News Alerts
January 29, 2002 - Report Grades States on Oral Health Initiatives No state got better than a B- grade and there were lots of Cs, adding
up to a C grade for the nation as a whole, on 22 measures of oral health
status, in a report released January 23 by the Chicago-based advocacy
group Oral Health America. Many states got failing grades on water fluoridation,
dental sealants, and availability of dentists, but on the encouraging
side, a very large number of states now have “dental directors” as part
of their public health systems.
The health of all racial and ethnic groups improved during the 1990s on 10 of 17 indicators set by the federal government’s Healthy People 2000 initiative, but on some indicators disparities in health between different populations remained the same or even increased. On half the 17 indicators, ethnic and racial disparities improved only slightly, and disparities actually widened substantially in areas such as work-related injuries, motor vehicle crashes, and suicide. In a report released today, the Department of Health and Human Services said the percent of children under 18 years of age living in poverty improved for all groups except Asians and Pacific Islanders. The percent of low birthweight infants improved only for black non-Hispanics. All racial and ethnic groups experienced improvement in the areas of prenatal care, infant mortality, teen births, death rates for heart disease, the tuberculosis and syphilis rate, and poor air quality. The report, "Trends in Racial and Ethnic-Specific Rates for the Health Status Indicators: United States 1990-1998," can be viewed or downloaded at www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/statnt/statnt23.pdf. You will need Acrobat Reader to view this document.
In a report released January 21, the Center for Health, Environment and Justice
charges that an estimated 622,301 students in five states--California,
Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey, and New York--are attending 1,195
schools located within half a mile of a Superfund toxic chemical site.
The report did not investigate individual schools to determine the health
risk to children and school personnel, but the report notes that children
are especially vulnerable to health damage from toxic chemicals and
urges precautions, including state laws, to prevent school construction
at such potentially dangerous locations. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced today that President Bush’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2003, which will go to Congress later this month, will include a request for $191.5 million—a $44 million increase over this year—to strengthen the National Health Service Corps, which supports doctors and clinicians who serve in rural and inner-city areas that lack adequate access to health care. The President’s budget will also request a total of $15 million, a 50 percent increase over current funding, to expand the Nursing Education Loan Repayment program to help address the nation’s growing need for nursing professionals. The nursing program repays the education loans of clinical care nurses who agree to work for two years in designated public or nonprofit health facilities that face a critical shortage of nurses.
The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, the federal
agency responsible for workplace safety, has identified the health industry
as the first to be surveyed for workplace hazards in a new National
Exposures at Work Survey (NEWS). As the first step, NIOSH, which is
part of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is inviting
the interested public to attend meetings in Seattle, Washington, on
February 12 and in Baltimore, Maryland, on February 27, to help identify
health and safety hazards in the health service industry and suggest
ways of correcting them.
The U.S. Department of Education is requesting comments by February 25 on the pending reauthorization of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). Specifically due for reauthorization by Congress this year are two parts of the IDEA—Part C, which covers services to infants and toddlers with disabilities, and Part D, national activities to improve education of children with disabilities. Part B of the IDEA, which covers services to school children, is permanently authorized and does not require reauthorization, but the Education Department says it welcomes the opportunity to carefully examine Part B as well. Click here for full information on the kind of input the department is seeking from the Federal Register: January 10.
The United States Supreme Court ruled unanimously January 8 that the Americans with Disabilities Act, a federal law that protects the rights of persons with disabilities in hiring and employment, does not apply to workers whose disabilities don’t limit their daily lives. Even though a Toyota employee’s carpal tunnel syndrome makes it impossible for her to continue working on an assembly line, she can still do routine manual tasks--such as combing her hair, for example—outside the workplace, and this makes her ineligible for special consideration under the ADA, the Court said. Though the ruling is specific to carpal tunnel syndrome, which varies widely among patients, causing extreme sensory deficits in some but only mild intermittent symptoms in others, this is the first time the high court has said people’s daily lives, not just their ability to perform in the workplace, must be assessed to know if they are ADA-eligible. Congress, which will reauthorize another disability law, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) this year, is expected to look at the experiences with ADA when it examines the IDEA. The case was Toyota Motor Manufacturing, Inc. v. Williams.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that diphtheria and tetanus toxoids and acellular pertussis vaccine (DtaP) remains in short supply and the shortage will continue into mid-2002. Shortages are greatest in the public sector. The shortage began in 2000 when two manufacturers (Wyeth Lederle, Pearl River, New York, and Baxter Hyland Immuno Vaccines, Baltimore, Maryland) stopped production of DtaP. Currently, the only two suppliers of the vaccine are Aventis Pasteur (Swiftwater, Pennsylvania) and GlaxoSmithKline (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania), who produce Tripedia and Infanrix. During the shortage, it is recommended that infants receive the first three of five recommended doses of DtaP, with deferral of the fourth and fifth doses. When the shortage ends, all children should receive the fourth and fifth doses of DtaP, with vaccination of children 4 to 6 years old needed to ensure immunity to pertussis, diphtheria, and tetanus during the elementary school years. The notice appeared in the January 4 issue of CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report at http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5051a3.htm For the recommended childhood immunization schedule for 2002, see the January issue of Health and Health Care in Schools on this website at http://www.healthinschools.org/ejournal/jan02_3.htm.
The Dallas Independent School District (DISD) has announced the |
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