Now on ScienceBlogs: HeartlandGate: Anti-Science Institute's Insider Reveals Secrets
A water cooler for the public health crowd
Liz Borkowski is a Research Associate at the George Washington University School of Public Health's Department of Environmental and Occupational Health. She lives in Washington, DC and loves public transportation and pumpkin empanadas.
Celeste Monforton, DrPH, MPH is a Professorial Lecturer at the George Washington University School of Public Health's Department of Environmental and Occupational Health. She also spent a decade working for the US Department of Labor, and has served on the teams investigating the 2006 Sago mine disaster and 2010 Upper Big Branch mine disaster for the state of West Virginia.
April 30, 2008
After so many stories about tainted drugs and food, here's some good news for a change: The FDA plans to hire hundreds of new employees to help it fulfill its responsibilities to assure the safety of food, drugs, cosmetics, and...
Posted by at 2:40 PM • 0 Comments •
Category: Occupational Health & Safety
In Congo, an estimated two million artisanal miners account for as much of 90% of the country’s mineral exports. The Washington Post’s Stephanie McCrummen reports on how this unofficial economy works: The diggers usually work in groups of three, heaving...
Posted by at 11:22 AM • 3 Comments •
April 29, 2008
Category: Regulation
Just as the 60-day deadline approached for filing a legal challenge to a new health standard to protect mine workers from asbestos exposure, mining industry trade associations submitted their petitions in federal court. MSHA's rule was published on February 29, and tick-tock,...
Posted by at 3:24 PM • 4 Comments •
Category: Environmental Protection Agency
On the heels of the Union of Concerned Scientists’ report on political interference with EPA scientists, the Government Accountability Office reports that the White House Office of Management and Budget is taking a major and non-transparent role in EPA toxic...
Posted by at 2:17 PM • 0 Comments •
April 28, 2008
Category: Occupational Health & Safety
Today is Workers’ Memorial Day, when we remember the victims of workplace deaths, injuries, and illnesses. According to the International Labor Organization, 2.2 million people die from work-related accidents and diseases every year, and another 430 million suffer from work-related...
Posted by at 3:22 PM • 0 Comments •
April 27, 2008
Category: Safety
On the eve of international Workers' Memorial Day (4/28), Ken Ward of the Charleston Gazette displays again his journalist acumen, particularly on health and safety issues for workers. Thirty years ago today, at the construction of the cooling towers at...
Posted by at 2:25 PM • 5 Comments •
April 25, 2008
Category: Blog roundup
There’s a lot going on right now with the FDA and drug regulation: The Health Affairs Blog has posts by Scott Gottlieb (a former FDA official now at the American Enterprise Institute) and Jerome Kassirer (a former editor-in-chief of the...
Posted by at 4:51 PM • 1 Comments •
April 24, 2008
Category: Environmental Protection Agency
The Union of Concerned Scientists has released another disturbing report about political interference with government science. For Interference at the EPA, they surveyed EPA scientists from all of the agency’s scientific program offices and 10 regional offices, and from more...
Posted by at 3:58 PM • 2 Comments •
April 23, 2008
Category: Regulation
Cong. Woolsey's Workforce Protections Subcommittee held a hearing today on OSHA's inadequate enforcement of safety and health standards at large, multiple-facility corporations. Members of the Committee heard the gruesome details of the death of Mr. Eleazar Torres-Gomez in an industrial dryer at a Cintas Corp. laundry...
Posted by at 3:36 PM • 2 Comments •
Category: Occupational Health & Safety
The longer fighting in Iraq continues, the more disturbing news we get about the troops’ mental health. The latest and most comprehensive study on veterans’ mental health to date (by the Rand Corporation) finds that nearly one in five Iraq...
Posted by at 10:12 AM • 0 Comments •
