rural—and more conservative—corners of the state became skeptical about whether the pandemic response they were hearing about was designed for them.
Barry Burden, director of the Elections Research Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, told us it is not possible to know how many Georgians voted for Biden and no other candidate. That “would require individual-level information from ballots, not aggregation information about ballots cast in each race,” he said.
“I believe that pleasure is freedom,” said Schalk, an associate professor in the Department of Gender and Women’s Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “Pleasure is part of liberation.”
Researcher Tim Wagner at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Space, Science, & Engineering Center (SSEC) knew exactly what it was. All he had to utter was “Superior Mirage” and his wife grabbed his camera for him. He snapped a photo shortly before 8:30 Wednesday morning – showing what appeared to be a mountain behind the capitol city.
UW-Madison media professor, Dr. Derek Johnson says even the largest theater companies are struggling right now. He says the new option to stream releases at home will likely be attractive to many families because of the lower cost.
Dr. Shilagh Mirgain, a UW Health distinguished psychologist, recommends if you live by yourself, prioritize social connection in safe ways.
UW Health Chief Quality Officer Dr. Jeff Pothof said he believes there will be a quick turn around once there is authorization , and the hospital is already preparing for which healthcare workers will get vaccinated first once shipments come in.
Quoted: Revel Sims, a gentrification expert and urban planning professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said the question he hears the most often is this: Can development occur without displacement?
“I don’t have a silver bullet answer,” he said. “For a long time, the strategy has been you can’t stop it, you just have to get benefits (through) community benefit agreements.”
Kenosha, Wisconsin, became a national byword for racial unrest when protests in August erupted in violence.After local police shot a Black man, Jacob Blake, seven times in the back, leaving him paralyzed, furious residents took to the streets expressing years of pent-up anger. During nighttime hours, fires were set.
Associate Professor of Sociology, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Steven Deller, a professor of agricultural and applied economics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, agreed the COVID-19 pandemic has created an opportunity for rural Wisconsin.
Election experts also attribute some of the disparity to “ballot roll-off,” which is when voters skip certain races. Barry Burden, director of the Elections Research Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, told us it’s not unusual for voters to “choose a candidate at the top of the ballot and then ‘roll off’ as they move down the ballot. There is nothing suspicious about lower participation in lower level races.”
“If you’ve ever had steaks or ice cream delivered to your home, they deliver it with dry ice. That’s the temperature we’re talking about here,” David Andes, UW-Madison professor and infectious disease chief said.
Craig Roberts, epidemiologist emeritus at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, said that “bubbles sound good in concept but are difficult to pull off, especially at this scale.”
“The key, he said, “is the degree to which the community stays in the bubble, of course, and nobody violates the rules” — sneaking into town, for example. But staff members could be potential problems if they’re coming and going from the community. That makes it more like a long-term care facility, he said, where only residents are on lockdown.
Steven Deller, a professor of agricultural and applied economics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, agreed the COVID-19 pandemic has created an opportunity for rural Wisconsin.
Before Thanksgiving, Wisconsin was “at least leveling out, maybe trending down a little bit on some of the measures we look at,” said Dr. Jeffrey Pothof, the chief quality officer for UW Health. It would have been too soon to know if the state’s outbreak had begun to recede, but there was data suggesting that was possible.
Dr. Jonathan Temte, associate dean of the UW School of Medicine and Public Health, said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Social Vulnerability Index gives some priority to rural areas. The index includes socioeconomic status, minority population, housing, transportation and other factors.
Previous holidays including Memorial Day, July 4 and Labor Day were followed by increases in new cases. David O’Connor, a virologist at the University of Wisconsin who has studied the role of travel in the pandemic, expects the same thing to happen after Thanksgiving and leading up to Christmas.
When asked to comment on similar claims about “Biden-only” voting in Georgia, Barry Burden, director of the Elections Research Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, told us it is not possible to know how many Georgians voted for Biden and no other candidate. That “would require individual-level information from ballots, not aggregation information about ballots cast in each race,” he said.
That’s what Ajay Sethi is expecting. The epidemiologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Medicine and Public Health said the data in the next two weeks will likely tell us where Wisconsin will stand a month from now. He isn’t optimistic.
Alta Charo is a law and bioethics professor at UW-Madison. She said a vaccine mandate at the federal level is unlikely because it would be challenged in courts. Charo explained there’s more public health power at the state level.
Associate Professor Ajay Sethi, an expert on infectious disease epidemiology, said in an email to The Badger Herald that students should space out their COVID-19 tests.
Days after millions of Americans ignored health guidance to avoid travel and large Thanksgiving gatherings, it’s still too soon to tell how many people became infected with the coronavirus over the course of the holiday weekend. But as travelers head home to communities already hit hard by the disease, hospitals and health officials across the country are bracing for what scientist Dave O’Connor called “a surge on top of a surge.”
“It is painful to watch,” said O’Connor, a virologist at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. “Like seeing two trains in the distance and knowing they’re about to crash, but you can’t do anything to stop it.”
Joe Lauer, an agronomy professor for the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said farmers were grateful for more normal weather patterns this year after an extremely wet season in 2019.
“The in-store experience is going to be so much different,” said Hart Posen, a professor of management and human resources from the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Wisconsin School of Business.
Malia Jones researches how our social environment affects our health as a social epidemiologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Applied Population Laboratory. She also serves as the editor in chief of Dear Pandemic, an interdisciplinary group of all-female researchers and clinicians who create fact-based social media content about COVID-19.
Greg Nemet, an energy researcher and professor of public affairs at University of Wisconsin-Madison, said Biden can accomplish a lot through executive orders.”The downside is they’re not durable if a new president comes in in four years or eight or 12 years and changes direction,” said Nemet.
“I think it is premature to feel that we turned the corner until we see at least a week or two to have sort of [a] decline,” said Dr. Oguzhan Alagoz, an expert in healthcare analytics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
