Until Tuesday, abortion rights advocates had prevailed on all seven measures that have appeared on statewide ballots since the fall of Roe.

The post Abortion rights advocates win in 7 states and clear way to overturn Missouri ban but lose in 3 appeared first on Boston.com.

Infections were reported between Sept. 27 and Oct. 11, in Colorado, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Oregon, Utah, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.

The post Deadly E. coli outbreak linked to McDonald’s Quarter Pounders sickens 49 people in 10 states appeared first on Boston.com.

"I saw my brother in these boys. I saw my son in these boys.”

First, we talk to an activist speaking out against violence towards blacks in America. Then, we hear how the story of one police shooting in San Francisco has been turned into a stage play.

Next, we learn why the Bahamas issued a travel advisory to the US. Also, we hear about the perils of "walking while black" in New York City. Plus, a daughter figures out how to talk to her father about race for the first time.

We end the show with “American Tune,’’ a posthumous release by the New Orleans musician Allen Toussaint.

Some students of color at Stoughton High School were among those who received such messages, according to a statement from Stoughton Public Schools.

The post Racist text messages referencing slavery raise alarms, prompt investigations in Mass. and other states appeared first on Boston.com.

Washington — State driver’s licensing agencies will have 60 days to initiate mandatory downgrades of commercial driver’s licenses and commercial learner’s permits once notified that a commercial motor vehicle operator has failed a drug or alcohol test, under a Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration final rule set to go into effect Nov. 8.

Arlington, VA – Maryland tops a list of states that show “superior safety and enforcement performance” regarding commercial motor vehicles, according to the American Transportation Research Institute.

This past summer, the Midwest and much of the East Coast experienced an unprecedented decline in outdoor air quality. Smoke from wildfires in Canada regularly sent air quality ratings well into to the unhealthy range – an Air Quality Index for the smallest particulate matter – PM2.5 – in excess of 151.

The tallest LEED certified green office building in the United States, the Comcast Center in Philadelphia, has more than 2,500 openings equipped with door and hardware products from ASSA ABLOY Group companies.

Albany, NY — Attorneys general from New York, California and Maryland have filed a lawsuit challenging the Environmental Protection Agency’s decision to indefinitely delay a requirement for employers to provide enhanced training intended to protect farmworkers, pesticide handlers and their families from exposure to pesticides.

Washington — Six states are dropping their lawsuit against OSHA after the agency finalized changes to its revised rule on submitting annual injury and illness data.

Washington – Current laws fail to protect workers from retaliation for reporting their employer for health and safety hazards, concludes a new report from the Center for Effective Government.

Washington — Most states have expanded their whistleblower protection laws over the past 12 years, including 10 states that have done so in their most recent legislative sessions, according to an analysis by watchdog group Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility.

“Phoenix Fire’s team knows their craft and their customers, and that’s a winning combination for a successful business,” expressed Pye-Barker CEO Bart Proctor.

Washington — OSHA has warned Arizona, South Carolina and Utah to adopt their own version of the agency’s emergency temporary standard on COVID-19 for health care workers or face possible revocation of their State Plan status, according to multiple reports.

Chicago — Coal miners in Kentucky, Virginia and West Virginia may be more than eight times more likely than the general public to die from black lung disease and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

Washington — The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has announced temporary relief from hours-of-service requirements for commercial motor vehicle drivers delivering “direct assistance” to emergency efforts in states affected by severe winter weather.

Washington — The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration is asking for comments on petitions seeking to restore California’s and Washington state’s rules on meal and rest breaks for commercial truck and bus drivers.

Ideal candidates are organizations already serving the security marketplace, including security consultants, investigators, and product vendors.

Secaucus, NJ — Lyme disease is becoming more common outside the Northeast and more prevalent in the United States overall, a recent study by lab services provider Quest Diagnostics shows.

Washington — Aiming to identify cases of black lung disease in current and former miners, NIOSH will provide free, confidential health screenings in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia.

Currently operating under the Peerless brand in the U.S., the company will unify its presence under the Beaulieu name.

