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In the Chinese provinces of Henan and Shanxi, police have raided 7,500 brick kilns and rescued hundreds of slave laborers, many of them children. Victims were kidnapped or entrapped with offers of work and then sold into slavery; officials report arresting 250 people for the crimes. Jane Macartney…
By Peter Lurie, MD, MPH, Deputy Director, Public Citizenâs Health Research Group
Dr. Lurie is a contributor to Public Citizenâs drug newsletter, available at www.worstpills.org. He will present testimony on state doctor gift disclosure laws before the Senate Special Committee on Aging on Wednesday…
By Liz Borkowski
When EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson announced last week that the agency would lower the limit for ground-level ozone pollution, he acknowledged that the current standard of 0.08 parts per million was insufficiently protective of public health. This was an appropriate …
Last Wednesday, June 20, I learned from a newspaper reporter that a gold miner was missing at the Newmont company's Midas mine near Winnemucca, Nevada. I checked MSHA's website, but nothing was posted about the accident. No problem, I'll cut them some slack. Maybe…
It occurred to me this morning that recently I've been living like a college student. I don't mean that I've been going to beer-saturated frat parties, having meals made for me at a cafeteria, and futilely trying to sleep through the thump-thump-thump of stereos playing too loud in the dorm.…
Jerrold Nadler (D-NY)  will chair a hearing today (June 25) on the federal government's failure to protect workers' and residents' health from the toxic dust cloud created in NYC after the September 11, 2001 attacks. The premiere witness will be Christine Todd Whitman, who was …
Louisville-Courier Journal reporters Laura Unger and Ralph Dunlop offer us the voices and faces of miners who are suffering from coal workers' pneumoconiosis. Their special report, Black Lung: Dust Hasn't Settled on Deadly Disease, includes an on-line version which features five…
Declan Butler, Reporter updates us on the situation of the six health workers facing death in Libya. The five Bulgarian nurses and Palestinian medic were sentenced to death on the charge of deliberately infecting Libyan children with HIV, despite scientific evidence that the infections resulted…
NGC 5135 is a barred spiral, similar in some ways to NGC 1365. Both galaxies are members of the IRAS "Bright Galaxy Sample," meaning that they are very luminous in the infrared as a result of vigorous star-forming activity. Both have very strong bars. Both harbor an active galactic…
by Les Boden
Iâm going to answer this question. But before I do, Iâm going to have to explain a few things about (ugh!) insurance.
If something bad happens to an insured person or company, the insurer is supposed to help soften the financial blow. You need a $50,000 operation and your medical…
In a recent post, I expressed frustration with the observation that those who sometimes question the tactics and language of some fighting for gender-equality then get lumped in with "everybody else who is clueless and oppressive," even if we care deeply about the issue. One of my complaints was…
With a bipartisan voice vote yesterday, the House Education and Labor Committee approved a bill that would force OSHA to regulate workers' exposure to diacetyl. Congresswoman Lynn Woolsey, chair of the Subcommittee on Workforce Protections and chief sponsor of the legislation, commented:…
By David Michaels
Lifelines Online, the safety and health publication of the Laborersâ Health and Safety Fund of North America, is publicizing some important videos â dealing with the history of occupational health and safety in the U.S., industrial hygiene pioneer Alice Hamilton, and the lung…
Following up on their investigative series on conditions at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center, the Washington Postâs Dana Priest and Anne Hull have written a series of wrenching articles on veterans returning from Iraq with post-traumatic stress disorder. Bureaucratic confusion and a shortage of…
âAs fire fighters, we know the risks of answering the call, but it does not lessen our pain when the worst happens,â said Harold Schaitberger, general president of the Int'l Association of Fire Fighters.
Nine fire fighters, aged 27 to 56, died on June 18 battling a blaze at a furniture…
Several members of the U.S. House and Senate introduced bills today to strengthen mine safety and health protections.  A  statement issued by Congressman George Miller (D-CA) says the bill builds upon the legislation passed in June 2006 called the MINER Act.Â
The…
In this post at the blog "This Week in Evolution", R. Ford Denison hits the nail squarely on the head.
Why should you go to grad school? Because you want to do grad school.
If you are viewing grad school as something you have to grind through in order to get the faculty job you covet, don't go.…
Most public health advocates are probably already aware that U.S. funds for international AIDS relief come with counterproductive strings attached â specifically, requirements that one-third of HIV prevention money go to abstinence-only education and that entities receiving PEPFAR grants explicitly…
by Revere, cross-posted from Effect Measure
If you've ever been to Duluth, Minnesota in the wintertime, at the top of the state on Lake Superior, you know how cold it can get. And if you go another 50 miles up the shore you'll come to Silver Bay. Also cold. And dangerous in another way. It is a…
Federal Judge Robert C. Chambers, US District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia, ruled in favor of environmental groups in their claim against coal mine operators and practices related to mountaintop removal mining.* This form of surface mining involves blasting…
By David Michaels
Seventy years ago, economist John Maynard Keynes predicted that his grandchildrenâs generation would enjoy three-hour workdays. Instead, a new study reports, one in five workers worldwide logs âexcessiveâ hours.
The study, Working Time Around the World, reviews global working time…
I'm just back from Hypericon, the Nashville area science fiction convention where, as I mentioned previously, I gave a couple of talks about science stuff— although one was about science in science fiction movies.
I was also on a panel with two other guys, Jim Messer and Fred Grimm, where we each…
This week, Congress has been wrestling with the reauthorization of the Prescription Drug User Fee Act; Merrill Goozner at GoozNews reports from Capitol Hill about the questions that FDA Acting Deputy Commissioner for Policy Randall Lutter couldnât answer at a hearing and about the provisions that…
By David Michaels
The National Football League, like many trade associations, has been disputing the long-term risks associated with employment in that industry. Weâve written about the leagueâs Committee on Mild Traumatic Brain Injury, supposedly independent but in fact dominated by individuals…
MSHA issued a news release yesterday announcing that eight mine operators have been put on notice for potential enforcement under the "pattern of violation" provisions of the Mine Act.  MSHA's release does not list the names of the mining operations, but…
This weekend I will be hanging out at Hypericon, a small Nashville science-fiction convention that is in its third years. I've met a number of people and made local friends there. I have also managed to finagle myself free admission by doing work in kind....
I'll be giving two talks:
Why "Was…
By Ruthann Rudel and Dick Clapp
Two recent papers by Ruthann Rudel and Julia Brody published in the journal Cancer compiled a list of 216 chemicals shown to cause mammary gland tumors in animal studies and presented a comprehensive state-of-the-science review of environmental factors in…
As David Michaels reported earlier today, Congresswoman Lynn Woolsey has introduced legislation that would force OSHA to issue standards for occupational exposure to diacetyl (an interim standard within 90 days and a final standard within two years). This artificial butter-flavoring substance has…
By David Michaels
The simple, powerful statement on the website of FEMA, The Flavor and Extract Manufacturers Association of the United States, summarizing the trade association's position:
The Flavor and Extract Manufacturers Association of the United States supports H.R.2693, legislation to…