APHA annual meeting
garrettbrown | November 9, 2016By Garrett Brown and Bob Jeffcott
A group of brave women’s rights and labor activists in San Pedro Sula, Honduras were the recipients of the 2016 International Award of the Occupational Health and Safety Section of the American Public Health Association (APHA). The distinction was formally announced at the association's annual meeting. Lynda Yanz, Executive Director of the Maquila Solidarity Network, based in Toronto, Canada, traveled to Denver, Colorado to accept the award on behalf of the Honduras Independent Monitoring Team (EMIH) at the November 1st awards luncheon.
EMIH team (L to R):…
cmonforton | November 3, 2016Kim Krisberg and I were in Denver this week at APHA’s 2016 Annual Meeting and Exposition — the year’s largest gathering of public health professionals. In our blog posts from earlier this week (here, here, here) we recapped just a few of the scientific sessions and events from the week. Below are some highlights from the final day at the meeting. You can read many more courtesy of the APHA Annual Meeting Blog.
Public health in the headlines: How does news coverage impact health?: Media. It’s everywhere these days. So, it’s not surprising that it impacts our health and behaviors as well as our…
cmonforton | November 3, 2016The American Public Health Association (APHA) adopted 11 new policy statements which will guide its work in the coming years. They include:
Raising the minimum wage: The policy calls on states to increase their minimum wage, index the minimum wage to inflation, and prohibit state-government preemption of municipal minimum wage policies. Among other things, the new APHA policy also recommends research on the effects of living wages on public assistance budgets.
Reducing exposure to highly fluorinated chemicals: The policy calls on Congress to fund research on alternatives to perfluoroalkyl and…
cmonforton | November 2, 2016Kim Krisberg and I are currently in Denver at APHA’s 2016 Annual Meeting and Exposition — the year’s largest gathering of public health professionals. In yesterday’s blog post, Kim recapped just a few of the scientific sessions and events from Sunday and Monday. Below are some highlights from Tuesday and you can read many more courtesy of the APHA Annual Meeting Blog.
How can we reduce gun violence? Less politics, more working together: The gun violence epidemic in America got worse in 2016. As of October, more than 40 people every day have died in the U.S. by gunfire, according to the…
kkrisberg | November 1, 2016Celeste Monforton and I are currently in Denver at the American Public Health Association's (APHA) 2016 Annual Meeting and Exposition — the year’s largest gathering of public health professionals. The meeting is packed with hundreds of scientific sessions, leading public health researchers and new findings on just about any public health topic you can imagine. Below are some highlights of the past few days, courtesy the APHA Annual Meeting Blog.
Trees don’t just make neighborhoods pretty. They can also save lives: With flowers in the spring, lush green leaves in the summer and changing colors…
cmonforton | November 4, 2015Kim 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 science and organize for healthier communities. Here are some highlights from yesterday’s events courtesy of the APHA Annual Meeting Blog.
“Stop asking for a seat at the table…we belong at the head of the table": In April in Baltimore, after the civil unrest that followed the death of Freddie Gray…
cmonforton | November 3, 2015Kim 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 science and organize for healthier communities. Here are some highlights from yesterday’s events courtesy of the APHA Annual Meeting Blog.
The tipping point: On our way to reducing gun violence: Public health advocates can agree that shootings are a huge health issue for the more than 33,000 victims of…
cmonforton | November 2, 2015Kim 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 and organize for healthier communities. As "the water cooler for the public health crowd," The Pump Handle is reporting from Chicago. Here are some highlights from yesterday’s event courtesy of the APHA Annual Meeting Blog.
Standing with temp workers: Rainy weather didn't stop advocates who took to…
kkrisberg | January 16, 2015Food safety is at the top of the list for local restaurant inspectors in Rockaway Township, New Jersey. Recently, however, inspectors tested out the feasibility of adding a new safety checkpoint to the menu — the safety of restaurant employees. The effort was a success and one that organizers hope will ultimately lead to safer working conditions for food service workers statewide.
“Workers need a voice,” said Peter Tabbot, health officer for the Rockaway Township Division of Health. “This is a small way that we can help provide a bit of that voice.”
The new occupational health and safety…
egrossman | November 13, 2013At the 141st meeting of the American Public Health Association (APHA) held last week in Boston, the organization’s Occupational Health & Safety section honored the achievements of some extraordinarily dedicated individuals and organizations whose efforts have been advancing workplace safety. While these awards are typically most meaningful to others in the field, events taking place elsewhere around the country – among them the largest Walmart workers’ strike to date and voter approval of the country’s highest yet minimum wage – highlight the importance of this year’s award winners’ work…
kkrisberg | November 11, 2013Larger investments in public health equal better health, fewer deaths and reduced medical spending — and the effect is especially pronounced in the communities that need it most, according to new research.