The post Home Ownership in America: A Socio-Cultural History of Housing in the United States was curated by information for practice.

The post Migration and the Rise of the United States: The Role of Old and New Diasporas was curated by information for practice.

The post Record Federal Grants to States Keep Federal Share of State Budgets High was curated by information for practice.

The post States’ Share of Medicaid Costs Remains Low but Is Set to Increase was curated by information for practice.

The post States Prioritize Reserves as Fiscal Flexibility Declines was curated by information for practice.

The post States Should Spur Use of “Direct Pay” Tax Credits to Advance Clean Energy in Low-Income Communities was curated by information for practice.

The post Latino Children Represent at Least 1 in 4 Kids Nationwide, and More Than 40 Percent in 5 States and Puerto Rico was curated by information for practice.

The post Patterns of depression symptoms in relation to stressors and social behaviors during the COVID-19 pandemic among older youth and emerging adults in the United States was curated by information for practice.

American Journal of Men’s Health, Volume 18, Issue 5, September-October 2024. Hispanic men have the highest prevalence of obesity relative to other racial and ethnic subgroups; however, this population is consistently underrepresented in weight management interventions. This systematic review aims to provide an overview of behavioral weight management interventions adapted for Hispanic men and describe […]

The post Behavioral Weight Management Interventions for Hispanic Men in the United States: A Systematic Review was curated by information for practice.

Journal of Disability Policy Studies, Ahead of Print. In 1997, the United States Agency for International Development established a policy focused on including people with disabilities in its development efforts. For the past two decades, this initiative has been echoed globally, yet research on its effectiveness remains limited. This study revisits a previous 2015 analysis […]

The post Disability Inclusion in Development Efforts: Analyzing the United States Agency for International Development’s Funding Solicitations for Evidence of Inclusive Practices was curated by information for practice.

Republican Kelly Ayotte's victory in New Hampshire will bring the total number of women holding governor’s offices to 13 — surpassing the previous high of 12 set in 2023.

President-elect Donald Trump won the election by flipping Georgia, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin after President Biden won them in 2020. Looking at how Democratic counties voted explains how he did it.

In a historic political comeback on Tuesday, former President Donald Trump was reelected for a second, nonconsecutive term to serve as the 47th president of the United States, and he has promised to “help our country heal” after a bruising campaign during which he escaped two assassination attempts.

The 2024 election yielded mixed results for the pro-life movement, with voters in several states supporting pro-abortion ballot measures as such referendums came up short in other states. 

Colonel-General Vladimir Zarudnitsky, the head of the Military Academy of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, published an article in August of this year, in which he casually referred to Russia's state-of-the-art development in the field of hypersonic weapons — the X-95 aircraft missile (also can be spelled as Kh-95). Why would Russia need yet another hypersonic missile given that the country already has Zircon and Kinzhal missiles? According to Vladimir Zarudnitsky, Russia needs to strive to achieve the dominant role of the Russian aviation in the field of aerospace, and it would be impossible to achieve the goal without the effective use of fighter and strike aircraft. Needless to say that the successful destruction of anti-aircraft, aviation and nuclear missile groups of a potential enemy is crucial for victory in any military operation. To achieve military superiority, it is vital for Russia to always be prepared to:

The International Boxing Association (IBA) has canceled the suspension of Russian and Belarusian athletes, a message posted on the official website of the organization says. The board of directors of the association voted for the admission of boxers from Russia and Belarus to international competitions. The decisions comes into force immediately, the IBA said. "The IBA strongly believes that politics shouldn't have any influence on sports. Hence, all athletes should be given equal conditions. Respecting its own autonomy as the international sports federation, the IBA shall remain politically neutral and independent,” the organization said in a statement.

Have you ever wondered what the richest state in the USA is? Many factors affect a state's wealth, including the cost of living, dominating industries, geographic resources, economic policies and the education of its workforce, among other things.

The poorest states in the U.S. often face a multitude of economic and social challenges that contribute to and perpetuate their low median household incomes.

