Long COVID and chronic pain: overlapping racial inequalities

The American Public Health Association (APHA) and prominent U.S. health organizations have acknowledged racism as a central cause of health inequality. In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. confronts an additional public health crisis: mass impairment from Long COVID. Occupational segregation and institutionalized racism have made working-class Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) more likely to experience Long COVID. Medical gatekeepers also prevent equal access to health: BIPOC face more obstacles in their search for disability accommodations and social support. To provide health equity to the Long COVID community, Disability Studies must confront racialized understandings of chronic pain and the consequences of these meanings by centering the lived experiences of BIPOC living with chronic pain.

Environmental Health Is a Hidden Treasure

The author discusses the need for environmental health (EH) professionals to push for the field's importance in public health, that was apparent during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, as of 2022. Topics covered include EH's thrust toward clean air, food, and water and a safe and healthy setting for living, and its gold standard status in public health education. Also noted is the National Environmental Health Association's (NEHA) evolving marketing of the profession.

Biopolymeric sustainable materials and their emerging applications

Advancements in polymer science and engineering have helped the scientific community to shift its attention towards the use of environmentally benign materials for reducing the environmental impact of conventional synthetic plastics. Biopolymers are environmentally benign, chemically versatile, sustainable, biocompatible, biodegradable, inherently functional, and ecofriendly materials that exhibit tremendous potential for a wide range of applications including food, electronics, agriculture, textile, biomedical, and cosmetics. This review also inspires the researchers toward more consumption of biopolymer-based composite materials as an alternative to synthetic composite materials. Herein, an overview of the latest knowledge of different natural- and synthetic-based biodegradable polymers and their fiber-reinforced composites is presented. The review discusses different degradation mechanisms of biopolymer-based composites as well as their sustainability aspects. This review also elucidates current challenges, future opportunities, and emerging applications of biopolymeric sustainable composites in numerous engineering fields. Finally, this review proposes biopolymeric sustainable materials as a propitious solution to the contemporary environmental crisis. © 2022 Elsevier Ltd.