School Notes: School of Public Health
July/August 2013

New approaches for a common childhood ailment

Otitis media, more commonly known to generations of parents and their children as an ear infection, is a painful fact of infancy, with nearly 80 percent of youngsters becoming infected by age 3. While it is not fatal, the infection further strains a heavily burdened US health-care system as worried parents seek relief for their children’s acute suffering. YSPH associate professor Melinda M. Pettigrew is studying the infection’s underlying bacterial and viral origins and is looking at novel approaches—ones that do not necessarily involve the use of antibiotics—to reduce its incidence.  During a recent seminar, Pettigrew explained how doctors rely heavily on antibiotics, prescribing them in most office visits. But the use of antibiotics for ear infections is controversial, as over half of otitis media episodes resolve without antibiotics and overprescribing them is driving antibiotic resistance, she said. 

Indoor tanning restriction signed into law by Connecticut governor

A measure to protect minors from the potentially harmful rays emitted by indoor tanning devices is now Connecticut state law after Gov. Dannel P. Malloy signed the legislation in early June. Public Act 13–79 will make it illegal for people under 17 to tan indoors. The new state law was prompted in part by research recently completed at the Yale School of Public Health that found a strong link between even moderate indoor tanning and the risk of basal cell carcinoma, a form of skin cancer. The research was led by Susan T. Mayne, the C.-E. A. Winslow Professor of Epidemiology and a cancer epidemiologist.

Yale team takes second in international health competition

When it comes to global health acumen, one group of Yale students has few peers. The five students traveled to Emory University in March to compete in the 2013 International Emory Global Health Case Competition. The teams had only days to formulate a detailed response to an identical health challenge before making presentations. An expert panel of nine judges awarded Yale second place, narrowly behind Johns Hopkins University, but ahead of 22 other teams from around the United States, Mexico, Singapore, and Canada.