Suubi4Her: a study protocol to examine the impact and cost associated with a combination intervention to prevent HIV risk behavior and improve mental health functioning among adolescent girls in Uganda.

Background: Asset-based economic empowerment interventions, which take an integrated approach to building human, social, and economic capital, have shown promise in their ability to reduce HIV risk for young people, including adolescent girls, in sub-Saharan Africa. Similarly, community and family strengthening interventions have proven beneficial in addressing mental health and behavioral challenges of adolescents transitioning to adulthood. Yet, few programs aimed at addressing sexual risk have applied combination interventions to address economic stability and mental health within the traditional framework of health education and HIV counseling/testing.

Father Loss and Child Telomere Length.

Background And Objectives: Father loss during childhood has negative health and behavioral consequences, but the biological consequences are unknown. Our goal was to examine how father loss (because of separation and/or divorce, death, or incarceration) is associated with cellular function as estimated by telomere length.

Methods: Data come from the 9-year follow-up of the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study, a birth cohort study of children in 20 large American cities ( = 2420).

Understanding the Link between Poverty and Food Insecurity among Children: Does the Definition of Poverty Matter?

This paper examines the association between poverty and food insecurity among children, using two different definitions of poverty-the official poverty measure (OPM) and the new supplemental poverty measure (SPM) of the Census Bureau, which is based on a more inclusive definition of family resources and needs. Our analysis is based on data from the 2001-11 Current Population Survey and shows that food insecurity and very low food security among children decline as income-to-needs ratio increases. The point estimates show that the associations are stronger as measured by the new supplemental measure of income-to-needs ratio than when estimated through the official measure.