Community News 16-44

Khadijah Gurnah honored at White House

Khadijah Gurnah of Middeltown, Connecticut, was honored at the White House this week  her work helping to enroll people in health insurance plans under the Affordable Care Act.

Khadija Gurnah is program manager for the American Muslim Health Professionals’ ACA outreach and enrollment efforts.

Read more here: http://www.bnd.com/2014/10/18/3461628/connecticut-woman-to-be-honored.html#storylink=cpy

Khadija earned her Master’s in Health Management from the Yale School of Public Health. She has worked in community health, focusing on inequities in healthcare delivery, and has published papers and articles on healthcare delivery to minority populations. Under Khadija’s direction, AMHP launched the first national grassroots initiative of its kind in the Muslim American community. With a limited budget and only seven on-the-ground organizers, AMHP mobilized 81 partner institutions, resulting in thousands of enrollments and newly formed relationships between clergy and civic leaders across religious, ethnic, and racial lines.

Selena Ahmed’s research establishes link between tea flavor & precipitation

A team of researchers including Montana State University professor Selena Ahmed has found that shifting patterns of precipitation affect key chemicals responsible for the flavor and health properties of tea.

Ahmed, assistant professor of health and human performance in the MSU College of Education, Health and Human Developoment, said the team’s research shows that major antioxidant compounds that determine tea health properties and flavor, including epigallocatechin, epigallocatechin gallate, epicatechin gallate, gallocatechin gallate, catechin and gallic acid, fell up to 50 percent in an area of southwest China during an extreme monsoon, while other compounds increased. Household income from the sales of tea grown during the extreme monsoon also dropped by up to 50 percent, Ahmed said.

The findings are based on field samples taken from tea gardens in southwest China. The researchers collected samples from two extreme weather events – an extreme drought and an extreme monsoon – and performed a chemical analysis of the samples. The researchers also interviewed tea farmers, who perceived the tea grown during the monsoon to be of lower quality and preferred tea grown outside of the monsoon season.

The findings were published Oct. 6 in PLOS ONE, a peer-reviewed journal of thePublic Library of Science. Ahmed was the paper’s lead author.

The results of the research, which attracted attention in a recent New York Times story on various animal and plant species around the world that may be threatened by warmer global temperatures, could have significant impacts on farmers’ livelihoods, both in China and around the globe, Ahmed said.

NY law students & lawyers combat hunger

More than 20 lawyers and law student members of the Muslim Bar Association of New York prepared and served 200 meals to the homeless in Manhattan’s Tompkins Square Park at their first annual “MuBANY Fights Hunger” event. The drive was coordinated with the Hunger Van.

The  event was made possible by donations from the law firms Ahmad Naqvi Rodriguez and Hussain Altaf & Khan.

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