Category Archives: Neighborhood Environments

In New York City, pandemic policing reproduced familiar patterns of racial disparities

In the past month, New York City has rolled back most of the public health mandates first put in place to control the spread of COVID-19 in early 2020, such as social distancing and mask wearing mandates. Now, new research … Continue reading

Posted in COVID-19, Ethnicity, Health Disparities, Mass Incarceration, Neighborhood Environments, Pandemic, Race, Racism, Social Environments, Spatial Analysis, Urban Health | Leave a comment

COVID-19 testing, case, and death rates and spatial socio-demographics in New York City

Social and Spatial Epidemiology Unit members, Byoungjun Kim, Andrew Rundle, Christopher Morrison, Charles Branas, and Dustin Duncan recently published research regarding neighborhood-level social and built environments as potential determinants of COVID-19 testing, case, and death rates in New York City. There is emerging … Continue reading

Posted in COVID-19, Mapping, Neighborhood Environments, Social Environments, Socioeconomic Status, Spatial Analysis, Urban Design, Urban Health | Leave a comment

How neighborhoods and infrastructure can impact HIV transmission among Black sexual minority men

Individual risky behaviors (ex. condomless sex, multiple partners, drug use) have long been a focus of HIV research and intervention strategies for sexual minority men (SMM). However, focusing on the individual level obscures the effects of broader societal influences and … Continue reading

Posted in Health Disparities, Neighborhood Disadvantage, Neighborhood Environments, Physical Disorder, Race, Racial Segregation, Urban Health | Leave a comment

Severe COVID-19 Projections: Data Visualization Tool

An online data visualization tool has just been released that allows users to explore the COVID-19 projections being released weekly by Jeff Shaman’s lab at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health.  These data have been powering Columbia’s interactive … Continue reading

Posted in COVID-19, Health Disparities, Neighborhood Environments | Leave a comment

At Risk Populations for Severe COVID-19

The Built Environment and Health Research Group has been creating maps showing where in the U.S. there are populations at high risk for severe COVID-19.  By county, they mapped the number of people 65 years and older, 75 years and … Continue reading

Posted in Health Care, Health Disparities, Neighborhood Environments | Leave a comment

Moving through the City: Understanding the neighborhoods transgender women live and socialize in.

Geospatial research can help scientists and public health officials better understand a diverse range of health risks and outcomes. In their recent paper published in Geospatial Health, however, Columbia’s Spatial Epidemiology Lab (led by Dustin Duncan) points out that the … Continue reading

Posted in Neighborhood Environments, Social Environments, Urban Health | Leave a comment

Neighborhood Health Effects: Does The Way We Define “Neighborhood” Alter the Effect?

There are many different ways that aspects of the social and physical environment can affect a person’s health. For example, body mass index and chronic disease are associated with the walkability of the area where a person lives. Spending more … Continue reading

Posted in Alcohol Consumption, Methods, Neighborhood Environments, Urban Health | Leave a comment

Analyzing Mixtures of Environmental Contaminants

It has long been understood that the burden of environmental pollution is disproportionately felt in certain neighborhoods, particularly low-income or minority neighborhoods.  In the 1980’s the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) described Environmental Justice as the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all … Continue reading

Posted in Environmental Justice, Event, Health Disparities, Neighborhood Environments, Teaching Tools | Leave a comment

Measuring Neighborhood Physical Disorder: Man on the Street verses Google Street View

Following is a post by Steve Mooney on a recently published paper.  Dr. Mooney is an alum of the Doctoral Program in Epidemiology and the Social Epi Cluster. We’ve done a lot with Street View at the Built Environment and Health … Continue reading

Posted in Methods, Neighborhood Environments, Physical Disorder | Leave a comment

Webinar Online – Urban Informatics: Studying How Urban Design Influences Health in New York City

Dr. Rundle’s March 2nd webinar for the ISBNPA webinar has been posted online at ISBNPA’s web site (Here and embedded below). His talk covered different approaches to assessing neighborhood walkability and the link between urban design and resident’s physical activity using New York … Continue reading

Posted in Neighborhood Environments, Physical Activity, Urban Health | Leave a comment