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Published June 8, 2021

An older pandemic overshadowed by COVID. A looming crisis for tenants across the United States. And a historical portrait that isn’t on the money.

CBS Miami reports on the 40-year anniversary of the AIDS epidemic, observed on June 5, with quotes from several widely recognized experts including Perry Halkitis, dean of Rutgers School of Public Health. Sharing tragic news that HIV recently claimed the life of a close friend, Halkitis reminds readers that AIDS “is a disease which continues to exist, one for which there is no vaccine [and] no cure.” He adds that, as with the COVID-19 vaccine, the government, the medical community, and the public need to work together. “What the COVID epidemic has shown us is there’s nothing we can’t defeat,” says Halkitis. “We need to end AIDS now.”

CBS Miami| It’s been 40 years since the beginning of the HIV/AIDS epidemic

The national eviction moratorium put in place by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is likely to expire June 30. And while Congress recently allocated assistance on the basis of state population, the funding doesn’t take into account “differences in the number of renter households, variation in the cost of rent, or the extent of pandemic-related hardship,” writes Peter Hepburn, an assistant professor of sociology at Rutgers University–Newark, in a New York Times op-ed. “With millions of tenants behind on rent and emergency rental assistance only now beginning to be disbursed, few states are ready for this eventuality.”

The New York Times | The end of the C.D.C. eviction moratorium means trouble

It’s been 16 years since a young girl asked President Obama to put Harriet Tubman on the $20 bill, a task Obama said he wanted to accomplish. So what’s the holdup? A Washington Post article dives into the twisting saga of getting Tubman’s face on the bill, and one Rutgers professor says cost is likely not the problem. “It doesn’t cost very much to change the portraiture—it’s just the everything else that they’re trying to do at the same time,” says Ruth Anne Robbins CLAW’91, a professor at Rutgers Law School in Camden and an expert on currency changes. “People have been asking now for just about a century to please put some women on the money.”

The Washington Post | When will Harriet Tubman adorn the $20 bill?

The New York Times features insight from Mona Lena Krook, a political science professor in the School of Arts and Sciences, on how women politicians face more online attacks than their male counterparts. Krook explains that women are often misrepresented on social media, as users tend to spread false images aimed to make them look more sexual or emotional. “Disinformation spreads rapidly,” says Krook, “because it taps into and reinforces existing sexist beliefs about female political leaders.”

The New York Times | Fake nudes and real threats: How online abuse holds back women in politics

Researchers at Rutgers’ Institute for Health, Health Care Policy, and Aging Research are working to find a way to use precision medicine with machine learning to better diagnose and treat patients. Zeeshan Ahmed, an assistant professor of medicine, believes that artificial intelligence can be combined with health information to treat patients with illnesses such as COVID-19 more effectively. “We believe we can achieve truly personalized treatment for earlier, more effective disease detection and prevention,” Ahmed tells ROI-NJ.

ROI-NJ | Precision instrument: Rutgers researcher hopes to grow field that combines AI with health care

A New York Times story on a landmark New Jersey bill that would bar landlords from asking about criminal convictions on housing applications features Boris Franklin SAS’19, who earned a bachelor’s degree in sociology from Rutgers after his release from prison. Under the state’s current laws, Franklin explains, he finds it almost impossible to rent an apartment: “I caught my charge in 2004, and they still just disqualify me.” He also describes the prospect of signing his own lease as more than just a measure of dignity. “It is a buffer between you and the streets and everything else,” Franklin says.

The New York Times | Landlords barred from using criminal records to deny housing

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