INTRODUCING our 2024–2026 cohort of Bell Postdoctoral Fellows!

Two head shots

We’re thrilled to announce that two new Bell Fellows have been selected from a competitive pool of applicants and will be joining us this coming fall! Kate Beach will complete her PhD in geography & environment at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where she has trained in health geography, spatial epidemiology, and population science at the Carolina Population Center. Beach’s work focuses on the links between health…

Three “Conversations” that tell the story of health and aging in rural South Africa

HAALSA letters with South African images behind them

Physicians, professors and research scientists affiliated with Health and Aging in Africa: Longitudinal Studies in South Africa (HAALSA)—the ten-year (and counting) project that has been following a cohort that started as 5,000 men and women aged 40 and over—have penned three pieces in The Conversation that delve into unique aspects of this burgeoning population: Pioneering researchers Stephen Tollman and Kathleen Kahn from the University of the Witwatersrand reflect back on…

Featured: Graduate Student Affiliate Jen Cruz’s work on breast cancer inequities in rural settings

The Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health features the research of our Graduate Student Affiliate Jen Cruz in this news piece…She returns to her small, rural hometown in Washington state to parse out the the differences between rural environments, and how these differences play a role in breast cancer screenings.

Exploratory workshop examines concept of community in context of climate change and energy transition

Jason Beckfield at podium at community and climate resilience exploratory workshop

The Harvard Center for Population and Development (HCPDS) co-sponsored a one-day workshop with the goal of bringing together policy experts and decision makers, researchers, and community-based advocates to explore the concept of “community” recently prioritized by federal legislation as it relates to climate change and energy transition. “Defining community for climate resilience and energy transition,” which was co-sponsored by The Salata Institute for Climate and Sustainability Research at Harvard University…

Announcing the winner of the 2023 Sissela Bok Ethics and Population Research Prize

Head shot of Leah Pierson

We’re thrilled to announce that Leah Pierson, PhD, has been selected from a competitive pool of applicants as the recipient of the 2023 Sissela Bok Ethics and Population Research Prize. Leah is currently a third-year medical student at Harvard Medical School, and recently completed her PhD in the Department of Global Health and Population at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Her research focuses on ethical issues in…

“Overtime” makes Princeton’s short list of Noteworthy Books in 2022

Overtime Book cover with screen shot of Princeton's list of noteworthy books in 2022

“Overtime: America’s Aging Workforce and the Future of Working Longer,” a volume co-edited by HCPDS Director Lisa Berkman and former Sloan Fellow on Aging and Work Beth C. Truesdale featuring 30 contributing interdisciplinary researchers has been named one of 11 Noteworthy Books in 2022 by Princeton University’s Industrial Relations section in the area of industrial relations and labor economics.

Nancy Krieger delivers Sedgewick Memorial Medal address at APHA’ s annual meeting

HCPDS faculty member Nancy Krieger was awarded the American Public Health Association’s 2023 Sedgwick Memorial Medal for her “activism and research surrounding health equity and social science.” Watch the 5-minute video of her Sedgewick Memorial Medal address at the APHA’s annual meeting, or read her speech published in the Journal of Public Health Policy.

Study links changes in work environment with reduced risk of cardiovascular disease among most at-risk employees

Graph showing greater protection of risk for those at higher cardiometabolic risk

A reduction in stressful conditions at work has now been linked to a reduction in cardiovascular disease (CVD) among those employees who were at an elevated risk of CVD at the start of the intervention study, especially if they were older workers. Researchers affiliated with The Work, Family & Health Network Study deployed interventions at two different types of works sites (IT and long-term care) designed to increase work-life balance…

Call for Applications: The Sissela Bok Ethics and Population Research Prize

Head shot of Sisslea Bok

We are pleased to announce that the call for applications is now open for the Sissela Bok Ethics and Population Research Prize. The $5,000 prize will be awarded to a doctoral student, postdoctoral fellow, or full-time, untenured faculty member at Harvard who has incorporated ethical considerations into his/her population science research. The deadline to apply is Friday, December 8, 2023.            

What’s to blame for the lagging U.S life expectancy? A closer look at mid-life ‘deaths of despair’ and retirement-age chronic disease

Head shot of Leah Abrams

Recent Sloan Fellow on Aging and Work Leah Abrams, PhD, is lead author on A Brief Report published in PNAS Demography that explores what could be driving the troubling status of U.S. life expectancy which has been stagnating since 2010. Abrams and her colleagues find chronic disease at the time of retirement to be a bigger factor than the ‘deaths of despair’ (drug overdose, alcohol abuse, and suicide) that have…