APHA
lborkowski | January 11, 2013by Kim Krisberg
Amidst discussions of new gun control measures, a study finds that adding new settings where people can bring concealed weapons could increase the risk of some crimes.
The study authors note that while that risk is pretty small, it's still a risk and one that policymakers should take into consideration. Published in the January issue of the American Journal of Public Health, the study examined 2001–2009 data from the Texas Department of Public Safety on criminal convictions associated with holders and nonholders of concealed handgun licenses (CHL). It found that concealed…
cmonforton | November 5, 2012At last week's American Public Health Association (APHA) annual meeting its Governing Council adopted about a dozen new policies to guide the Association's advocacy activities. Over APHA's 140 year history, these resolutions have covered a variety of public health topics, from the 1950 policy supporting fluoridation of public water supplies, the 1960 policy supporting compulsory pasteurization of milk, the 1969 policy calling for American forces to be withdrawn from Vietnam, to the 1982 policy condemning the apartheid policy of the Government of the Republic of South Africa, and the 2009…
lborkowski | September 14, 2012by Kim Krisberg
Funny cats and disaster preparedness. It's a marriage made in Internet heaven.
"Cats are all over the Internet," says Michele Late, coordinator of the American Public Health Association's (APHA) Cat Preparedness Photo Contest. "And if cats are what people want, then marrying them with emergency preparedness seems like a smart fit."
Launched just after Labor Day weekend, APHA's cat photo contest takes its inspiration from the enormous popularity of an Internet meme known as LOLcats, in which — yep, you guessed it — people take funny photos of cats and photoshop them with funny…
lborkowski | August 3, 2012by Kim Krisberg
To the long list of hard-to-pronounce bacteria and viruses that threaten people's health can now be added one more threat: sequestration. Except sequestration isn't a disease — well, unless you'd call Congress' chronic inability to deal with the national debt in a fair and balanced way a disease.
Of course, if sequestration were a real disease, the public health system might actually be immune to such budget-slashing illnesses by now, considering its near-constant exposure rate. But come this January, if Congress doesn't act, the public health system will absorb another round…
cmonforton | July 23, 2012A night out for the midnight premiere of the summer blockbuster "Batman: The Dark Knight Rises" turned deadly. Twelve people are dead and at least 59 were wounded. The victims will be mourned, the suspect studied, and the incident relegated to our criminal justice system. In my circle, however, we see gun violence a public health problem. It affects people, it causes death, injury and disability, and it can be addressed with environmental, legal, and behavioral interventions. A classic paper examining violence in a public health frame was published in a 1993 issue of the journal Health…
lborkowski | June 28, 2012by Kim Krisberg
For me, there were few better places to hear about today's 5-4 Supreme Court ruling upholding the Affordable Care Act and its individual insurance mandate than at a meeting of the American Public Health Association (APHA). Here in Charlotte, N.C., for APHA's Midyear Meeting, I was surrounded by hundreds of public health practitioners, researchers and advocates as we all watched the magnified scroll of Scotusblog.com, anxiously waiting for the decision.
At 10:08 a.m., the blog declared: "The individual mandate survives as a tax."
That was when the cheers (and tears) began. You…
lborkowski | May 21, 2012by Kim Krisberg
"We will pay for this by taking money from one of the slush funds in the president's health care law."
That's an April quote from U.S. House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, on how Republicans plan to offset the cost of stopping scheduled hikes in student loan interest rates. And the "slush fund" in question? The Prevention and Public Health Fund, the historic $15 billion investment in prevention authorized via the Affordable Care Act (ACA).
The April move by House Republicans wasn't the first attempt to raid the fund. Several tries have been made to repeal the fund entirely or…
lborkowski | May 3, 2012by Andrea Hricko, MPH
Rick Brown, PhD, a sociologist by training, was a world renowned champion of public health. Thousands of occupational health, children's health, and community health advocates who knew him are mourning his loss. Rick passed away two weeks ago of a stroke while lecturing in Kentucky.
His work on health care issues (especially the lack of health insurance for children) and his development of the California Health Interview Survey (CHIS) were just two of his major achievements. He was a longtime professor at UCLA School of Public Health, adviser to several U.S. Presidents,…
lborkowski | April 2, 2012This week (April 2-8) is National Public Health Week. As Kim Krisberg described a couple of weeks ago, localities and groups across the country are recognizing it with a wide range of activities, from a health film festival to a safe sex carnival to a 1950s-themed health fair featuring the jitterbug and hula hoops. (Go here to find an event in your area.) This year, the American Public Health Association (which has organized National Public Health Week since 1995) has made the week's theme "A Healthier American Begins Today: Join the Movement!" The NPHW website explains the theme's…
cmonforton | February 23, 2012Agricultural exceptionalism is a term used to describe the special status awarded to employers and firms involved in agriculture. Proponents argue that the special status is necessary because (1) agricultural products contribute to broad national goals (e.g., providing safe and affordable food, preventing hunger); and (2) farming is inherently risky because of the uncertainty of weather and pests.
