Research supports that exposure to stressors (e.g., perceived stress and racism) during pregnancy can negatively impact the immune system, which may lead to infection and ultimately increases the risk for having a preterm or low‐birthweight infant. It is well known that Black women report higher levels of stressors at multiple timepoints across pregnancy compared with women of all other racial and ethnic groups. This study addresses gaps in the literature by describing pregnant and early post‐partum Black women's exposures to structural racism and self‐reported experiences of racial discrimination, and the extent to which these factors are related. We used a cross‐sectional study design to collect data related to exposures to racism from pregnant and early post‐partum Black women residing in Oakland, California, from January 2016 to December 2017. Comparative analysis revealed that living in highly deprived race + income neighborhoods was associated with experiencing racial discrimination in three or more situational domains (p = .01). Findings show that Black women are exposed to high levels of racism that may have negative impacts on maternal health outcomes.

Preliminary evidence indicates that the experience of the novel coronavirus is not shared equally across geographic areas. Findings in the United States suggest that the burden of COVID-19 morbidity and mortality may be hardest felt in disadvantaged and racially segregated places. Deprived neighbourhoods are disproportionately populated by people of colour, the same populations that are becoming sicker and dying more often from COVID-19. This commentary examines how structurally vulnerable neighbourhoods contribute to racial/ethnic inequities in SARS-COV-2 exposure and COVID-19 morbidity and mortality and considers opportunities to intervene through place-based initiatives and the implementation of a Health in All Policies strategy.

Ovarian cancer survival rates have stagnated in the last 20 years despite the development of novel chemotherapeutic agents. Modulators of gene expression, such as histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibitors, are among the new agents being used in clinical trials. Predictors of sensitivity to chemotherapy have remained elusive. In this study, we show that the expression of the transcriptional corepressor C-terminal binding protein-2 (CtBP2) is elevated in human ovarian tumors. Downregulation of CtBP2 expression in ovarian cancer cell lines using short-hairpin RNA strategy suppressed the growth rate and migration of the resultant cancer cells. The knockdown cell lines also showed upregulation of HDAC activity and increased sensitivity to selected HDAC inhibitors. Conversely, forced expression of wild-type CtBP2 in the knockdown cell lines reversed HDAC activity and partially rescued cellular sensitivity to the HDAC inhibitors. We propose that CtBP2 is an ovarian cancer oncogene that regulates gene expression program by modulating HDAC activity. CtBP2 expression may be a surrogate indicator of cellular sensitivity to HDAC inhibitors.