Celeste Monforton, DrPH, MPH
of Lecturer, Texas State University & Professorial Lecturer Milken Institute School of Public Health.
cmonforton
Posts by this author
November 6, 2015
The criminal trial of former Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship went into its fifth week. Among others, the jurors heard from a veteran federal mine safety inspector, and a former Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) ventilation expert who went to work for Blankenship at Massey Energy…
November 4, 2015
Kim Krisberg and I are with our public health colleagues this week at the 143rd annual meeting of the American Public Health Association (APHA). More than 12,000 researchers, practitioners, and advocates from across the US and the globe have gathered in Chicago to swap best practices, share new…
November 3, 2015
Kim Krisberg and I are with our public health colleagues this week at the 143rd annual meeting of the American Public Health Association (APHA). Thousands of researchers, practitioners, and advocates from across the U.S. and the globe have gathered in Chicago to swap best practices, share new…
November 2, 2015
Kim Krisberg and I are with our public health colleagues this week at the 143rd annual meeting of the American Public Health Association (APHA). Thousands of researchers, practitioners, and advocates from across the US and the globe have gathered in Chicago to swap best practices, share new science…
October 30, 2015
The criminal trial of former Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship concluded its fourth week. Chris Blanchard the former president of Massey Energy’s Performance Coal Company was the prosecution's witness for the entire week. The Upper Big Branch mine was part of the Performance Coal Company subsidiary…
October 27, 2015
The anti-poverty group Oxfam America wants consumers to help poultry workers. Oxfam is calling on consumers to use their purchasing power to demand better working conditions for the 250,000 individuals who work in US poultry processing plants. The target of their demands? The four firms that…
October 23, 2015
The criminal trial of former Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship went into its third week. Jurors heard testimony from Upper Big Branch (UBB) coal miners Stanley “Goose” Stewart, Richard “Smurf” Hutchens, and Scott Halstead, UBB superintendent Rick Hodge, and MSHA investigator Keith McElroy, among…
October 22, 2015
Jeffrey Shannon’s work-related death could have been prevented. That’s how I see the findings of federal OSHA in the agency’s citations against his employer, AECOM Technical Services dba Urs Corporation
The 49 year-old was working in March 2015 at Sunoco’s Marcus Hook Industrial Complex in Delaware…
October 20, 2015
Kenneth Schultz, 56, suffered fatal traumatic injuries on Tuesday, October 13 while working on a commercial construction project in Oceanside, CA. The Seaside Courier reports:
The construction site will be the site of a new FedEx distribution center.
The deceased worker “…was using a hand-held…
October 16, 2015
The second week of the criminal trial against former Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship continued in Charleston, WV. The US attorneys called eight former employees to the witness stand. They included Blankenship’s executive assistant and five miners who worked at the Upper Big Branch (UBB) mine just…
October 15, 2015
“Ugh,” “argh,” or a moan. That's what I typically hear from injured workers when they describe their experience maneuvering the workers’ compensation (WC) system. The trouble runs the gamut from insurers refusing to authorize treatment by specialists (e.g., an orthopedist,) to insisting they return…
October 10, 2015
The criminal trial of former Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship began this week in Charleston, WV. The company’s Upper Big Branch mine was the site of the massive coal dust explosion in April 2010 which killed 29 coal miners. The Justice Department’s case against Blankenship involves conspiring to…
October 2, 2015
More than 1.5 million US farmworkers will be better protected in the years ahead because of a new regulations issued this week by the EPA. The agency’s Worker Protection Standard (WPS) addresses the hazards related to pesticide exposure for farmworkers. The WPS was initially adopted by EPA in 1992…
September 30, 2015
I’m still shaking my head and asking out loud, “what were they thinking?” Am I getting this right?: Volkswagen installed software so its diesel-polluting vehicles would deceive EPA-mandated emissions tests. And buyers of the vehicles were deceived by Volkswagen. The company led them to believe they…
September 25, 2015
The American Chemistry Council (ACC) has teamed up with the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) to push a bill in Congress to amend the Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976 (TSCA). We’ve written previously (e.g., here, here, here) about this flawed legislation (S.697). Regrettably, it has 55…
September 23, 2015
Alejandro Anguiana’s work-related death could have been prevented. That’s how I see the findings of Indiana OSHA in the agency’s citations against his employer, Markman Peat.
