regulation
revere | June 22, 2009If you don't want to smell, the FDA has a recommendation: use an over-the-counter cold remedy that contains an intranasal zinc solution. You won't smell. Possibly ever again:
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration today advised consumers to stop using three products marketed over-the-counter as cold remedies because they are associated with the loss of sense of smell (anosmia). Anosmia may be long-lasting or permanent. (FDA Press Release)
Losing your sense of smell is no joke. It is intimately involved with your sense of taste and is a warning sense for dangerous gases. The role of zinc in…
sb admin | June 19, 2009As we learned this week, Cal/OSHA and the OSH Appeals Board are in a state of disarray.  A daring group of state employees have raised their voices in protest (see "CalOSHA inspectors demand change") reminding us that dysfunction in their agency can translate into more injuries and illnesses for California's workers. The collective action of these inspectors and staff is vital. So too is the sole voice of individuals who share their experience and insight.Â
Meet Jack Oudiz, who joined Cal/OSHA in 1985.  Mr. Oudiz is retiring from Cal/OSHA and shares the following:
My…
revere | June 18, 2009We were among the first to bring you the full text of the leaked minutes of the secret meeting of the bisphenol-A (BPA) cabal at a posh private club in Washington, DC on May 28. It turns out those minutes may be almost as toxic to the cabal as their endocrine disrupting chemical is to humans. I guess I am exaggerating. It would have to pretty toxic for that. But it is at least producing some unpleasant fall out (see also here). You may remember one element (besides describing as the "holy grail" finding a “pregnant young mother who would be willing to speak around the country about the…
revere | June 9, 2009You learn a lot when you move from investigator to subject. I just heard about Drive-by Tylenol for day-care and school age kids. This is the practice of stuffing a couple of Tylenol down the little tyke's throat to bring down a fever just before entering the daycare center. The objective is to get 4 or 5 hours of work in before being called to school because your child has a fever. The underground lore about it includes not using any flavored Tylenol preps with red dye in them so that when the child urps up everthing after lunch there will be no tell-tale pink color savvy teachers will…
sb admin | June 8, 2009As the public health community mourns the loss of a great scientist and colleague, The Pump Handle would like to share some of what has been written about Kate Mahaffey. Please leave your own remembrances in the comments section below.
"I have known Kathryn as a colleague for more than a decade, but most recently have been impressed with her steadfast scientific integrity while at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. She always managed to honestly communicate scientific findings that while unpopular with some, were critically important to protecting public health.  ...Kathryn is a…
sb admin | June 5, 2009It is with deep sadness we inform you of the sudden passing of Kathyrn R Mahaffey, PhD.   Kate had an exceptional and diverse career, with appointments at FDA, NIOSH, NIEHS and EPA.  Most recently, Kate served as a Professorial Lecturer at the George Washington University School of Public Health.
Her husband, David Jacobs offers the following remembrance and tribute to her significant contributions to the public's health.  Information about a memorial service appears at the end of this post.
Kathryn R. Mahaffey passed away peacefully in her sleep June 2, 2009 after decades of…
sb admin | June 5, 2009I think it was around Christmastime last year, while frantically traipsing through the mall in search of bargains, that an over-eager kiosk salesperson stepped into my path. Wonderful, I thought. Another person trying to sell me overpriced hand cream. I tried to go around her, hoping sheâd get the hintâto no avail. Oddly, instead of launching into a speech about my unhealthy cuticles, she asked me if I was a smoker.
And thatâs when I noticed she was selling e-cigarettes:Â plastic cigarettes that look almost exactly like the real deal. (They even puff out odorless vapor that looks…
sb admin | June 3, 2009cross-posted from OMBWatch
Despite the Obama Administration's consistent theme of creating a new, more open government, the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) has yet to prove it will comply with the Administration's Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) policies. In its response to a 2008 FOIA request, MSHA refused to release information that has been consistently released in the past. An appeal of that response provides a test of the administration's approach to implementing its openness policies.
On his first full day in office, President Barack Obama issued a memorandum about…
revere | May 31, 2009We've had occasion to write about the endocrine noise-maker bisphenol-A (BPA) quote a few times (see here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here for starters). The word about BPA has gotten to consumers and they have fled BPA-containing products like they are swine flu carriers. Meanwhile the scientific evidence is piling up and what the market hasn't done will likely bring BPA into the cross-hairs of food safety regulations, if not via the FDA then by state and local governments, some of which have already acted.
So it looks like the writing is on the wall for BPA unless the food…
sb admin | May 20, 2009Two months ago, I applauded OSHA for announcing that its SBREFA panel meeting on a draft diacetyl proposed rule would be open to the public. Today, I feel schnookered. OSHA hosted its teleconference-meeting yesterday (5/19) and today (5/20) with specially-selected small employers, but failed to provide meaningful notice to allow the public to participate. Is a meeting really "public" if you don't tell the public? Or is it really public if you only tell a select few? Â
 Not in my book.
