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February 29, 2008
The safety and sustainability of the worldâs food supply has been on peopleâs minds lately.
Andrew Schneider at Secret Ingredients reminds us of the tainted food problems weâve had here over the past several years, from E.Coli-contaminated spinach and salmonella-tainted pot pies to the latest…
February 29, 2008
Weâve written before about the problems with conflicts of interest on EPA scientific advisory panels. In particular, we think scientists working for product defense firms, whose money comes from clients seeking to avoid regulation of their products, ought to be barred from such panels. Now, a group…
February 28, 2008
I wrote last week about how the FDAâs mixup with Chinese factory names kept it from inspecting the Chinese facility producing the main ingredient for Baxterâs heparin; this problem came to light after the drug was implicated in four deaths. (To date, more than 400 adverse reactions have been…
February 28, 2008
The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco has ruled that Californiaâs regulation of pollution from ships using its port is pre-empted by the Clean Air Act, and thus requires a waiver from the EPA. This is bad news for the state, since the last time it requested a waiver from EPA, the…
February 27, 2008
The Charlotte Observerâs excellent series on poultry workers began by detailing the injuries workers suffer and the way company officials dismiss their complaints (highlighted in a previous roundup), and continued with a look at the inadequate regulations, inspections, and fines for poultry-…
February 27, 2008
Diacetyl â the butter-flavoring chemical linked to severe lung disease in food and flavoring workers â hasnât been in the news much recently. It got a lot of attention in September, when we drew attention to the case of a Colorado man who appeared to have developed bronciolitis obliterans from…
February 26, 2008
Todayâs front page story in USA Today is about a shortage of surgeons at U.S. hospitals, with a focus on rural areas; the shortage threatens the health of 54 million rural Americans, reports Robert Davis. Part of the problem is that medical schools held enrollment steady for too long, rather than…
February 25, 2008
Most of us are lucky enough not to have to worry about our sewage. We flush the toilet, it goes away somewhere, and we don't have to worry about cholera or other diseases that spread when waste contaminates the water supply.
While most of sewage systems do a great job of making the water look clean…
February 25, 2008
In the LA Times, Victoria Kim follows up on the issue of USDA inspections related to the record-setting beef recall. The terrible practices caught on tape at the Hallmark slaughterhouse evidently occurred under the nose of USDA inspectors, and Kimâs article explains how this can happen:…
February 24, 2008
That's the headline from an editorial in today's Savannah Morning News, laying responsibility for the broken workplace safety regulatory system on the Secretary of Labor's desk. The words of editorial page editor, Tom Barton, sound like those I've heard before when a workplace disaster strikes a…
February 22, 2008
Thereâs been a lot of blogging about vaccines lately:
Mark Meier at Science Progress explains how a cocaine-addiction vaccine was developed, and what questions and hurdles it still faces.
Jacob Goldstein at WSJâs Health Blog explains what this yearâs mismatched flu vaccine means for next yearâs…
February 21, 2008
In an 8-1 decision in Riegel v. Medtronic, the Supreme Court has ruled that medical-device manufacturers whose products secured pre-market FDA approval are immune from liability for personal injuries. So, if youâre injured by a medical device (like a drug-coated stent or prosthetic hip) thatâs…
February 21, 2008
There are a number of memorable quotes in the Center for Study of Responsive Law's newly released report "Undermining Safety: A Report on Coal Mine Safety."  In one section, report author Christopher W. Shaw discusses the mining industry's lobbying for "targeted inspections" (a la the OSHA…
February 20, 2008
As the recent problems with tainted food, drugs, toys, and other consumer products have made clear, our regulatory system has a lot of holes in it. Part of the problem is the current reluctance of agency appointees to do anything that might burden the industries in question, but thatâs not the…
February 20, 2008
In the Washington Post, Petula Dvorak describes the jobs of social workers in the nationâs capital:
As guardians watching over thousands of the city's imperiled children each year, social workers confront armed drug dealers, push past stoned parents, shrug off cockroaches, sit on urine-soaked…
