By the end of 2011, the Labor Department’s worker safety agencies expect to issue six new rules to better protect workers from on-the-job hazards. In the Department’s regulatory plan issued yesterday, OSHA projects it will finalize four rules while MSHA expects to complete two new standards. As I’ve written before, these plans quickly become stale […]
Yesterday I mentioned sewer systems as an indispensable part of urban infrastructure, and today I want to focus on the more visible issue of transportation. The efficiency with which people and goods move into and within cities has a huge impact on both energy use and air quality. And the availability of non-driving modes of […]
Cancer
“It’s on our website”: an insufficient response to asbestos danger lurking in millons of attics
No doubt that a federal agency’s website can be a useful public relations tool. We all have much better access now to government data, reports and other records. That’s certainly a good thing. But even the most content-rich website cannot substitute for other forms of communication and information sharing. Yet more and more lately I’m […]
APHA Annual Meeting
Protecting health by eliminating hazards: New APHA policy statements take proactive approach to preventing illness and injury
by Elizabeth Grossman At this year’s American Public Health Association (APHA) annual meeting that took place in Denver November 7-11, the APHA’s Environmental and Occupational Health and Safety sections proposed new policy statements that recommend proactive strategies for preventing illness and injury by reducing exposure to hazardous chemicals and through design that promotes workplace safety. […]
The Washington Post’s Jane Black gives us a heads-up about the forthcoming update to the Dietary Guidelines for Americans. Every five years, USDA’s Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion issues new dietary guidelines based on analysis by the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee, a group of scientific experts appointed by the Secretaries of HHS and USDA. […]
Peter Janiszewski at Obesity Panacea has posted a fascinating series on the issue of people who are obese but metabolically healthy. We worry about rising rates of obesity because obesity increases the risk for health problems like diabetes and cardiovascular disease — but what if that’s not universally true? And if it turns out that […]
Earlier this week, FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg presented Frances Kelsey with the first in what will be a series of awards bearing Kelsey’s name. Fifty years ago, as a new medical officer with the FDA, Kelsey refused to approve US sale of Kevadon, a drug widely recognized by its generic name, thalidomide. The drug was […]
Cancer
Rohm and Haas rejects link between vinyl chloride and brain cancer, victims disagree, see you in court on Sept 20
The Center for Public Integrity’s Jim Morris reports this week on a civil lawsuit between the chemical manufacturer Rohm and Haas, and the family of Franklin Branham, 63, who died just a month after being diagnosed with a glioblastoma brain tumor. The Branham family is the first of 31 victims who lived in McCullom Lake, […]
As we try to figure out how to curb an unhealthy increase in obesity, one of the factors under consideration is the built environment. Those who in live in places where few destinations are within walking/biking distance, public transit is limited, and the environment is unfriendly to pedestrians and cyclists may find it harder to […]
Check out Carnal Carnival #1: Essentials of Elimination, hosted by Bora at A Blog Around the Clock. It’s a fascinating collection of blog posts all about poop. (The post I put up yesterday on sanitation is among them.) Many of the posts are about the interesting things scientists can learn by studying excrement – human […]