A steady decline over more than two decades has resulted in a 25% drop in the overall cancer death rate in the United States. The drop equates to 2.1 million fewer cancer deaths between 1991 and 2014. The news comes from Cancer Statistics 2017, the American Cancer Society’s (ACS) comprehensive annual report on cancer incidence, mortality, and survival. It is published in CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians and is accompanied by a consumer version of the publication, Cancer Facts and Figures 2017.

Welcome to a new year. Are you ready to set your resolutions for this year? How about starting by learning more about the international Understanding Small Enterprises (USE) Conference, which is being held in the U.S. for the first time this coming October 25-27, 2017. NIOSH is collaborating with the Center for Health, Work & Environment at the Colorado School of Public Health to host USE 2017.

Gig worker safety, U.S. mining deaths are down even as U.S. mining black lung disease cases are on the rise and public health professionals weigh in on proposed repeal of the Affordable Care Act. These were among the top stories posted on ISHN.com last week.

Just days away from its first compliance deadline, a Chicago cleaning company has asked a federal appeals court to review OSHA’s new fall protection rule for general industry. News sources say the company, which filed the petition for review Dec. 27 with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in Chicago, supports the majority of the provisions in the rule.

Nearly half of all adult asthma cases – 48 percent -- might be related to work – and thus, preventable -- according to a study published in the CDC’s MMWR last month. This finding means as many as 2.7 million U.S. workers might have asthma caused by or exacerbated by workplace conditions.

The first weekend of the new year could be a dangerous one for the 80 million Americans who are in the path of what authorities are calling a “historic” winter storm. As the weather system that has already devastated western states sweeps eastward, the National Weather Service has issued a winter storm warning for parts of Georgia, the Carolinas and Alabama that begins this afternoon.

Preliminary data released by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) indicate that in 2016, 25 miners died in work-related accidents at the nation’s mines – down from 29 in 2015. The figure represents the lowest number of mining deaths ever recorded and only the second year that mining deaths dropped below 30.

For the third time since the summer of 2015, a worker with a metal container manufacturer has suffered an amputation injury. In each incident, federal safety investigators found that, if the employer had complied with workplace safety standards, the injuries were preventable.

Coal workers’ pneumoconiosis, also known as “black lung disease,” has reappeared in the U.S. in “alarming” numbers, according to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH).