Whitney Zahnd

The marquee at The Englert Theatre in Iowa City showing the Dar Williams show for March 5.

Lovely Dar Williams and Joy Clark concert tonight in Iowa City!

1/ What’s the price of a 1% drop in MMR vaccination rates?

According to a new report by the Common Health Coalition, it’s 17,000+ measles cases, 4,000 hospitalizations, 36 preventable deaths… and a $1.5 billion annual price tag.

This is a fascinating read! I need to see if these images are in the public domain. I love using New Deal era U.S. Public Health Service art as office decor!

This RAND report puts the RHTP's inability to offset upcoming Medicaid cuts in grim perspective

www.rand.org/pubs/researc...

How many times will I give feedback/advice to students or other mentees that I need to internalize myself before I actually take it heart? 🤦‍♀️

Lawmakers, Health Groups Resist Their States’ Rural Health Fund Plans - KFF Health News Some Republican state lawmakers and state health associations are pushing back against spending plans under the Trump administration’s $50 billion federal rural health fund. Federal administrators alr...

Some state lawmakers and health associations say the political rhetoric around a federal program initially pitched to keep rural hospitals afloat doesn’t match reality.

“[It] will not save a single hospital in our state,” said the head of the Nebraska Rural Health Association.

They also release a "Using Rural-Urban Variables" tip sheet: www.cdc.gov/rural-health...

Analyzing Demographics Within Rural Populations This page gives researchers tips on disaggregating rural data by key demographic groups.

Amid the [waves hands at the state of the world], I still want to highlight the good work of CDC scientists/staff. For example, the CDC Office of Rural Health just released "Analyzing Demographics Within Rural Populations
Considerations for Rural Public Health Research" www.cdc.gov/rural-health...

The Mothers of Illinois Athletics: Illini Women’s Sports Pioneers - University of Illinois Athletics Just as George Huff is known as the "Father of Illini Athletics", so too should Ella Morrison, Jeanette Lincoln, Gertrude Moulton, Louise Freer and Laura Huelster

They had a women's physical education department in the late 1800s--pretty cool! fightingillini.com/news/2022/3/...

History of Women's Sports WOMEN’S SPORTS TIMELINE: Illinois' Pre-Title IX Era History 1870: Illinois Industrial University (later named University of Illinois) admitted women

Same is true at University of Illinois (my alma mater)--granted it was a club sport for women vs. a varsity sport for men--but women played basketball 10 years before men (1896 vs. 1906). fightingillini.com/sports/2022/...

Those "quick, straightforward empirical project" are the best ones though--hypothetically speaking. I can relate!

This is day 2 of the 2026 Iowa River pelican extravaganza

Love to see it! If everyone sticks around, this team is going to be GOOD next year!

Farmers Increasingly Rejecting Data Center Bids For Land - Farm Policy News The tech industry’s relentless push for data centers is colliding with farmers who see the projects as a threat to their way of life. Despite being offered sums that often dwarf the land’s recent valu...

1/ Today's Farm Policy News Summary covers how "the tech industry’s relentless push for #data centers is colliding with #farmers who see the projects as a threat to their way of life."

farmpolicynews.illinois.edu/2026/03/farm...

You tell ‘em, Carrie!!

A brown tabby with a white bib and paws stands on a dining room chair.

Happy International Cat Rescue Day from Iowa City Animal Care and Adoption Center alumna, Noelle!

A screenshot of Rachel Dratch from SNL. She's a white woman with short dark hair and blue eyes, and she's making an awkward expression that implies, "Sorry I have to tell you this and ruin your good time. But also I'm kind of not sorry about it." I've added a subtitle that reads, "That's AI."

an updated debbie downer sketch but it's friends showing her funny videos and she has to respond like this to every single one like this:

A true trail blazer, Lusia Harris became the first Black woman inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1992, fifteen years after being the first and only woman ever selected in the NBA Draft.

More Black history spotlights: https://info.sports-reference.com/bhm-spotlights#bbr

Oh no! 😔

What a resilient and compelling life she lived.

I absolutely adored Rainbow Brite as a child (and as an adult if I'm honest)--my favorite lunch box and Halloween costume.

Henrietta Lacks’s Family Settles Suit With Novartis Over Use of Her Cells Ms. Lacks’s family accused Novartis of profiting from her cells, which were taken from her without her consent in 1951, when she was dying of cervical cancer.

The family of Henrietta Lacks, a Black woman whose cells were taken from her without her consent in 1951, has reached a settlement with the pharmaceutical giant Novartis. The family had accused Novartis of profiting from Lacks’s cells, which have been used in groundbreaking research.

Tipoff of Iowa-Illinois women’s basketball!

Alma mater and employer match up in women’s basketball!

A proud professor stands with her doctoral student after his successful dissertation defense.

Congrats to my doctoral student, Gawain, on a successful defense of his dissertation focused on racial disparities in prostate cancer. 🎉

A tuxedo cat loafs under furniture at a cat cafe.

@publichealthguy1.bsky.social Important cat news—I was perusing social media of the local cat cafe and happened upon Button’s doppelgänger whose name is Professor Poop Fighter! 😂

South Carolina seeks non-CDC reinforcements to contain growing measles outbreak A dozen public health experts are arriving in South Carolina to help the state contain the largest U.S. measles outbreak in more than 30 years, but they're not coming from the Centers for Disease Cont...

South Carolina has requested urgent assistance with handling the measles outbreak there.

They did not request it from RFK Jr.’s moribund CDC, but rather the CDC Foundation, which is a nonprofit that is independent of the U.S. government.

RFK Jr. continues to do NOTHING about this outbreak.

Sorry for the loss of your canine friend/family! That's always so tough. 😔

Why do I have to pretend that I'm going to print something in order to save it as a PDF. Why do I have to engage in a little ruse.

RFK Jr. May Eliminate the USPSTF, Original Task Force Members Warn Dismantling the task force would be 'an existential threat to clinical practice,' they said

As I have mentioned previously, RFK Jr. is taking steps to eliminate the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF).

This is a group that was started by Reagan, who I guess was too woke lol.

USPSTF’s evidence-based screening recommendations must be covered by insurance.

👵🏻

I’ve been doin’ just fine…until I read that.

Truth

“Professional” Program Redefinition Endangers the US Healthcare Workforce Nurse practitioners are a lifeline for the millions of Americans who live in healthcare deserts: 87% are trained as primary care providers, and 80% care for Medicaid patients. Yet an obscure commit…

87% of NPs are primary health care providers. “Yet an obscure committee now promises to strip them of access to educational funds, putting the healthcare system, the nursing workforce, and patients at risk,” writes Cory Ellen Gatrall in this week’s ER essay. nursingclio.org/2026/02/23/p...