lborkowski | August 9, 2012Millions of people will gain insurance under the Affordable Care Act, but will they be able to get appointments with healthcare providers? Coverage doesn't automatically translate into access, and some newly insured individuals will struggle to find physician practices that will take them on as patients. In particular, states that adopt the (now optional) Affordable Care Act Medicaid expansion, which extends eligibility to adults up to 133% of the poverty level, may encounter a severe shortage of providers willing to accept new Medicaid patients. Although Medicaid reimbursement levels vary…
cmonforton | August 8, 2012The NBC News affiliate in California's Bay Area released last week a multi-part investigative series entitled "Children in the field: American kids pick your food." The anchorwoman introducing the first segment said:
"They are too young to drive, work in an office, or even a local fast food joint, but thousands of them work long hours in brutal conditions to make sure we eat well, and on the cheap."
Investigative reporter Stephen Stock added:
"We talked to children who said they started working the fields when they were 8, 10 and 11 years old. While most of us had jobs when we were teens,…
cmonforton | August 7, 2012I feel dense for not knowing this important public health fact: women with extremely dense breast tissue are at least four times more likely to develop breast cancer.
Over the years, I've had my routine screening mammograms with stellar results. No evidence of cancer in my two mammary glands. I've heard radiology technicians comment about my dense breasts, but I thought it was an interesting attribute like droopy breast, or perky breasts or double D breasts.
In December 2011, just before my 50th birthday, I was overdue for my routine screening mammogram. I felt a little guilty for putting…
lborkowski | August 6, 2012We've written before (see here and here) about Sheri Sangji, a 23-year-old laboratory worker who died from burns she suffered when one of the chemicals she was using caught fire. She was working unsupervised and without protective clothing in a UCLA chemistry lab, using tert-Butyllithium solution, which reacts violently with water and is spontaneously flammable in air. Jim Morris of the Center for Public Integrity describes the tragedy and the events following it in an in-depth piece for iWatch News. About the repurcussions, including legal proceedings that are now underway, Morris writes:
[…
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…
lborkowski | August 2, 2012A bill just passed by the Massachusetts legislature secures important rights for temporary workers. The Temporary Workers Right to Know Act would require temporary staffing agencies to provide employees with a written job order containing information about the staffing agency and worksite employer; the job requirements (including any special clothing, tools, and trainings necessary, and any costs that will be charged to the employee); details about when and how much the employee will be paid; and details about any fees the employee will be charged, such as for meals or transportation. It…
lborkowski | August 1, 2012By Dick Clapp
After years of diligent and effective advocacy by former Marines and family members, the House voted on July 31, 2012 in favor of the Honoring America’s Veterans and Caring for Camp Lejeune Families Act (H.R. 1627). The House version was amended by the Senate and passed earlier in July and the final version now goes on to President Obama for signing into law. The first section of the bill is named after Janey Ensminger, the nine year-old daughter of former Marine Jerry Ensminger, who was conceived and born at Camp Lejeune and lived there until she was diagnosed with leukemia,…
cmonforton | July 31, 2012A few weeks ago, the editors of my local Austin American-Statesman admitted they were wrong. In "Tort reform's slight impact no shock," the editors recalled their support for a 2003 proposition on the Texas ballot to put a $750,000 cap on non-economic damages in medical malpractice cases. The measure passed by a 51 to 49 percent margin, with strong support by the Texas Medical Association.
"We tepidly supported the proposition. After all, voters were being asked to limit their legal rights should they fall victim to medical error. Still, reservations noted, we crossed our fingers in the…
cmonforton | July 30, 2012[7/30/2012 Update below]
Just hours before a granite memorial was unveiled for the 29 men who were killed in the Upper Big Branch (UBB) coal mine on April 5, 2010, another West Virginia coal miner was killed on-the-job. Johnny Mack Bryant II, 35, died at the Coal River Mining Fork Creek #10 mine in neighboring Boone County. The mine is about 20 miles from Whitesville, WV the location of the UBB memorial. The Charleston (WV) Gazette reports the fatal-injury incident occurred at about 4:15 am on July 27 when Mr. Bryant was fatally "pinned between a mine wall and the boom of a continuous…
lborkowski | July 27, 2012by Kim Krisberg
In the fall of 2011, a new Texas statute took effect against employers who engage in wage theft, or failing to pay workers as much as they’re owed. The statewide statute put in place real consequences, such as jail time and hefty fines, for employers found guilty of stealing wages from workers. It was a big step forward in a state where wage theft has become as common as cowboy boots and pick-up trucks.
