Recent pieces address causes of, and potential solutions to, the US’s shameful rate of maternal mortality; how the prosperity gospel explains the GOP’s approach to healthcare; how homeownership became the engine of inequality; and more.
Injury Control & Violence
A well-known secret: The “reverse business case” threatens worker health and safety
Accounting professors have confirmed what we always suspected: companies which are scrambling to meet or just beat Wall Street analysts’ profit projections have worker injury rates that are 12% higher than other employers. The recent research indicates that frantic efforts by “benchmark-beating” employers – increasing employees’ workloads or pressuring them to work faster, at the same time that these employers cut safety spending on activities like maintaining equipment or training employees, to meet the profit projections – are the likely source of increased injuries and illnesses.
Despite a post-recession construction boom in the southern U.S., a survey of 1,435 construction workers describe low wages, sparse benefits, and no potable water on sweltering summer days.
Last week, 217 Republican members of the House of Representatives passed a bill that, if it becomes law, will leave millions of people without health insurance.
Right now, according to public health officials, about half a million U.S. kids have blood lead levels that could harm their health. However, new research finds many more children — hundreds of thousands more — are likely going unidentified.
Injury Control & Violence
Nation’s largest wireless infrastructure provider linked to two worker deaths in eight days
In an eight-day period, two workers lost their lives at communication towers. Their deaths reminded me of the grave hazards in the industry and the subcontracting model that can shield firms from responsibility for the hazards they create.
Investigation reveals how Case Farms poultry plants exploit immigrant workers; Chinese workers who make Ivanka Trump’s clothing line are overworked and underpaid; California lawmakers consider bill to protect salon workers from harmful chemicals; and Trump’s budget would slash funds for combating child and forced labor overseas.
Government
Study: Training parents as immunization advocates a promising approach to vaccine hesitancy
Protecting babies and children against dangerous — sometimes fatal — diseases is a core mission of public health. Everyday, in health departments across the nation, someone is working on maintaining and improving childhood vaccination rates and keeping diseases like measles and mumps from regaining a foothold in the U.S.
House Republicans are trying again to undo the Affordable Care Act, this time by letting states opt out of some of the law’s most popular provisions.