The findings are the latest in a series of studies that researcher Glen Mays and his colleagues at the National Coordinating Center for Public Health Services and Systems Research (PHSSR) are conducting on the health and economic value of public health spending. While Mays has authored previous research on the topic — such as this 2011 study that found public health spending is associated…
lborkowski | November 6, 2013At the American Public Health Association's annual meeting in Boston this week, the organization officially approved 17 policy statements, including one calling for the US to improve access to paid sick and family leave and one urging the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to require workplace injury and illness prevention programs. Having APHA on the record supporting these improvements will bolster ongoing campaigns for paid leave and OSHA's efforts to advance an injury and illness prevention standard. (Check out more news from Boston at the APHA Annual Meeting blog.)…
cmonforton | November 5, 2012At last week's American Public Health Association (APHA) annual meeting its Governing Council adopted about a dozen new policies to guide the Association's advocacy activities. Over APHA's 140 year history, these resolutions have covered a variety of public health topics, from the 1950 policy supporting fluoridation of public water supplies, the 1960 policy supporting compulsory pasteurization of milk, the 1969 policy calling for American forces to be withdrawn from Vietnam, to the 1982 policy condemning the apartheid policy of the Government of the Republic of South Africa, and the 2009…
lborkowski | October 30, 2012The American Public Health Association's annual meeting is taking place this week in San Francisco, with the theme of "Prevention and Wellness Across the Life Span." If you're not there (or if you're there but can't possibly attend all the sessions you want to), the APHA Meeting Blog is a great way to get a taste of the research and ideas being discussed.
Among the annual meeting bloggers is Kim Krisberg, a regular Pump Handle contributor. She covered the meeting's opening session, which featured APHA Executive Director Georges Benjamin, UnitedHealth’s Reed Tuckson, House Minority Leader…
cmonforton | July 26, 2012The New York Times headline read "Fire Ravages a Doll Factory In Southern China, Killing 81." It was November 1993, the city was Shenzhen and the location was the Zhili toy factory. Ms. Yuying Chen, 17, was one of 250 workers in the factory. Like many others, she had traveled from her rural farming community to the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone to work in a manufacturing plant. She dutifully sent money back home to her family. When the fire broke out, the workers found the doors and windows locked making escape difficult. Ms. Chen suffered third-degree burns over 75 percent of her…
lborkowski | November 2, 2011Something that's come up in a couple of the different sessions I've attended at the American Public Health Association annual meeting is the problem of inadequate definitions of success. It's important to set targets and measure progress against them - and missing targets can be a signal that it's time to revise the strategy. But if the targets are set without sufficient thought, a person or group can think they're succeeding when they're not really doing such a great job.
One example of this came up in the session "Getting from here to there: Promoting health and environmental justice…
lborkowski | November 1, 2011One of my favorite parts of the American Public Health Association annual meeting is the Occupational Health & Safety Section's awards lunch. It's always inspiring to hear about and from the award recipients, who bring dedication, creativity, and much-needed stubbornness to the cause of ensuring safe and healthy workplaces. The 2011 honorees are:
Alice Hamilton Award: Martin Cherniack of the Center for the Promotion of Health in the New England Workplace (CPH-NEW), author of the book The Hawk's Nest Incident: America's Worst Industrial Disaster
Lorin Kerr Awards: Lamont Byrd of the…
lborkowski | October 31, 2011The American Public Health Association is having its annual meeting in DC this week, and the theme is "Healthy Communities Promote Healthy Minds & Bodies." The APHA YouTube channel features several clips from yesterday's opening session, including former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, who spoke about the Affordable Care Act, and APHA President Dr. Linda Rae Murray, who noted "we are not where we used to be - but we are not where we need to be."
Kim Krisberg, whose name you may recognize from her monthly posts here, describes some of the opening session highlights at the APHA Annual…
cmonforton | September 19, 2011The winners of this year's American Public Health Association's (APHA) recognition awards for achievement in occupational health and safety illustrate the diversity of talent among those committed to ensuring workers' rights to a safe workplace. Martin Cherniak, MD is a clinician and researcher at the University of Connecticut; Amy Liebman is with the Migrant Clinicians Network; Dr. Salvador Moncada i LluÃs is with Spain's Union Institute of Work Environment and Health; LaMont Byrd is Director of Safety and Health for the Teamsters; and Barbara Rahke, a grassroots leader in Philadelphia's…
lborkowski | December 23, 2010United States Senator Bernard Sanders, Independent of Vermont, received this year's Paul Wellstone Award at the Activist Dinner on 7 November in Denver, during the annual meeting of the American Public Health Association. Dr. Anthony Robbins presented the award "for his principled support for a universal comprehensive health care system..."
Senator Sanders prepared this video for the activists who attended. During his 10-minute address (skip to 0:40 for the start of remarks), Senator Sanders focuses on the new healthcare law and explains why he voted for it, what it does for prevention and…