UCLA In the News lists selected mentions of UCLA in the world’s news media. Some articles may require registration or a subscription to view. See more UCLA In the News.
Reversal of assault weapon ban may be on solid legal ground | Los Angeles Times
But UCLA law professor Adam Winkler, who focuses on the Constitution and 2nd Amendment issues, strongly disagrees with Chemerinsky. Winkler interprets both the Heller opinion and a 1939 court ruling — United States vs. Miller — as broadly protecting firearms currently in common use. That ruling regulated sawed-off shotguns and machine guns. “Benitez’s opinion was unnecessarily provocative,” Winkler says. “If nothing else, it was totally tone-deaf comparing Swiss Army knives to rifles.”
Fake reviews still a problem for Amazon | Wall Street Journal
The researchers found that sellers continue to juice their listings with paid-for reviews because the benefit wears off after about a month — when unhappy purchasers start countering the high scores with low ratings — and because Amazon’s algorithms appear to put more weight on recent reviews. … “Deletion after a lag like that is inadequate,” said Brett Hollenbeck, the study’s co-author and an assistant professor of marketing at UCLA. “Sellers still find it profitable, and consumers still feel harmed by buying these products.”
For many tribal nations, pandemic brought an increase in population | CNN
That people who weren’t previously enrolled with a tribe would see the benefits of doing so at this moment isn’t particularly surprising, said Desi Small-Rodriguez, an assistant professor of sociology and American Indian studies at the University of California, Los Angeles. “Tribes have risen to a place of power and authority and caretaking of their citizens that local, state and the federal government has not,” she said. “I think people are realizing that and acknowledging that.”
Metro to test free rides for some customers | Los Angeles Times
Brian Taylor, the director of the Institute of Transportation Studies at UCLA, thinks that Metro’s data-based improvements to its bus routes are a promising way to revive ridership by reallocating service. Increased service frequency, decreased wait times, investments in the safety of bus stops such as lighting and added shelter could attract more ridership than free fares, Taylor said in an interview.
COVID Delta variant sparks concerns in U.S. | The Hill
Christina Ramirez, a professor of biostatistics at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health, called for more sequencing to get better data on which variants are spreading, where there are hot spots and which strains might be thwarting the vaccines. To prevent a variant from emerging that’s resistant to the vaccines, she suggested sending doses globally to countries enduring surges. “Our best defense is to really vaccinate places that are having uncontrolled outbreaks because this is where our next variant is really going to come from,” she said.
GOP governors tout their ‘relaxed’ approach to pandemic | Associated Press
But it’s not clear that states with tighter lockdowns necessarily fared worse than others. Economists at the UCLA Anderson Forecast in Los Angeles found in a new analysis that among large state economies, those with more pandemic restrictions, including California, generally had less economic contraction in 2020 than states with looser regulations. The researchers argued there was a correlation among stricter protocols, lower COVID-19 infection rates and the gross domestic product. (Also: Bay Area News Group.)
Heart disease and diabetes deaths climbed amid COVID | Associated Press
For months now, researchers have known that 2020 was the deadliest year in U.S. history, primarily because of Covid-19. But the data released this week showed the biggest increases in the death rates for heart disease and diabetes in at least 20 years. “I would probably use the word ‘alarming,’” said Dr. Tannaz Moin, a diabetes expert at UCLA, said of the trends.
With drought continuing, Vegas bans grass | New York Times
“There’s a 100 percent chance that it gets worse before it gets better,” Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at the University of California, Los Angeles, tells the graphics editor Nadja Popovich in The Times today. “We have the whole long, dry summer to get through.”
Is there a way to dial down the political hatred? | New York Times
The same Pew survey found that 39 percent of Americans who wed since 2010 were in an interfaith marriage, and a 2016 survey by Lynn Vavreck, a political scientist at UCLA, found that only 45 percent of Americans didn’t care about the political affiliation of their child’s spouse.
Did Black Lives Matter protests push cities to defund police? | Washington Post
(Column by UCLA’s Joshua Ferrer and Joyce Nguy) We analyzed the link between local racial-justice protests’ intensity and changes in municipal law enforcement expenditures and found that, yes, overall, cities with more-intense protests did significantly decrease their police expenditures. But that wasn’t true in every city. Many cities increased their law enforcement budgets, perhaps suggesting a racially conservative backlash.
The latest on the pandemic | Wall Street Journal
“It’s a true reflection of a decrease in overall circulation in the U.S.,” said Anne Rimoin, an infectious-disease epidemiologist at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health. “But we still do have pockets where we’re seeing transmission of the virus, and we need to be careful.” (Rimoin was also interviewed by Fox News.)
Havana Syndrome attacks leave baffling symptoms | WebMD
But Robert Baloh, MD, a neurologist at UCLA, says the cases in Havana and the subsequent reports of other incidents around the world could have another, less sinister explanation and could represent more of a psychological than physical illness. Outbreaks like this are a well-known phenomenon, Baloh says, and the cluster that began in Havana fits the pattern.
What is avoidant personality disorder? | U.S. News & World Report
“The symptoms and traits are ingrained within the character of the individual. They are typically rooted in experiences that occurred throughout critical developmental periods. As one continues to get older, neuropathways of the brain actually develop in relationship to these experiences, resulting in our perceived personality,” notes Michael Wetter, a clinical psychologist and director of psychology at UCLA in the division of Adolescent and Young Adult Medicine.
Why Long Island Pride groups welcomed LGBTQ cops | Newsday
Bianca Wilson, a senior scholar of public policy at the University of California, Los Angeles, School of Law, said there hasn’t been sufficient research to explain why suburbs tend to be more welcoming of cops at Pride parades but thinks the difference reflects how certain activist groups hold more sway in cities like New York. (UCLA’s Gary Gates is also quoted.)
Not eating meat at dinner can reduce heart disease risk | Well + Good
This finding is noteworthy, says Dana Hunnes, Ph.D., R.D., senior dietitian at UCLA Medical Center and author of the upcoming book “Recipe For Survival,” even to someone like herself, a longtime proponent of plant-based eating as a means for reducing the risk of chronic disease. “The fact that they found a direct, 10-percent decrease in risk for heart disease with a plant-based meal at night is really quite astounding,” she says. “This has the power to prevent millions of deaths every year.”
