Association of Social Vulnerability and COVID-19 Mortality Rates in Texas between 15 March 2020, and 21 July 2022: An Ecological Analysis.

Background: Despite the key role of social vulnerability such as economic disadvantage in health outcomes, research is limited on the impact of social vulnerabilities on COVID-19-related deaths, especially at the state and county level in the USA.

Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional ecologic analysis of COVID-19 mortality by the county-level Minority Health Social Vulnerability Index (MH SVI) and each of its components in Texas. Negative binomial regression (NBR) analyses were used to estimate the association between the composite MH SVI (and its components) and COVID-19 mortality.

Discretizing continuous variables in nutrition and obesity research: a practice that needs to be cut short.

Background/objectives: Nutrition and obesity researchers often dichotomize or discretize continuous independent variables to conduct an analysis of variance to examine group differences. We describe consequences associated with dichotomizing and discretizing continuous variables using two cross-sectional studies related to nutrition.

Subjects/methods: Study 1 investigated the effects of health literacy and nutrition knowledge on nutrition label accuracy (n = 612).

The Commit to Be Fit framework: a community case study of a multi-level, holistic school-based wellness initiative in rural Virginia.

Background: Public health interventions that target children's physical, mental, and emotional health will enhance their ability to learn and grow. Although more complex, school initiatives that address multiple ecological levels and take a holistic view may be more effective and likely to lead to lasting change.

Aims: This article presents the framework of Commit to Be Fit (C2BF) as an example of how schools can integrate multi-level and holistic approaches for health.

Examining the impacts of public transit on healthy aging through a natural experiment: study protocols and lessons learned from the Active El Paso project.

This paper describes protocols and experiences from a seven-year natural-experiment study in El Paso, Texas, a border city of predominantly Latino/Hispanic population. The study focuses on how Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) impacts physical activity and thus plays a role in alleviating obesity and related chronic diseases that impact healthy aging. Our protocols describe a longitudinal and case-comparison study, which compared residents exposed to new BRT stations with those who were not.