September 10, 2008 The Pump Handle

Our post on preventing falls among the elderly has been included in the latest edition of Hourglass, a monthly blog carnival devoted to the biology of aging. Alvaro at SharpBrains has assembled recent aging-related posts in a creative format; for more, check out Ouroboros for the Hourglass archive, submission info, and upcoming schedule. Blog carnivals  are […]

September 9, 2008 The Pump Handle 1Comment

The recent issues of Newsweek and TIME both carried sobering articles about the state of cancer research. Newsweek’s Sharon Begley reports that cancer is on track to claim 565,650 lives in the U.S. this year, and that number isn’t a whole lot better than it was in 1971, when President Nixon signed the National Cancer […]

September 8, 2008 The Pump Handle 1Comment

Last month, David Michaels spoke to Google employees about his book Doubt is Their Product: How Industry’s Assault on Science Threatens Your Health, and Google has now posted the video on YouTube as part of their Authors@Google series. The Google employees asked astute questions (starting around the 31-minute mark), touching on freedom of speech issues; what industry […]

September 4, 2008 The Pump Handle 4Comment

Ken Ward of the Charleston Gazette has been following closely and reporting on the deadly blast on Aug 28 at the multinational Bayer CropScience’s plant in Institute, WV.  His first story (here) indicated that witnesses saw a red fireball at about 10:25 pm, and that thousands of residents were told to shelter in place, and his next story reported on […]

September 4, 2008 The Pump Handle

The Department of Labor’s Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) confirmed yesterday that it has referred evidence related to the Crandall Canyon disaster to a federal district attorney for a possible criminal investigation.  Murray Energy was assessed a $1.34 million civil penalty on July 24 for violations related to the massive ground failure which took […]

August 21, 2008 The Pump Handle

It’s World Water Week, and officials from around the world are meeting in Stockholm to discuss how to get adequate water and sanitation to the world’s population – even as drought and other environmental problems threaten the global water supply. The conference organizers explain the problem and what WWW intends to do about it:

August 15, 2008 The Pump Handle 3Comment

by revere, cross-posted at Effect Measure A couple of days ago we discussed the murky questions surrounding the death of accused anthrax attacker Dr. Bruce Ivins. At the center of stipulating the cause and manner of death were the procedures for filling out the state of Maryland’s death certificate by the medical examiner. Determining and […]

August 11, 2008 The Pump Handle 7Comment

Several bloggers are raising concerns about the FBI’s case against Dr. Bruce Ivins, who was suspected of carrying out the 2001 anthrax attacks and who died from an acetaminophen overdose hours before he was supposed to meet with government officials about the case. In particular, Revere explains why the anthrax tracing and medical report explanations are fishy, […]

August 5, 2008 The Pump Handle 3Comment

by revere, cross-posted at Effect Measure The Health Care Renewal blog has made a business of chronicling the undreside of the American health care system: fraud, conflicts of interest by respected academics, bureaucratic incompetence and malfeasance. I do basic research and don’t get involved in health care delivery so I only refer to them occasionally, […]

August 4, 2008 The Pump Handle

On July 28, five representatives of the crane industry met with OMB OIRA, including several who were members of the OSHA Neg/Reg committee, to press OMB to complete its review of the agency’s proposed rule on cranes and derricks.  The existing OSHA rule dates back to 1971.  Efforts to update the crane safety standards began in 2003 when a negotiated […]