Epidemiology and Biostatistics Seminar Series

 

Half of the world's population lives in cities, and this number is expected to reach 70% by 2030. In this talk, I will review previous, current and future work that has focused in understanding the distribution of health outcomes and disparities in cities of the Americas. First, I will show preliminary results using the BRFSS survey examining the distribution of health inequalities across US cities. Second, I will show work conducted in the SALURBAL study, characterizing mortality outcomes in all cities of 10 latin American countries. Last, I will present an outline of my recently funded grant focused on understanding the health consequences of the phenomenon of urban scaling in US and Latin American cities.

 

Usama Bilal is an Assistant Research Professor in the Urban Health Collaborative and the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at the Drexel Dornsife School of Public Health. His research primarily focuses on the macrosocial determinants of health, with a specific interest in city- and neighborhood-level dynamics and nutrition-related conditions. He is also interested in the use of complexity methodologies to study the emergent properties of urban environments, especially as they relate to retail food environments.