Advocates for expanding Medicaid in Kansas staged a protest outside the entrance to the statehouse parking garage in Topeka in May 2019. Today, twelve states have still not expanded Medicaid. The biggest are Texas, Florida, and Georgia, but there are a few outside the South, including Wyoming and Kansas.; Credit: John Hanna/AP

There are more than 2 million people across the United States who have no option when it comes to health insurance. They're in what's known as the "coverage gap" — they don't qualify for Medicaid in their state, and make too little money to be eligible for subsidized health plans on the Affordable Care Act insurance exchanges.

Briana Wright is one of those people. She's 27, lives near Jackson, Miss., works at McDonalds, and doesn't have health insurance. So to figure out her options when she recently learned she needed to have surgery to remove her gallbladder, she called Health Help Mississippi, a nonprofit that helps people enroll in health insurances.

Because she lives in Mississippi, "I wasn't going to be eligible for Medicaid — because I don't have children [and] I'm not pregnant," she tells NPR. When she had her income checked for Healthcare.gov, it was just shy of the federal poverty line — the minimum to qualify for subsidies. "It was $74 [short]. I was like, oh wow," she says.

Wright's inability to get a subsidized policy on Healthcare.gov is related to how the Affordable Care Act was originally designed. People needing insurance who were above the poverty line were supposed to be funneled via the federal and state insurance exchanges to private policies — with federal subsidies to help make those policies affordable. People who were under the poverty line were to be funneled to a newly-expanded version of Medicaid — the public health insurance program that is jointly funded by states and the federal government. But the Supreme Court made Medicaid expansion essentially optional in 2012, and many Republican-led states declined to expand. Today, there are 12 holdout states that have not expanded Medicaid, and Mississippi is one of them.

So, Wright is still uninsured. Her gallbladder is causing her pain, but she can't afford the surgery without shuffling household bills, and risking leaving something else unpaid. "I'm stressed out about it. I don't know what I'm going to do," she says. "I'm going to just have to pay it out of pocket or get on some payment plan until it all gets paid for."

Hoping to finally find a fix for Wright and the millions like her who are in Medicaid limbo, several teams of Democratic lawmakers have recently been hashing out several options — hoping to build on the momentum of the latest Supreme Court confirmation that the ACA is here to stay.

OPTION 1: Sweet-talk the 12 holdout states

The COVID-19 relief bill passed in March included financial enticements for these 12 states to expand Medicaid. Essentially, the federal government will cover 90% of the costs of the newly eligible population, and an additional 5% of the costs of those already enrolled.

It's a good financial deal. An analysis by the nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation estimates that the net benefit for these states would be $9.6 billion. But, so far — publicly, at least — no states have indicated they intend to take the federal government up on its offer.

"If that is not getting states to move, then that suggests that the deep root of their hesitation is not about financial constraint," says Jamila Michener, a professor of government at Cornell University and author of the book Fragmented Democracy: Medicaid Federalism And Unequal Politics.

Instead, Michener says, the reluctance among some Republican-led legislatures and governors to expand Medicaid may be a combination of partisan resistance to President Obama's signature health law, and not believing "this kind of government intervention for these groups of people is appropriate."

What's Next: When asked about progress on this front in an April press briefing, Biden's press secretary Jen Psaki said "the President is certainly supportive of — and an advocate for — states expanding Medicaid," but did not answer a follow up about whether the White House was directly reaching out to governors regarding this option.

OPTION 2: Create a federal public option to fill the gap

Some have advocated for circumventing these holdout states and creating a new, standalone federal Medicaid program that people who fall into this coverage gap could join. It would be kind of like a tailored public option just for this group.

This idea was included in Biden's 2022 budget, which says, in part: "In States that have not expanded Medicaid, the President has proposed extending coverage to millions of people by providing premium-free, Medicaid-like coverage through a Federal public option, paired with financial incentives to ensure States maintain their existing expansions."

But it wouldn't be simple. "That can be quite complex — to implement a federal program that's targeted to just these 2.2 million people across a handful of states," says Robin Rudowitz, co-director of the Medicaid program at the Kaiser Family Foundation, who wrote a recent analysis of the policy options.

