Age bias a challenge to prove in the workplace; coal miner deaths up over last year; workers protest after the death of a California farmworker; and the United Auto Workers looks forward after union defeat at Nissan plant in Mississippi.
The Pump Handle mourns the death of Lizzie Grossman. She was a contributor to The Pump Handle for more than six years. Lizzie’s first dozen blog posts featured her reporting about the Deepwater Horizon clean-up.
Public trust in science is a fickle creature. Surveys show a clear majority of Americans believe science has positively impacted society, and they’re more likely to trust scientists on issues like climate change and vaccines. On the other hand, surveys also find that factors like politics, religion, age and race can greatly impact the degree of that trust. It presents a delicate challenge for agencies that depend on trust in science to do their jobs.
U.S. investments in global health research have saved millions of lives and prevented immeasurable suffering. And by working to detect, treat and eventually eliminate infectious diseases worldwide, we’re protecting our own country too. That cliché about diseases knowing no borders is unfortunately very true. All that alone should be enough to remain committed to the cause.
Government
Study: Small drop in measles vaccination rate could cost public sector millions of dollars
Another day, another study that underscores the societal benefits of vaccines and the consequences we’d face without them.
The feds grant billions in contracts to shipbuilders with serious worker safety lapses; Texas lawmakers want to undo an Austin initiative that protects construction workers; Chevron agrees to highest fine in Cal/OSHA history after refinery fire; and Democrats hope to ban a dangerous pesticide after EPA fails to act.
Affordable Care Act
Study: ACA-backed efforts to reduce hospital readmissions also reduced mortality
With the future of the Affordable Care Act still up in the air, most of the news coverage has gone to insurance coverage, premiums and Medicaid. And rightly so. But also included in the massive health reform law were a number of innovative measures to improve the quality and value of the medical care we actually get in the doctor’s office. With repeal still on the table, those measures are at risk too.
Uber’s new insurance plan won’t do much to protect its injured workers; investigation finds 1,000 additional black lung cases in Appalachia; Washington state welcomes a new paid family leave law; and St. Louis workers face a pay cut after state legislators overturn the city’s minimum wage hike.
Five-part series investigates worker safety and lax accountability at nuclear facilities; workers at port trucking companies in Southern California report conditions mirroring indentured servitude; seventh journalist murdered in Mexico since beginning of 2017; and a new farmworkers union is born in Washington.
Affordable Care Act
GOP health care bills would cripple public health opioid response: ‘We’d essentially be putting up the white flag’
In Cuyahoga County, Ohio, nearly 200 people have died from opioid-related overdoses in the first five months of this year. That means that this one U.S. county is on pace to lose more than 700 people to fatal overdoses by the end of 2017.