In El Paso, which sits on the western-most tip of Texas on the border with Juarez, Mexico, and is among the most populous cities in the nation, wage theft has become so rampant…
cmonforton | July 26, 2012The New York Times headline read "Fire Ravages a Doll Factory In Southern China, Killing 81." It was November 1993, the city was Shenzhen and the location was the Zhili toy factory. Ms. Yuying Chen, 17, was one of 250 workers in the factory. Like many others, she had traveled from her rural farming community to the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone to work in a manufacturing plant. She dutifully sent money back home to her family. When the fire broke out, the workers found the doors and windows locked making escape difficult. Ms. Chen suffered third-degree burns over 75 percent of her…
lborkowski | July 25, 2012The 19th International AIDS Conference is happening this week here in Washington, DC, and as the Washington Post's David Brown reminds us, it's a very different gathering from one that took place in San Francisco in 1990, when HIV was a mystery and AIDS a death sentence. Today, AIDS is still a terrible disease, but better understanding of it has improved both interventions and attitudes. "The issue is no longer what to do but rather whom to do it for, where, how quickly and at what cost," Brown writes. He offers this global snapshot:
Today, more than 8 million people in low- and middle-income…
lborkowski | July 24, 2012Celeste wrote earlier about an excellent series of investigative stories on the resurgence of black lung disease among US coal miners. If you missed any of them when they first came out, they are:
“Dust reforms stalled by years of inaction” and “Miners say UBB mine cheated on dust sampling,” by Ken Ward Jr., Charleston Gazette
“Black lung surges back in coal country,” by Chris Hamby, iWatch News (Center for Public Integrity)
“As Mine Protections Fail, Black Lung Cases Surge” and “Black-Lung Rule Loopholes Leave Miners Vulnerable,” by Howard Berkes, NPR (and more from NPR on black lung here…
egrossman | July 23, 2012by Elizabeth Grossman
When the National Institute of Occupational Health and Safety (NIOSH) found exposure levels of respirable silica at hydraulic fracturing (fracking) operations that were 10, 25, and 100 times greater than federal recommended safety limits, NIOSH was confident enough about these findings to present them at a national Institute of Medicine forum and to publish them on its website. These findings also formed the basis of a hazard alert issued jointly by NIOSH and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). But as I reported previously on The Pump Handle, NIOSH…
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 | July 20, 2012by Kim Krisberg
Legislative attacks on women's health care are so commonplace these days that they make proposals that don't include a state-mandated vaginal probe seem moderate.
In fact, so many legislators are introducing proposals under the guise of protecting women's health (2011 marked a record number of reproductive health restrictions), that it was pretty refreshing to read how the Affordable Care Act will actually protect women's health. Like, for real.
Last week, the Commonwealth Fund released a report finding that the health reform law is already making a difference in the lives of…
cmonforton | July 19, 2012I wonder sometimes if House Republicans have the same reading list as former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin. They obviously didn't read the series of articles about black lung disease in U.S. coal miners prepared by Chris Hamby and Jim Morris of the Center for Public Integrity, and Ken Ward Jr., of the Charleston (WV) Gazette. Coal mine workers in their 30's, 40's and 50's are developing the fast-progressing form of the lung disease. The stories lay out in detail some of the reasons for the epidemic, as well as the ineffective regulatory and enforcement system that fails to protect our nation…
cmonforton | July 18, 2012Patty and Gary Quarles lost their only child on April 5, 2010. Gary Wayne Quarles, 33, was part of the crew operating the longwall mining machine at Massey Energy's Upper Big Branch coal mine. He died that day in a massive coal dust explosion along with 28 other men. Patty's and Gary's life will never be the same. The lives of all the families and close friends of those 29 coal miners changed forever that day. They've suffered losses that few of us will ever understand. A recent story in the Washington Post entitled "After Massey mine disaster killed their son, settlement of millions…
cmonforton | July 17, 2012You'd think the chemical giants Dow, DuPont, and the 160 other firms who are members of the American Chemistry Council (ACC) would expect the association's lobbyists to get their facts straight when moaning to Congress about federal regulations. Last week the ACC claimed that the Labor Department's Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) was moving forward with a regulation on combustible dust. They claimed that the "proposed rule will only add onerous requirements to existing regulations." The ACC also made the ludicrous claim that OSHA had not "met its statutory obligation…
lborkowski | July 16, 2012If you haven't yet read Maryn McKenna's riveting Atlantic article "How Your Chicken Dinner is Creating a Drug-Resistant Superbug," you should. McKenna, working with the with the Food and Environment Reporting Network, has delved into research that's been accumulating about the association between the extensive use of antibiotics in poultry and the increase in drug-resistant urinary tract infections.
A quick bit of background: For decades, health officials and advocates have been concerned about the overuse of antibiotics. The more you use an antibiotic, the more quickly bacteria resistant to…