lborkowski | November 3, 2011Bicycling has been in the news a lot this week. E&E News reports that China is trying to get people back onto bicycles in an attempt to address traffic problems. The city of Zhongshan has launched a bike-sharing system with 4,000 bikes; Hangzhou and Shanghai have systems with 50,000 and 19,000 bikes, respectively. Reporter Coco Liu contrasts these figures to the US's largest bike-sharing program: DC's, with 1,100 bikes. (Read my earlier post on Capital Bikeshare here.) Even with such relatively large systems, though, demand can quickly outstrip supply, as when a train full of homeward-…
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…
lborkowski | October 31, 2011The American Public Health Association is having its annual meeting in DC this week, and the theme is "Healthy Communities Promote Healthy Minds & Bodies." The APHA YouTube channel features several clips from yesterday's opening session, including former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, who spoke about the Affordable Care Act, and APHA President Dr. Linda Rae Murray, who noted "we are not where we used to be - but we are not where we need to be."
Kim Krisberg, whose name you may recognize from her monthly posts here, describes some of the opening session highlights at the APHA Annual…
egrossman | October 28, 2011by Elizabeth Grossman
Bananas in Ecuador, Nicaragua, Belize, and the Philippines; broccoli in Guatemala; carpets in India, Nepal, and Pakistan; cocoa in Ghana, Ivory Coast, Nigeria, and Cameroon; coffee in Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Kenya, Mexico, and Panama; cotton in Egypt, Brazil, China, Uzbekistan, and Turkey; electronics and toys in China, clothing in China, India, Malaysia, Thailand, and Argentina; rice in Brazil, India, and the Philippines; melons, onions, and tomatoes in Mexico What these products - along with diamonds, gold, sugarcane, shoes, rare earth and…
lborkowski | October 27, 2011The Obama administration has asked a federal advisory committee, the National Biodefense Science Board, to make recommendations about testing the anthrax vaccine in children. The vaccine has been tested in adults, administered to military personnel, and stockpiled so it can be administered quickly should an attack occur in the US. The Washington Post's Rob Stein reports that a federal simulation of an anthrax attack got federal officials thinking about how to handle children. If an actual attack occurs, would be easier to make the call to vaccinate children if we had already conducted…
cmonforton | October 26, 2011In big bold orange letters, the cover of the United Mine Workers of America's (UMWA) report on the Upper Big Branch mine disaster reads "Industrial Homicide." The union's 154-page report says:
"Massey Energy must be held accountable for the death of each of the 29 miners. Theirs is not a guilt of omission but rather, based on the facts publicly available, the Union believes that Massey Energy and its management were on notice of and recklessly tolerated mining conditions that were so egregious that the resulting disaster constituted a massive slaughter in the nature of an industrial homicide…
lborkowski | October 25, 2011A few of the recent pieces I've liked:
Maryn McKenna at Superbug: Scathing Report: Polio Eradication "Not ... Any Time Soon"
Douglas Starr at Discover Magazine: Sparks of Truth: Can Science Bring Justice to Arson Trials?
Scicurious at The Scicurious Brain: Grab your Coffee, I think this paper may depress you
Patricia Leigh Brown at California Watch: On edge of paradise, Coachella workers live in grim conditions
Andrew Villegas at Kaiser Health News: Groups Thank "Obamacare," and Not Sarcastically
And in the "worth hearing" category: Not Exactly Rocket Science blogger Ed Yong talks to BBC's…
New data shows nursing home workers suffer more injuries than construction, factory and mine workers
cmonforton | October 24, 2011We've seen reality shows featuring dirty jobs, cops and coal miners. I wonder if it's time for one showing a day-in-the-life of nursing home workers. Most of us don't give much thought to what goes on inside of nursing homes, that is until a friend or family member needs to reside in one. What might appear as a quiet, slow-paced, restful setting is usually a stress-filled, physically-demanding environment for the people who work in them. Lifting and moving patients from beds, toilets, recliners, showers, and wheelchairs can cause all sorts of injuries, but then throw on top of that, the…
lborkowski | October 21, 2011The Institute of Medicine has released a report recommending that the Food and Drug Administration and the US Department of Agriculture consider "a fundamental shift in strategy" when it comes to nutrition labeling." While the recommendation for a "front-of-package" (FOP) labeling system is not new, the IOM authors don't just want the usual nutrition facts to be moved from the back of the package to the front; rather, new labels should specifically encourage shoppers to choose healthier products.
The authors cite EPA's Energy Star program as a successful government labeling system, because it…
cmonforton | October 20, 2011Tucked away on federal OSHA's website is a list of 163 employers with the dishonorable label "severe violator." The designation comes from an enforcement program launched in April 2010 to identify
"recalcitrant employers who endanger workers by demonstrating indifference to their responsibilities under the law."
