CSDE Affiliate Ali Mokdad (Health Metrics Sciences, Epidemiology) joined NPR Morning Edition to discuss cancer rates in Lebanon, which is experiencing the fastest increase in cancer incidence and mortality anywhere in the world. NPR interviewed Mokdad during his travels to Beirut to meet with the Lebanese Parliament and present results from a study Mokdad co-authored as a member of the GBD 2023 Cancer Collaborators. The study, “The global, regional, and national burden of cancer, 1990-2023, with forecasts to 2050: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2023”, was published in The Lancet in September.

When: Friday, October 31, 2025 at 12:30 pm

Where: 360 Parrington Hall and on Zoom

We are looking forward to hosting Sanyu Mojola from Princeton University on Friday, October 31 in Parrington Hall 360 and on Zoom. This seminar is co-sponsored by the Population Health Initiative. Follow this link to sign up for a 1:1 meeting with Dr. Mojola during their visit.

Washington, DC, the capital of the United States, has the nation’s largest racial life expectancy gap, and it has experienced many of the nation’s worst epidemics, including maternal and infant mortality, homicide, heroin overdoses, and HIV/AIDS. These epidemics have disproportionately affected African Americans. Why and how does racial health inequality exist and persist? Starting from the city’s founding in the late 1700s and drawing on a range of sources—including archival material, life history interviews, and census, vital statistics, and disease surveillance data—this book illustrates how the physical, social, and policy design of the city contributes to the production and reproduction of disproportionate Black death.

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Sanyu A. Mojola is Professor of Sociology and Public Affairs and the Maurice P. During Professor of Demographic Studies at Princeton University. She directed Princeton’s Office of Population Research between 2020 – 2024. Her mixed methods research examines how societies produce health and illness, with a particular focus on the HIV/AIDS pandemic as it unfolds in various settings such as Kenya, South Africa and the US. She has investigated how social dynamics within schools, communities, labor markets, cities and eco-systems can lead to health inequality. She is especially interested in how the life course, gender, race/ethnicity and socio-economic status shape health outcomes. In addition to her first book, Love, Money and HIV: Becoming a Modern African Woman in the Age of AIDS, and forthcoming book, Death by Design: Producing Racial Health Inequality in the Shadow of the Capitol, her work has appeared in the American Journal of Sociology, Population and Development Review, Demography, Social Science and Medicine and Journal of Marriage and Family, among other journals.  She is currently working on a book on health, aging and social change in rural South Africa.  https://scholar.princeton.edu/smojola

Sponsor: Retirement Research Foundation (RRF)

Award amount: $150,000 (most awards average $100,000 to $200,000)

Number of applications UW can put forward: 1 per department. Departments must make their selections.

OSP deadline: 10/28/2025 is the 3-day deadline

Sponsor deadline: 11/1/2025 for LOI

Program Description: The Retirement Research Foundation (RRF) funds research that seeks to identify interventions, policies and practices to improve the well-being of older adults and/or their caregivers. Preference is given to projects aimed at generating practical knowledge and guidance that can be used by advocates, policy-makers, providers, and the aging network. Of particular interest are:

• Interventional trials; translational studies; and health services and policy research
• Projects that build on the investigator’s past studies
• Proposals that include robust dissemination plans, if appropriate, to assure that findings reach audiences positioned to act on them

 

The UW Office of Research invites applications from UW researchers for the inaugural Research Impact Advocates cohort in 2025–26. This program will provide training, engagement opportunities, and community for up to 20 UW researchers interested in increasing their capacity to engage public audiences about their research findings and expertise. Learn more about the program and how to apply by the November 1 deadline.