Health Policy

George Mason Associate Professor of Health Administration and Policy discusses the importance of job-protected paid leave.

Anand Discusses Research on Paid Family Leave with U.S. Policymakers 

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Paid leave policies do not always include job protection: US President's 2022 Economic Report

CHHS welcomes Dr. Jeah Jung to the Health Administration and Policy faculty. Jung brings research expertise in health economics, health policy, and health disparities.

In a recent study, George Mason University Associate Professor Hong Xue, PhD and colleagues evaluated the impact of ending market exclusivity for brand-name statin drugs. The first study to comprehensively assess the economic impact of generic competition for statins found that ending market exclusivity for statins saves U.S. $12 billion and individuals nearly $1,000 annually.

Jhumka Gupta, ScD, MPH, associate professor in the College of Health and Human Services’ Department of Global and Community Health, says that she has always been drawn to research that seeks to “bring the ‘hidden side’ of things out in the open: such as violence against women and girls and refugee populations.” Gupta’s research on period poverty, and more broadly, stigma and menstrual health, is helping to inform a national policy discussion on health equity, reaching well beyond the public health community. U.S. Rep. Grace Meng (D-Queens) has referenced Gupta’s research in support of legislation for menstrual equity. After Gupta saw her research referenced on Rep. Meng’s social media, she reached out to Meng’s office to share additional resources. In May 2021, Meng introduced the Menstrual Equity for All Act of 2021, aimed at increasing access to menstrual products, and she met with Gupta to learn more about her work. 

In a first-of-its-kind study, Associate Professor Hong Xue and Professors Alison Cuellar and Lawrence Cheskin and colleagues at George Mason University's College of Health and Human Services examined associations between the amount of time spent on specific social media sites and the use of both e-cigarettes and traditional cigarettes.  

While most of the social media platforms reviewed in the study showed no significant association with vaping, Xue and his colleagues did find that college-age e-cigarette users who spent more time on Snapchat did have a higher prevalence of lifetime e-cigarette use as well as an increased frequency of e-cigarette use in the past 30 days.

College-age e-cigarette users who are occasional or regular vapers spend an average of just over two hours a day on Snapchat, according to the study. Non-users, on the other hand, spend less than an hour each day on the app. The study also found that each extra hour on Snapchat was associated with a 4.61 percent increase in likelihood of lifetime e-cigarette use