The label is not easy to get. In any given year, less than 1% of U.S. worksites are subject to an OSHA inspection, and few violations (only about 4%) are classified as "willful," "repeat," or "failure-to-abate" ----one of the necessary criteria for the severe violator designation…
cmonforton | October 19, 2011It's too late for Ronald Martin of Dema, Kentucky. "I'm in last stage of black lung," he wrote in shaky script, "please help the miners so they won't suffer like I suffer. I can't breathe but a little." Mr. Martin sent his note to the Labor Department's Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) to comment on the agency's proposed rule to reduce workers' exposure to respirable coal mine dust---the dust that damaged his lungs so severely. Other coal miners also sent their comments to MSHA, urging the agency to put a more protective regulation in place as soon as possible to prevent…
lborkowski | October 18, 2011by Kim Krisberg
Mark Martin isn't inclined to sit down and shut up -- well, unless it's on the seat of a bicycle.
"More people need joy in their lives and there's a real simple way to get it: ride a bicycle," Martin told me. "It's a joyous thing to ride a bike."
The Baton Rouge, La., bicyclist hasn't owned a car in 20 years -- "I just love my bike," he said. In fact, he loves biking so much that he said he was driving people crazy talking about the need for better biking and pedestrian infrastructure in his community. Somebody ought to do something about it, he thought, and so he did.…
lborkowski | October 17, 2011The kidnapping of two aid workers from the Dadaab refugee camp on the Kenya-Somalia border is a grim reminder of the crisis situation in the region, especially Somalia. Al-Jazeera's Peter Greste has some numbers:
[I]n Somalia alone, four million people are still starving nationwide; three million of those live in the South. Of these, 750,000 people risk death in the next four months if they do not get aid immediately.
According to the United Nations agency responsible for monitoring food supplies in Somalia, almost half a million children are suffering from "severe acute malnutrition". About…
lborkowski | October 14, 2011
By Jay Graham
Global Handwashing Day is coming up on October 15, and events in its honor will be occurring all week. Children are a key focus of handwashing campaigns. Diarrhea continues as the second leading cause of death in kids under 5 years of age globally. Nearly one in every five child deaths, around 1.5 million a year, is due to diarrhea. It kills more children than AIDS, malaria, and measles combined - more than 4,000 children dying every day.
So, why Global Handwashing Day? Handwashing may be the single most cost-effective public health intervention ever. In a systematic review,…
cmonforton | October 13, 2011An ad hoc committee of the Institute of Medicine (IOM) identified a litany of potential benefits of including information about individuals' occupations, industry, and work environment in their electronic health records (EHRs). The reason the question was posed at all stems from a provision in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 which provides hefty incentives for health care providers to convert patients' medical records from paper to electronic form. At the time the bill was passed, one reporter noted that only about 8 percent of the nation's hospitals and 17% of its…
lborkowski | October 12, 2011Back in August, events and exhibits marked the one-year anniversary of learning that 33 miners who were trapped underground in Chile's San Jose mine were alive. The rescue, which involved drilling a 2,000 foot shaft and lifting out the miners who'd endured 69 days underground, captivated viewers around the world.
The New York Times' Alexei Barrionuevo takes a look at how the miners have fared since their rescue, and reports that the trauma of being trapped underground continues to afflict many of them. Their situations are not what one might expect for international celebrities:
One year…
lborkowski | October 11, 2011Last Friday, CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report included a report on the listeriosis outbreak associated with Jensen Farms cantaloupe (the grower is recalling the melons; look for "Rocky Ford" on the label). So far, 84 cases have been confirmed in 19 states, and 15 of these victims have died.
The number of cases may continue to rise, because even though the contaminated cantaloupes are at or near the end of their shelf life, the illness has a long incubation period (usually 1-3 weeks, but as much as 70 days). People who ingested the bacteria in late September might still experience…
cmonforton | October 10, 2011Freshman congressman Larry Bucshon (R-IN) scolded OSHA chief David Michaels for using the term "cancer" as a buzz word. The congressman, who is also a thoracic surgeon, said:
"I don't like it when people use buzz words that try to get people's attention, and cancer is one of those."
The exchanged occured last week at a House congressional oversight hearing called "Workplace Safety: Ensuring a Responsible Regulatory Environment," where Members were examining some of OSHA's enforcement and regulatory initiatives. Assistant Secretary of Labor for OSHA, David Michaels mentioned lung cancer in…
egrossman | October 7, 2011by Elizabeth Grossman
On September 7th, Tropical Storm Nate began roaring over the Gulf of Mexico where a liftboat, the Trinity II, was stationed in the Bay of Campeche working for Geokinetics, a U.S. company engaged to support offshore oil operations of the Mexican oil company Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex). By the 8th, high seas and winds had disabled the Trinity II - a liftboat that serves as a kind of work platform with legs anchored in the ocean floor - compelling the ten member crew to abandon the Trinity II and attempt to board a life raft. According to a chronology posted by Geokinetics…