Carolina Population Center

Carolina Demography Director Nathan Dollar will speak on a panel at the "Six Decades Later: Legacies of the 1965 Immigration Act" event at 5:30 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 3 at UNC's Sonja Haynes Stone Center for Research in Black Culture and History.
apps2.research.unc.edu/events/index...

UNC-Led Study Published in the New England Journal of Medicine Demonstrates Repellent-Treated Baby Wraps Can Substantially Reduce Malaria Among Young Children | Institute for Global Health and Infecti... Published today in the New England Journal of Medicine, this trial led by Ross Boyce, MD, MSc and colleagues highlights the potential impact of permethrin-treated textiles as a novel tool in the fight...

Insecticide-treated baby wraps help protect against malaria during the day when bed nets can't be used, says CPC Fellow Ross Boyce.
globalhealth.unc.edu/2025/09/unc-...

Congratulations to Carolina Population Center fellows Elizabeth Frankenberg, Robert Hummer, and Nathan Dollar for their successful renewal of the Carolina Center for Population Aging and Health (CCPAH)!
Visit the CCPAH website to learn about their work.
ccpah.cpc.unc.edu

Lauren Gaydosh Recipient of Milbank Quarterly-IAPHS Early Career Award | Milbank Memorial Fund News article: The Milbank Quarterly was pleased to present its Early Career Award in Population Health to Lauren Gaydosh, PhD, an Associate Professor of Sociology and faculty fellow at the Carolina Po...

Congratulations to CPC Fellow Lauren Gaydosh, who received the Early Career Award in Population Health from the Milbank Quarterly at the 2025 Interdisciplinary Association for Population Health Science (IAPHS) Conference!
www.milbank.org/news/lauren-...

Experts independently resurrect Census Bureau advisory committee axed by Trump administration A U.S. Census Bureau advisory committee disbanded by the Trump administration has reconstituted itself.

Census Scientific Advisory Committee chaired by CPC Fellow Barbara Entwisle returns as an independent body to continue offering recommendations.
apnews.com/article/cens...

Cancelling annual hunger survey may mean the government plans to cut food assistance programs, says CPC Fellow Lindsey Smith Taillie.
www.wsj.com/economy/trum...

MAHA’s ‘Make Our Children Healthy Again’ guidance ignores real causes of poor childhood health, experts say | CNN Experts say the latest MAHA report, which focused on children’s health, didn’t include science-backed ways or address funding to improve their well-being.

CPC Fellow Barry Popkin says that without regulations or laws to mandate change in the food and drug industries, 'MAHA' report is "all promises and has no teeth."
www.cnn.com/2025/09/10/h...

The Jarring Contradiction at the Heart of Kennedy’s Agenda

Recommending lower priority solutions rather than tackling more substantial issues like sugary drinks in schools "speaks to industry lobbying," CPC Fellow Lindsey Smith Taillie says.
www.nytimes.com/2025/09/11/h...

The MAHA plan for healthier kids includes 128 ideas, but few details The Make America Healthy Again commission is proposing more than 100 moves to address the root causes of childhood chronic disease. Critics say other Trump administration moves contradict the goals.

'Make America Healthy Again' report lacks "actual, meaningful action that would help Americans address our problems with poor diets and physical activity," CPC Fellow Lindsey Smith Taillie says.
www.npr.org/transcripts/...

Low Birth Rates Are Here To Stay | Opinion Individuals and families need to be supported by a strong social safety net that includes paid leave and a robust child care infrastructure. There are no quick fixes.

Opinion: Low Birth Rates Are Here To Stay—Until Our Economy Works for Everyone, says CPC Director Karen Benjamin Guzzo.
www.newsweek.com/low-birth-ra...

Inside UNC Health's 1st-of-a kind rural women's health fellowship  - Becker's Hospital Review | Healthcare News & Analysis UNC Health is aiming to build a new pipeline of OB-GYNs equipped not only to practice in rural communities, but to take on leadership roles where they can address longstanding disparities in maternal ...

Interview: CPC Fellow Kavita Arora says investments in women's health and maternal care in the U.S. will ensure the best outcomes for families and communities.
www.beckershospitalreview.com/quality/hosp...

The under-five population has grown in four North Carolina urban counties, bucking trends North Carolina has seen strong in-migration since 2020.

Growing under-5 populations in four N.C. counties are a result of prime working-age people moving to the state, says Carolina Demography Director Nathan Dollar.
www.axios.com/local/raleig...

A Mississippi city's tax break spurred post-Katrina building. But will homes stand the next storm? A decade after 2005's Hurricane Katrina, one Mississippi city began offering property tax breaks to encourage building near the waterfront

Towns that allow building in flood zones face a compounding risk of those areas being inundated by rising seas and storm water, says CPC Fellow Miyuki Hino.
abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory...

Rural NC lacks OBGYNs. New UNC Health fellowship aims to change that The program, the first of its kind in the country, hopes to address rural maternal health gaps.

New UNC Health fellowship aims to train physicians to be leaders in OBGYN care and prepare them for the realities of a rural practice, says CPC Fellow Kavita Arora.
www.newsobserver.com/news/politic...

Congratulations to CPC Fellow Elizabeth Frankenberg, who was elected President of the Population Association of America (PAA) for 2026!
www.populationassociation.org/blogs/paa-we...

Don’t Panic: Population Projection is Not a Crystal Ball The best way to get those dozens of rates for each year is to rely on current rates and recent trends. This works well when things are changing slowly and in predictable ways, but it means our projections are often limited to forecasting a future that’s a lot like the present.

CPC Director Karen Guzzo and co-authors argue that population projections aren't a 'crystal ball' and become less accurate as researchers project farther from the present.
sites.utexas.edu/contemporary...