The 41 year-old was working in March 2015 at the company’s operation in Kingsbury, IN. The initial press reports indicated…
September 18, 2015
It puts a smile on my face when I come across a worker who uses ingenuity to address a safety hazard.
I had a big grin yesterday as I was leaving a restaurant in Austin, TX. I was walking around the outside of the building toward the area where I’d parked my car. I saw one of the restaurant’s…
September 17, 2015
Terry Leon Lakey, 51, suffered fatal traumatic injuries on Wednesday, September 16, 2015 while working at Terex Services in Waco, TX. KCEN reports:
*The incident occurred at 5:40 am when “the victim was crushed by a piece of hydraulic equipment.”
The CSB affiliate in Waco was more specific,…
September 15, 2015
For the second time this year, OSHA has put a poultry company on notice for inappropriate medical treatment of injured workers. The agency sent a letter last month to Delaware-based Allen Harim Foods raising concerns about the company's use of emergency medical technicians (EMTs) to treat chronic…
September 11, 2015
This week’s recap of "The Year in US Occupational Health and Safety" concludes with the section dedicated to national reporting on worker health and safety topics.
When Kim and I looked back over the past 12 months and brainstormed topics to include in the report, on the top of our list was the…
September 8, 2015
In the fourth edition of “The Year in US Occupational Health & Safety,” which we released on Labor Day, we recap some of the key activities that occurred at the federal level in the previous 12 months. One of the most noteworthy events was the Ebola virus epidemic, which brought worldwide…
September 7, 2015
The fourth edition of “The Year in US Occupational Health & Safety: Fall 2014 – Summer 2015” was released today, Labor Day 2015. The yearbook recaps key policy changes and research on worker safety and health at the federal, state, and local levels. Our goal is for the report to be a resource…
September 3, 2015
For part of this summer, I escaped the sweltering heat of central Texas and took refuge in Leamington, Ontario, Canada. It's a lovely place in southern Ontario on the banks of Lake Erie. From my sister's cottage, I could see Pelee Island on the horizon.
On a morning walk, the nose of my golden…
September 1, 2015
Norberto Galicia Romero’s work-related death could have been prevented. That’s how I see the findings of federal OSHA in the agency’s citations against his employer, Thomas Concrete.
The 49-year-old was working in February 2015 at the company’s plant in Marietta, GA. The initial press reports…
August 28, 2015
I’ve heard a lot of myths over the years about OSHA. Some people think, for example, that OSHA is motivated to assess penalties because it needs the money to operate. (Truth: OSHA penalties go to the US Treasury and OSHA doesn’t get any share of them.) There have been times when misinformation or…
August 26, 2015
It was paltry. It was a pittance. It was pathetic. That’s what I thought of OSHA’s proposed $99,000 penalty to DuPont for safety violations related to the November 2014 death of four of its employees. OSHA dinged the company for one repeat and nine serious violations. Wade Baker, 60, Gibby Tisnado…
August 22, 2015
On August 6, two unrelated events got my attention. The first was OSHA’s announcement of a long overdue regulatory proposal. The agency released a proposed rule to protect the health of about 35,000 US workers who are exposed to beryllium. The lightweight, super-strong metal can cause a disabling…
August 19, 2015
Davide Nascimento, 28, suffered fatal traumatic injuries on Friday, July 31, 2015 while working at a construction site in Longmeadow, MA. WFSB.com reports:
The incident happened at a sewer project on Hazardville Road around 7:45 a.m.
Nascimento “…was trapped inside a trench that began rapidly…
August 12, 2015
“It’s just like the paper we read in class.” That was the email message I received last week from a former undergraduate student from a class I used to teach called "Health and the Environment." She was referring to a report of two young children from the Cincinnati, OH area who were lead poisoned…
August 7, 2015
My husband and I (along with our 70 pound golden retriever) recently spent 26 hours in our car driving from Texas to Michigan. That’s lots of time to kibitz on all sorts of topics.
He heard me rant about four workers killed on the job last fall at DuPont’s LaPorte, TX plant because of gross safety…