It also may be a heavy lift, politically, says Michener. "Anything that expanded the footprint of the federal government and its role in subsidizing health care would be especially challenging," she says.

What's next: This idea was raised as a possible solution in a letter last month from Georgia's Democratic senators to Senate leaders, and Sen. Raphael Warnock said this week he plans to introduce legislation soon.

OPTION 3: Get around stubborn states by letting cities expand Medicaid

Instead of centralizing the approach, this next idea goes even more local. The COVER Now Act, introduced by Rep. Lloyd Doggett, D-Texas, would empower local jurisdictions to expand Medicaid. So, if you live in Austin, Texas, maybe you could get Medicaid, even if someone in Lubbock still couldn't.

The political and logistical challenges would be tough, policy analysts say. Logistically, such a plan would require counties and cities to create new infrastructure to run a Medicaid program, Rudowitz notes, and the federal government would have to oversee how well these new local programs complied with all of Medicaid's rules.

"It does not seem feasible politically," Michener says. "The legislators who would have to vote to make this possible would be ceding quite a bit of power to localities." It also might amplify geographic equity concerns, she says. People's access to health insurance would not just "be arbitrarily based on what state you live in — which is the current state of affairs — It's also going to be arbitrary based on what county you live in, based on what city you live in."

What's next: Doggett introduced the bill earlier this month. There's no guarantee it would get a vote on the House floor and — even if it did — it wouldn't survive a likely filibuster in the evenly divided Senate.

OPTION 4: Change the ACA to open up the exchanges

A fourth idea, Rudowitz says, is to change the law to remove the minimum cutoff for the private health insurance exchanges, since "right now, individuals who are below poverty are not eligible for subsidies in the marketplace." With this option, states wouldn't be paying any of the costs, since the federal government pays premium subsidies, Rudowitz says, but "there are issues around beneficiary protections, benefits, out-of-pocket costs."

What's next: This idea hasn't yet been included in any current congressional bills.

Will any of these ideas come to fruition?

Even with a variety of ideas on the table, "there's no slam dunk option, it's a tough policy issue," Rudowitz says. All of these would be complicated to pull off.

It's possible Democrats will include one of these ideas in a reconciliation bill that could pass without the threat of a Republican filibuster. But that bill has yet to be written, and what will be included is anyone's guess.

Even so, Michener says she's glad the discussion of the Medicaid coverage gap is happening, because it's sensitizing the public, as well as people in power, to the problem and potentially changing the political dynamic down the line. "Even in policy areas where you don't have any kind of guaranteed victory, it is often worth fighting the fight," she says. "Politics is a long game."

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

The EcoComplex is a system that recovers all useable products and by-products from a group of private and public partners located in a close-knit defined area. This group of partners works together to use each other�s waste products either as a source of energy (electricity, steam, or heat) or as a raw material for the production of their own product (pallets, lumber, compost, brick shapes/art). The EcoComplex is also focused on making and using �green� energy and on economic development.

Immigration benefits the U.S. economy overall and has little negative effect on the income and job opportunities of most native-born Americans, says a new report by a panel of the National Research Council.

Policymakers, employers, and educational institutions should take steps to strengthen the nation’s skilled technical workforce, says a new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

NASA’s large strategic missions like the Hubble Space Telescope, the Curiosity rover on Mars, and the Terra Earth observation satellite are essential to maintaining the United States’ global leadership in space exploration and should continue to be a primary component of a balanced space science program that includes large, medium, and smaller missions, says a new report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

For his pioneering role in national health policy and health services research, the National Academy of Medicine today announced Stuart Altman is the recipient of the 2018 Gustav O. Lienhard Award for Advancement of Health Care.

In my nearly 20 years at SpaceX, I have experienced hundreds of Falcon launches and test firings. As such, my level of anxiety prior to these events had been waning until, of course, Saturday, May 30, 2020. On that day, and for days leading up to it, my heart was in my throat.

In 2020, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration obtained commitments from manufacturers to cease sales for food contact use of grease-proofing substances that contain certain types of PFAS.