IPR Director and economist Diane Whitmore Schanzenbach has studied food insecurity for most of her academic career, but when some of the first data on food insecurity in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic came through in April, she was shaken. “I’ve never seen numbers this bad,” Schanzenbach said. She has released three reports analyzing the latest numbers on Americans' food insecurity and food insufficiency since May 13.
IPR economist Hannes Schwandt’s review of existing evidence shows the rate of reported COVID-19 deaths among pregnant mothers is low, and when they are infected most of them experience mild cases or show no symptoms.
Soledad Adrianzén McGrath joined the Northwestern Neighborhood & Network Initiative, or N3, as its first executive director, where she will help with strategic direction and building relationships with partners. She is a Northwestern alumna.
IPR political scientist James Druckman collaborated on a national survey of attitudes that finds a majority of Americans (60%) support efforts to make it easier to vote by mail in the upcoming November election.
The COVID Impact Survey collected information for a select set of states and metropolitan areas. Notably, more than 1 in 10 respondents in New York and Texas reported receiving help from a food pantry in the previous seven days.
Faculty Opinion
“We usually see disasters as unifying. They bring us together, they unite us, they increase support for our neighbors, to help each other out. But while we see anecdotal stories of that in the press, we haven’t actually seen a lot of data supporting that that’s what’s going on.”
IPR held its spring 2020 quarter series entirely online. Some of the colloquia were recorded and covered IPR faculty research on various aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic, including gender equality, legal issues, and analyzing infection rates.
