Our Opioid Use, Meth, and Drug Injection cores, Visibly Invisible, concentrate on the complex string of factors that contribute to drug use in communities throughout the United States, though particularly rural communities in New York's sprawling and diverse "Southern Tier" (central/Western New York). Our work here centers primarily around a new research project that examines nonmedical opioid use and drug injection among Black, Latino, and Native American individuals in this region. Via funding from Engaged Cornell and the Rural Humanities Initiative, our team is also seeking to elucidate and bridge academia-community chasms through inclusive, equitable research that incorporates the views and ideas of “participants” into the research design a la Community-Based Participatory Research principles.

We're also involved with The Delta Rural Health Study, an NIH-funded project that examines the social epidemiology of opioid use and drug injection in rural southern Illinois, focusing on the southernmost 16 counties in the region.