February 20, 2008
OSHA's Regional Office in New York announced the successful resolution of a retaliation case filed by a worker who was discharged by his employer after he expressed concerns about entering a workspace which had just been "bombed" with an insecticide. The case began more than two years ago at a…
February 19, 2008
If you havenât heard yet, USDA has ordered the largest meat recall in U.S. history â 143 million pounds of beef from the Hallmark/Westland Meat Packing Company. USDA officials believe that the meat distributed by the company poses little or no hazard to consumers, which is fortunate, because much…
February 19, 2008
Baxter International announced recently that it has temporarily halted production of heparin, a generic anti-clotting drug, because of four fatalities and hundreds of bad reactions potentially tied to the drug. Baxter and the FDA say they donât know the exact cause of the bad reactions, but…
February 18, 2008
Kudos! to the U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB) for providing an update on their investigation of the devastating explosion at the Imperial Sugar/Dixie Crystals refinery near Port Wentworth, Georgia. As I've noted in previous posts, because the CSB makes it part of their business to provide …
February 16, 2008
The final deceased victim of the February 7 explosion at the Imperial Sugar refinery has been recovered from the scene, and a ninth victim, Mr. Michael Fields, 40, succumbed to his severe injuries earlier today at the Joseph M. Still Burn Center in Augusta, Georgia.  U.S. Senators Johnny…
February 15, 2008
Those hoping to fix the U.S.âs current healthcare system have plenty to chew on this week.
Sara Robinson at Campaign for Americaâs Future debunks several myths about U.S. vs. Canadian healthcare (Part I here). Keep this handy for the next time someone whines that single-payer healthcare will mean…
February 15, 2008
Friends and colleagues continue to offer lovely memorials to Rep. Tom Lantos (D-CA), who passed away on February 11. (here, here)  Human Rights Watch noted in their tribute  he was an "unwavering advocate for fundamental rights," and "his remarkable and sustained efforts on behalf of…
February 14, 2008
Public health values prevention. In many cases, this means spending a relatively small amount of money up front (on things like water treatment and vaccination) to avoid spending a lot more money later (on medical care, lost productivity, and reduced earning potential - not to mention quality of…
February 14, 2008
Reporters and bloggers are using the occasion of Valentineâs Day to explore the health and environmental aspects of typical gifts and recommend worker- and Earth-friendly alternatives.
â¢Â Jennifer Sass at NRDCâs Switchboard blog describes how typical greenhouse practices harm flower workers, and…
February 13, 2008
Fire suppression experts from a North Carolina firm are providing assistance in Port Wentworth, Georgia at the Imperial Sugar factory. After the devastating explosion five days ago on Thursday evening, February 7, the fire continues to burn.  Two workers remain missing in the fire and debris.…
February 13, 2008
This week, North Carolinaâs Charlotte Observer is running an in-depth series, âThe human cost of bringing poultry to your table.â After a 22-month investigation, reporters convey the grim picture: poultry-plant workers suffer high rates of crippling injuries, but fear losing their jobs if they…
February 12, 2008
Forbes has created a âMisery Measureâ to rank the countryâs 150 biggest metro areas, and I wasnât surprised to see Detroit awarded the title of Most Miserable City. What did surprise me, though, was one of the factors Forbes considered: number of Superfund sites. Kudos to them for acknowledging…
February 12, 2008
The date is set for the presidential candidatesâ Science Debate 2008 â itâll be April 18th at Philadelphiaâs Franklin Institute â so now the push is to get candidatesâ commitment to participate. Hillary Clinton, Mike Huckabee, John McCain, and Barack Obama have been invited, and the fact that the…
February 11, 2008
The tumultuous tenure of Dr. David Schwartz, who directed the NIH National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, is over. Bob Grant at TheScientist.com reports:
During his time as NIEHS director, Schwartz's leadership was often questioned. Scientists and lawmakers criticized Schwartz in 2005…
February 11, 2008
By Francis Hamilton Rammazzocchi
For the second time in two months, America has witnessed a catastrophic industrial explosion involving multiple fatalities. On December 19, 2007, the small T2 Chemicals in Jacksonville, FL, detonated in a towering mushroom cloud, killing four workers. And earlier…