Americans have become acutely aware of the COVID-19 pandemic caused by a wild bat virus that found a home in the cells of the human respiratory system. The virus enters when we inhale respiratory droplets sneezed or coughed by an infected person. Mercifully, it cannot remain infectious for more than...

During the 1960-70’s, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) developed into the preeminent public health agency in the United States and the world.  Whenever a state health department or a foreign health ministry had an infectious disease problem on which they wanted assistance, they called on CDC.  Inherent in the...

In late January, as the new coronavirus was making its first incursion into the United States, the Supreme Court upheld the Trump administration’s contested “public charge” rule, which enables federal officials to deny green cards to immigrants who use social safety net programs. The decision received scant media attention, in...

A new Wild West has taken root not far from Tombstone, Arizona, known to many for its faux-historical reenactments of the old West. We’re talking about a long, skinny territory -- a geographic gerrymander -- that stretches east across New Mexico and down the Texan Rio Grande to the Gulf...

Since 1994, the Malpai Borderlands Group, a coalition of ranchers, has worked to steward approximately 800,000 acres of rangeland in southern Arizona and New Mexico. The group started with the idea that if its members — ranchers from multiple generations who worked the land — could come together to manage...