Trump Administration Scraps Research Into Health Disparities

"We don't want their voices silenced." CPC Fellow Jaime Slaughter-Acey seeking donations to complete data collection for study canceled by Trump administration.
www.nytimes.com/2025/08/13/h...

MAHA Draft Report Brings Relief to Some, Chagrin to Others

Draft report on children's health shows the White House isn't serious about reducing ultraprocessed food in kids' diets, says CPC Fellow Lindsey Smith-Taillie.
www.nytimes.com/2025/08/15/h...

The Two-Word Phrase Unleashing Chaos at the NIH All research is allowed so long as it’s “scientifically justifiable.”

CPC Fellow Arianna Planey: Says collecting data on participants' gender has been and remains scientifically justified and doing so improves health research.
www.yahoo.com/news/article...

'FAIR' research funding model faces skepticism from faculty, but is the best choice for maintaining a strong research enterprise, says CPC Fellow Penny Gordon-Larsen.
www.theassemblync.com/education/hi...

Israel plans to fully occupy Gaza Plus: The latest from Israel.

"I'd say it's logistically unfeasible."

Carolina Demography Director Nathan Dollar joins Capital Tonight to talk about President Trump's proposed 'new census.'
spectrumlocalnews.com/nc/charlotte...

A former FDA chief’s ‘brilliant’ move to test the agency’s commitment to making America healthy | CNN The former head of the US Food and Drug Administration is testing the Trump administration’s commitment to “Make America Healthy Again” with a challenge to crack down on some of the key ingredients in...

Former FDA chief's petition to bar ultraprocessed food ingredients is "the strongest play a citizen can do to affect our food supply that I’ve ever seen,” says CPC Fellow Barry Popkin.
www.cnn.com/2025/08/07/h...

Ultraprocessed Food Still Makes Up More Than Half of Americans’ Diets, C.D.C. Data Show

New CDC report showing only a slight decline in consumption of ultra-processed food was flawed by small data set, CPC Fellow Barry Popkin says.
www.nytimes.com/2025/08/07/w...

18th NIH Matilda White Riley Distinguished Lecture: The Life Course, Aging, and Health Disparities: Preliminary Insights from Wave VI of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health Date: August 28, 2025, 3:00–4:00 p.m. ET Location: Virtual Presenter: Robert Hummer, Ph.D., University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Overview This presentation will focus on the history, theoretical and substantive motivations, empirical contributions, innovations in recent data collection, and preliminary descriptive findings from Wave VI of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health). Add Health is one of the most innovative and widely used nationally representative longitudinal studies of Americans ever undertaken. It provides data for thousands of researchers around the world to more fully understand the multilevel (biological, survey, contextual) life course factors that contribute to health and health disparities among U.S. adolescents and adults. The presentation will describe the origins of Add Health and how it has evolved over 30 years. Significant attention will be given to the recently completed wave (Wave VI) of data collection and the preliminary descriptive insights from this new dataset, which will soon be publicly available. The presentation will conclude with information on how to access Add Health data.

@uncpopcenter.bsky.social's Bob Hummer is giving the 18th NIH Matilda White Riley Distinguished Lecture on August 28th from 3-4pm ET. This honor recognizes Bob's contributions to population science & his stewardship of Add Health. Register for the webinar here: obssr.od.nih.gov/news-and-eve...

The FDA is targeting orange juice. Here’s why, and what the science says. A proposed tweak affecting sugar levels for pasteurized orange juice responds to industry concerns about Florida’s changing crop and raises broader questions about whether the drink is healthy.

Proposed tweak to sugar levels in orange juice raises broader questions about its health benefits. CPC Fellow Barry Popkin says OJ, like all fruit juices, is "sugar water."
www.washingtonpost.com/health/2025/...

A professor had a $2.4m grant to study Black maternal health. Then Trump was elected Jaime Slaughter-Acey said it was ‘heartbreaking’ to discover her study on Black maternal health was cancelled after the Trump administration’s NIH cuts

CPC Fellow Jamie Slaughter-Acey says cuts to federal research funding are part of a larger pattern of political interference in science that puts the health of all people at risk.
www.theguardian.com/world/2025/a...

18th NIH Matilda White Riley Distinguished Lecture: The Life Course, Aging, and Health Disparities: Preliminary Insights from Wave VI of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health This presentation will focus on the history, theoretical and substantive motivations, empirical contributions, innovations in recent data collection, and preliminary descriptive findings from Wave VI ...

Congratulations to CPC Fellow Bob Hummer, who is this year’s speaker for the 18th NIH Matilda White Riley Distinguished Lecture on August 28!
obssr.od.nih.gov/news-and-eve...

Coke with cane sugar may not be that big of a MAHA victory Coca-Cola is going to offer a cane sugar version of its signature beverage, rather than one sweetened with corn syrup.   Major segments of the food industry, including General Mills and H…

CPC Fellow Barry Popkin says without new FDA regulations, letting food companies voluntarily stop using artificial dyes has minimal impact and is largely symbolic.
thehill.com/policy/healt...

‘Gold Standard Science’ in Theory and Practice The Trump administration’s efforts to raise scientific standards are justified, but its methods are shortsighted.

Drastically reducing governmental funding of science threatens to weaken, if not destroy American scientific research supremacy, says CPC Fellow Peter Coclanis.
thedispatch.com/article/gold...

Fears that falling birth rates in US could lead to population collapse are based on faulty assumptions While the changes in population structure that accompany low birth rates are real, the impact of these changes has been dramatically overstated.

CPC Director Karen Benjamin Guzzo and co-authors argue that fears of a population 'collapse' are misguided and based on faulty assumptions about birth rates, population growth, and economics.
theconversation.com/fears-that-f...