In my March 17 post OSHA's new direction on diacetyl, I noticed that OSHA's Federal Register…
sb admin | May 13, 2009by Rena Steinzor, cross-posted from CPR Blog
With his attractive family and a phalanx of top aides in tow, Professor Cass Sunstein had a cordial, 45-minute hearing before the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee yesterday. He was introduced by former student and current Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) who praised Sunstein as a teacher, mentor, and eclectic thinker, all qualities for which he is rightly known. Ironically, however, the remainder of the hearing could be summarized as efforts by the three Senators in attendanceâ Chairman Joseph Lieberman (I-CT), ranking…
lborkowski | May 13, 2009Labor Secretary Hilda Solis signed off on her first semi-annual agenda of regulations, which was published in the Federal Register on Monday, May 11. She writes:
"This document sets forth the Department's semiannual agenda of regulations that have been selected for review or development during the coming year. The Department's agencies have carefully assessed their available resources and what they can accomplish in the next 12 months and have adjusted their agendas accordingly."
I've griped before about not understanding the difference between the items listed on this "agenda" and the…
sb admin | May 13, 2009by Pete Galvin
You never learn much from a "wired" confirmation hearing, and that was true yesterday at the hearing for Cass Sunstein to be director of OIRA. Only three Senators bothered to come (apart from his former student, now the Senator from Minnesota, who introduced him before leaving) and two short rounds of questions were designed to let him place on the record a few key statements to respond to interest groups. Â
He is, he assured them, not in favor of banning hunting; he thinks both OSHA and the Clean Air Act are constitutional; and his number one priority at OIRA is to follow…
sb admin | May 12, 2009Early Sunday morning (May 10), I read a news brief from WSAZ reporting that seven workers had been rescued from a flooded underground coal mine in Gilbert, WV, after being trapped for 32+ hours. As I combed the web for further details, I was struck by the news accounts and audio recordings noting that the trapped miners and their families had spoken numerous times by telephone during the ordeal, as if such conversations are ho-hum-routine during mine emergencies. Â
I was fascinated simply reading that the miners trapped under the earth had a means to communicate with the surface.…
sb admin | May 11, 2009By Myra Karstadt
Peanuts, pistachios, peppers (maybe tomatoes too), spinach, spicesâ¦â¦â¦.The list of produce recalled due to bacterial contamination gets longer, and baleful glances are cast at the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (CFSAN- say siff-san), the part of FDA charged with regulating the safety of those agricultural products.
With any luck, sometime during the next few years, the organization within CFSAN that deals with the safety of agricultural produce, the Office of Food Safety, will be moved over to a new food safety agency. Unfortunately, based on past history…
sb admin | May 6, 2009Over the next week, two Senate committees will hold confirmation hearings on senior Administration officials who could play key roles in worker health and safety policy. First, the Senate HELP Committee will meet tomorrow (May 7) to consider the nomination of M. Patricia Smith for Solicitor of Labor. I wrote previously about Ms. Smith's efforts as NY Commissioner of Labor to address the needs of vulnerable workers, including her creative and aggressive approaches to ensure that workers are paid their legally earned wages. I hope to hear Ms. Smith discuss how she will direct…
sb admin | May 1, 2009University of Maryland Law Professor Rena Steinzor called for fundamental changes to the role of OMB's Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) in federal regulatory review, at a House Committee hearing held on April 30. The Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight of the Committee on Science and Technology has been examining OIRA's functions and responsibilities, with the chairman stating:
"...Though rarely in the headlines, OIRA has, in the years since its creation under President Reagan, quietly become the most powerful regulatory office in the Federal government."…
sb admin | April 30, 2009Labor Secretary Solis announced today the next step in OSHA's effort to propose a rule to protect workers exposed to the butter-flavoring agent diacetyl. The Small Business Administration and OSHA identified 13 "small-entity representatives" (SERs, defined by SBA as companies with 500 or fewer employees nationwide) to serve on the panel which allows them to review the proposed regulatory text and regulatory analysis, and make recommendations for changes to the draft proposed rule before it is published in the Federal Register for the standard public comment period.  In OSHA's letter…
revere | April 24, 2009As an academic epidemiologist I routinely do NIH funded research involving human subjects. That means my university must adhere to very strict regulations and guidelines for the protection of research subjects. Approval and monitoring of the ethical conduct of research funded by the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), of which NIH is a part, was made a legal requirement in the 1970s following widespread abuses, of which the Tuskeegee Syphilis Study and the experiments by Nazi doctors were the most notorious. But less flagrant ethical breeches were widespread in medical research. I…
revere | April 14, 2009If you have any of your clothes dry cleaned it's more than likely you are being exposed to a chlorinated solvent called PCE (for perchloroethylene aka perc aka tetrachloroethylene/tetrachloroethene). You may be lucky enough to also get some in your drinking water, too (which means you are also breathing it and absorbing it through your skin) -- because PCE is also one of the most prevalent groundwater contaminants in the US. It has some other nice properties: it causes cancer and birth defects and probably autoimmune disease. And it isn't needed to dry clean clothes. Other than that, no…