Our countryâs food-safety system may leave a lot to be desired, but the New York Timesâ Gardiner Harris reminds us that we should be grateful to the epidemiologists who let us know an outbreak is occurring at all. And it turns out that many of these alarm-sounding professionals work in Minnesota. âIf not for the […]
by revere, cross-posted from Effect Measure This year’s flu season isn’t over, but it’s almost over, and it was fairly typical and much better than last year, which was nasty. It began at the end of September but didn’t take off until early January, peaking in mid Februrary. New cases are still appearing but much […]
In today’s New York Times, Elisabeth Rosenthal highlights an intervention that can slow global warming while improving people’s respiratory health: cleaner-burning stoves. Primitive cooking stoves emit black carbon (or soot), which researchers now estimate is responsible for 18% of global warming. How does it work? Rosenthal explains: Like tiny heat-absorbing black sweaters, soot particles warm […]
A New Blog in the Health Reform Galaxy The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, one of the biggest names in the health policy world, has launched a new blog, called The Userâs Guide to the Health Reform Galaxy. I donât know if theyâre purposely invoking The Hitchhikerâs Guide to the Galaxy, but like the fictional Guide, they […]
by revere, cross-posted from Effect Measure The idea that if the United States joins the rest of developed nations and finally adopts a universal health care system it will bankrupt itself is not based in reality. The reality is that the US spends a larger proportion of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) than any other […]
It’s National Public Health Week, and the American Public Health Association is encouraging people to recognize public health’s contributions and get involved in advancing public health. This year’s theme is “the healthiest nation in one generation” – in other words, the U.S. is currently far from being the healthiest nation, but we can turn that […]
by Alison Bass (cross-posted) Martin Keller is finally stepping down as the long time chief of psychiatry at Brown University. Brown University officials made the announcement in a Dear Colleagues letter dated today from Edward J. Wing, Brown’s new Dean of Medicine and Biological Sciences. While Brown officials insist that the decision to step down […]
By Nalini Padmanabhan, cross-posted from Target Population Anyone whoâs ever taken a psychology class would be able to tell the story of Kitty Genovese and the societal observation it gave birth to, known as the Genovese effect or the bystander effect. Her story is not easily forgotten. According to Michael Dorman of NewsDay, her 1964 […]
We spend a lot of time writing about all of the things that are going wrong, so it’s nice to highlight some promising news periodically. In particular, it seems like there have been a lot of positive news stories about hospitals lately. The Washington Post’s Ceci Connolly profiles Pennsylvania’s Geisinger Health system, which is demonstrating that it’s […]
Trust For Americaâs Health and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation have released a report on improving food safety, and one of the chief problems they identify with the current system is a lack of centralized food-safety authority: The report calls for the immediate consolidation of food safety leadership within the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) […]