This exceptionalism allows employers, for example, to provide lesser protection and benefits to their workers compared to what is given to workers employed in non-agriculture industries.…
lborkowski | December 19, 2011J. Freedom du Lac reports in the Washington Post that Army Spec. David Emanuel Hickman, killed by a roadside bomb in Baghdad on November 14th, was the 4,474th US servicemember to be killed in Iraq. With all the US troops now gone from Iraq, Hickman's death may well be the last servicemember fatality directly attributed to this conflict. The number of Iraqi deaths is much higher and much less precise; the Iraq Body Count website puts it between 104,122 and 113,700. And as a 2009 American Public Health Association policy statement points out, the consequences are greater than death alone. Here'…
lborkowski | November 2, 2011Something that's come up in a couple of the different sessions I've attended at the American Public Health Association annual meeting is the problem of inadequate definitions of success. It's important to set targets and measure progress against them - and missing targets can be a signal that it's time to revise the strategy. But if the targets are set without sufficient thought, a person or group can think they're succeeding when they're not really doing such a great job.
One example of this came up in the session "Getting from here to there: Promoting health and environmental justice…
lborkowski | November 1, 2011One of my favorite parts of the American Public Health Association annual meeting is the Occupational Health & Safety Section's awards lunch. It's always inspiring to hear about and from the award recipients, who bring dedication, creativity, and much-needed stubbornness to the cause of ensuring safe and healthy workplaces. The 2011 honorees are:
Alice Hamilton Award: Martin Cherniack of the Center for the Promotion of Health in the New England Workplace (CPH-NEW), author of the book The Hawk's Nest Incident: America's Worst Industrial Disaster
Lorin Kerr Awards: Lamont Byrd of the…
cmonforton | September 19, 2011The winners of this year's American Public Health Association's (APHA) recognition awards for achievement in occupational health and safety illustrate the diversity of talent among those committed to ensuring workers' rights to a safe workplace. Martin Cherniak, MD is a clinician and researcher at the University of Connecticut; Amy Liebman is with the Migrant Clinicians Network; Dr. Salvador Moncada i LluÃs is with Spain's Union Institute of Work Environment and Health; LaMont Byrd is Director of Safety and Health for the Teamsters; and Barbara Rahke, a grassroots leader in Philadelphia's…
lborkowski | May 18, 2011By Kim Krisberg
Climate change is one of the greatest challenges of our time. Climate change will affect, in profoundly adverse ways, some of the most fundamental determinants of health: food, air, water. In the face of this challenge, we need champions throughout the world who will work to put protecting human health at the centre of the climate change agenda.
-- Margaret Chan, MD, MPH, director-general, World Health Organization, 2008
Human health may not be the first image that pops to mind when it comes to climate change. People often envision melting icebergs or desperate polar bears…
lborkowski | December 29, 2010Liz and Celeste are on vacation, so we're re-posting some content from our old site.
By Celeste Monforton, originally posted 4/5/10
The painful and deadly toll that asbestos imposes on families across the globe is a public health problem of growing magnitude. In the U.S., individuals who are diagnosed today with asbestos-related disease may trace their exposure to the lethal mineral fibers back several decades. The number of new cases of asbestos-related disease in the U.S. has not yet plateaued, and may not for years. Globally, the World Health Organization estimates that 125 million…
lborkowski | December 23, 2010United States Senator Bernard Sanders, Independent of Vermont, received this year's Paul Wellstone Award at the Activist Dinner on 7 November in Denver, during the annual meeting of the American Public Health Association. Dr. Anthony Robbins presented the award "for his principled support for a universal comprehensive health care system..."
Senator Sanders prepared this video for the activists who attended. During his 10-minute address (skip to 0:40 for the start of remarks), Senator Sanders focuses on the new healthcare law and explains why he voted for it, what it does for prevention and…
egrossman | November 23, 2010by Elizabeth Grossman
At this year's American Public Health Association (APHA) annual meeting that took place in Denver November 7-11, the APHA's Environmental and Occupational Health and Safety sections proposed new policy statements that recommend proactive strategies for preventing illness and injury by reducing exposure to hazardous chemicals and through design that promotes workplace safety. All five policy statements presented at public hearings on November 7 have now been approved. Two additional policy proposals - one that addresses the public health impact of U.S immigration policy…
lborkowski | November 18, 2010Last week at the American Public Health Association's annual meeting in Denver, APHA's Occupational Health and Safety section held its awards luncheon - always one of the highlights of the meeting thanks to its combination of stellar awardees and creative musical skit. This year's award winners won well-deserved recognition for the many ways in which they advance occupational health and safety.
Sherry Baron won the 2010 Alice Hamilton Award, which "recognizes the life-long contributions of individuals who have distinguished themselves through a career of hard work and dedication to improve…