Alex Cohen is the Director of Learning and Evaluation for the Richard M. Fairbanks Foundation. The dangers of smoking are well-known. Smokers are more likely to die from lung cancer, heart disease, lung disease and other deadly illnesses, not to mention the health risks caused by secondhand smoke exposure or the impacts to newborns caused by smoking among pregnant women. Yet smoking still persists—for example, more than 1 in 5 Hoosiers currently smoke—in large part due to the addictive effects of nicotine. More than two-thirds of smokers want to quit, but nicotine keeps smokers smoking and consuming the other carcinogens and toxicants for the long term. What if it was […]

Alex Cohen is the Director of Learning and Evaluation for the Richard M. Fairbanks Foundation. The toll of the opioid epidemic is often measured in lives lost due to overdose—and for good reason. It’s estimated that, across the United States, 115 people die of opioid overdose every day. But the impact of opioids can also be seen in HIV and Hepatitis C infections, which are being driven up by rising numbers of individuals injecting opioids. From 2013 to 2017, Indiana’s Marion County has seen a 1,000 percent increase in acute Hepatitis C cases, mirroring national trends. HIV has also spiked in recent years. These patterns have inspired the Marion County […]