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We’re so pleased to be introducing the Nerdy Girl who holds it all together, the heart of our scrappy little band of volunteers: Gretchen Peterson. Before joining the Nerdy Girls, Gretchen Peterson had a long and successful career as a middle school teacher. 👩‍🏫 “Until May of 2020, I taught technology and entrepreneurial classes to Read more…

A special message from the author of Your Local Epidemiologist, Dr. Katelyn Jetelina. She has personally asked Dear Pandemic to post this, and it’s also available on her blog (which has NOT been hijacked, and you should go check it out! THE SHOW MUST GO ON. As many of you already know, last Thursday there Read more…

Time to meet another Nerdy Girl! Introducing Dr. Shoshana Aronowitz, PhD, FNP-BC, MSN, RN. Dr. Aronowitz is a researcher and clinician studying low-barrier substance use treatment, innovative delivery of harm reduction supplies, racial disparities in pain treatment in the context of the overdose crisis, the intersection of criminal justice and healthcare, and reproductive/sexual health. Here Read more…

This week in Meet the Nerdy Girls, we’re delighted to introduce Dr. Amanda Simanek, PhD, MPH! Dr. Simanek is a social epidemiologist who studies the psychosocial determinants of infectious disease, links between infection and chronic disease, and the pathways by which social inequities in health occur across the lifecourse and across generations. We asked her Read more…

Dr. Ritter is one of our fantastic team of clinicians here at Dear Pandemic. She’s a geriatric nurse practitioner and health services researcher. In her clinical practice, she helps people with complicated medical and social needs make a personalized plan for continued care. Her research examines better ways to provide care following hospitalization, specifically in Read more…

If you’re nerdy and you know it, wear a Dear Pandemic t-shirt! Occasionally we offer our branded t-shirts for purchase by our community, and this is one of those opportunities to proudly display your support and your nerdiness. So, here’s the deal: Click the link below to order and pay for your very own t-shirts Read more…

Time for us to meet our next Nerdy Girl! Introducing Dr. Sandra Albrecht, PhD, MPH. Dr. Albrecht is a regular contributor here at Dear Pandemic, and is also the Editor-in-Chief at our Spanish-language sister site, Querida Pandemia. Like several of the other NG’s, Dr. Albrecht is a researcher trained in social epidemiology. She studies the Read more…

This week we are delighted to be introducing our readers to nerdy girl extraordinaire, Dr. Aparna Kumar, PhD, MPH, CRNP. Dr. Kumar is a psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner (PMHNP-BC) and researcher specializing in child, adolescent, and women’s mental health. Her career has focused on decreasing stigma in mental health through research and education. As Read more…

This week we are featuring Dr. Jennifer Beam Dowd, our incoming Nerdy Girl-In-Chief & scientist extraordinaire. Dr. Dowd is a health and social scientist who identifies most as a “demographer.” What’s a demographer? We’re glad you asked. Dr. Dowd uses statistics to study patterns in human populations–especially how long people live and why. Her impressive Read more…

Join Nerdy Girls Dr. Malia Jones and Dr. Amanda Simanek LIVE at Dear Pandemic FB Page as they answer community questions from our Question Box. Saturday, January 2nd 9:30 a.m. Central Time

These are dark days – literally and figuratively – but here at Dear Pandemic we see great hope ahead. We salute all #WomenInSTEM who are brightening prospects for the New Year… ➡️ SCIENTISTS such as Dr. Kizzy Corbett at the NIH, who Dr. Fauci praises as being “at the forefront of the development of the Read more…

Dearest Dear Pandemic followers, On this Pandemic 2020 New Year’s Eve, we leave with you the comic below, which sums up so many of the ways this has been a strange and challenging year. We thank all of you who have come alongside us on this wild ride (nearly 57K of you now!) and helped Read more…

This week we are featuring Dr. Lauren Hale, one of the Nerdy Girls who has been helping Dear Pandemic serve up practical (and often entertaining) COVID info since March 13th. Dr. Hale mostly studies the social patterning of 💤 sleep 💤, with particular attention to how social and contextual factors influence sleep and health disparities. Read more…

A: Yes! We love lifting up the tireless work of female clinicians and scientists in this pandemic, and we are delighted to share a little bit about Dr. Sara Oliver, a member of the CDC’s Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS). Sara Oliver, MD, MSPH is an EIS Officer at the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Read more…

This Christmas we’re grateful for the gift of the Dear Pandemic community, the gift of science, and the gift of a vaccine for Santa! Merry Merry to all who celebrate! Love, Your Nerdy Girls References: Fauci assuring kiddos he vaccinated Santa Image credit Link to original FB post

Nerdy followers, 2020 has been A YEAR. We’ve laughed, we’ve ugly cried, and we’ve grieved – together. We’ve written over 700 posts informing and empowering individuals to safely navigate pandemic life. Despite being a volunteer operation, Dear Pandemic has not previously asked for donations, because we know the extra financial burdens you face, and we’ve Read more…

In this week’s edition of our “Meet those nerdy girls” series, we’re introducing Dr. Lindsey Leininger, who is a Clinical Professor of Business Administration at Dartmouth College’s Tuck School of Business, and the “Nerd-in-Chief” at Dear Pandemic. In the Before Times, Dr. Leininger described herself as a health policy researcher. Now, she identifies as an Read more…

In this week’s edition of our “Meet those nerdy girls” series, we are introducing co-founder and Editor-in-Chief at Dear Pandemic, Dr. Malia Jones. It all started early in the morning on Thursday, March 5th, when Dr. Jones sat down at her computer and wrote a lengthy message to her friends and family about the pandemic. Read more…