An important paper about protecting science from political interference. Europe needs to defend its science against the kind of attacks unfurling in the US. By Martin McKee, Christina Pagel & Tiago Correia in the European Journal of Public Health: academic.oup.com/eurpub/artic...

1,747 excess deaths in Belgium due to the second heat wave of 2026 (June 18 to July 1), according to preliminary estimates from our public health institute (+48%). As our defense minister cynically puts it: “Enjoy the beautiful weather. And go live your life!” www.sciensano.be/fr/coin-pres...

Did the iPhone *really* cause the baby bust? A more skeptical reading of the new viral study from LCDS Deputy Director @drjenndowd.bsky.social jenndowd.substack.com/p/did-the-ip...? #demography #econsky #causalsky @nuffieldcollege.bsky.social @oxpop.bsky.social

"The Trump administration has struck what some see as the final blow to PEPFAR, the vaunted US program that has saved the lives of 26 million people living with HIV. The State Dept now says that as of 30 September, CDC support for PEPFAR will end in most countries." www.science.org/content/arti...

📢JOB OFFER Postdoc fellowship within the project “Climate change-related #mortality in different population groups in urbanized Belgium” (TEMPUR), funded by the FNRS and FWO. 🔎Full details: euraxess.ec.europa.eu/jobs/399708 📆Deadline: 15/02

Today, launching the World Urbanization Prospects 2025 with new UN estimates and projections of urbanization for 237 countries and areas of the world & 12,000+ cities with 50,000+ inhabitants in 2025. www.un.org/development/... - see also new online datasets and plots: population.un.org/wup/

🚨 The Economist has been telling you for years that polygamy causes civil war by locking men out of marriage. A new article with @rebeccasear.bsky.social and @anthrolog.bsky.social explains that the demography of marriage markets doesn't actually work that way. 🧵 www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Our new editorial in Bulletin of the WHO about ongoing initiative to improve the measurement of adult mortality in low-and-middle-income countries, where major data gaps have recently been compounded by US decision to end support for Demographic & Health Surveys pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC...

Mobile phone surveys are a promising tool for rapid measurement of age-specific mortality in settings where face-to-face surveys are difficult to implement. Researchers computed mortality levels from national MPS conducted in 2021–2022 in Burkina Faso. www.demographic-research.org/articles/vol...

Our study estimates excess deaths in children and parental loss due to the war in Gaza in 2023. From Oct 8 to Dec 31, 2023, 8120 children <18 were killed due to the conflict, 15127 children lost a father, and 9886 children lost a mother -in 3 months pophealthmetrics.biomedcentral.com/articles/10....

I’ve struggled to find the right words following Musk/Trump’s decision to end the Demographic and Health Surveys Program (the OG DHS). While nothing is inevitable, there is no denying this is a huge blow personally, professionally and for the world. /1 dhsprogram.com

Surreal read of the day: a paper using USAID-funded and now terminated Demographic & Health Surveys to count the huge number of lives saved by the now frozen US PEPFAR program to fight HIV, co-authored by current US admin’s nominee to lead cuts in health research jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...