Featured on Home Page

RSS

Sales of sugary drinks in Berkeley, California have decreased sharply since the city levied a tax on sweetened beverages a year ago, according to a new study published Tuesday in the journal PLOS Medicine.

Another depressing installment of the Weekly Toll. Note that there are 39 fatalities listed here, going back, more or less, for about a week. There are an average of 13 workers killed every day on the job in the United States, which means the list below only covers about one-quarter of the workers actually killed on the job over the last week.

Efforts to manage a national health crisis will be getting a little help from an unlikely source – a fast food restaurant chain. Kentucky Fried Chicken—the largest chicken-on-the-bone quick service restaurant in the U.S.—has committed to phasing out chicken raised with antibiotics important to human medicine in its U.S. stores by the end of 2018.

Citing how important weather reports by pilots are to flight safety, the National Transportation Safety Board, (NTSB) in a special investigation report, called for changes in training and procedures for pilots, air traffic controllers and others within the aviation community to enhance the effectiveness of the entire pilot weather reporting system with the intent to reduce pilots’ inadvertent encounters with hazardous weather and to prevent weather-related accidents.

Although homes have been rebuilt and a new high school is up and running, the town of West, Texas hasn’t been able to close the terrible chapter of its history that began on April 17, 2013 – the day that an explosion at the West Fertilizer company killed 15 people and leveled dozens of buildings.

Rates of new diagnosed cases of type 1 and type 2 diabetes are increasing among youth in the United States, according to a report, Incidence Trends of Type 1 and Type 2 Diabetes among Youths, 2002-2012, published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

A National Institutes of Health (NIH) study found that although 94 percent of Americans aged 12 and older have good vision, the remaining six percent, or 14 million, are visually impaired. Of these, more than 11 million have uncorrected visual impairment, such as nearsightedness. They need eyeglasses or contact lenses to improve their vision. Teenagers, people with diabetes, Hispanics, and people who are economically disadvantaged have higher rates of visual impairment and can most benefit from corrective lenses.

A spring-loaded scalpel knife, a cable-based fall protection system and eyewear to ease computer vision strain were among the occupational safety and health products featured on ISHN.com this week.

Retired miners face losing health benefits, Acosta looks likely for DOL head and the nation’s oldest safety association considers a brand new name. These were among the top stories featured on ISHN.com this week.

Strong safety programs are critical for the economic success of the chemical and petrochemical industries, according to the U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB), which has released a “Business Case for Safety” that underlines that theme.