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January/February 2025
Journal of Environmental Health Volume 87, Number 6 View the IssueAbout the Cover Preventing foodborne illness within military operations is essential to maintain the security and defense capabilities of units. This month's cover article eva...
FY 2025 Federal Budget Update
December 27, 2024 Before the holiday break Congress passed and President Biden signed a continuing resolution averting a government shutdown. This measure keeps the government operating at FY 2024 funding levels along with more than $110 billion...
December 2024
Journal of Environmental Health Volume 87, Number 5 View the IssueAbout the Cover Tropospheric ozone concentrations have trended downward in many U.S. cities since 2000. In Texas, however, concentrations and regulatory exceedances abruptly ro...
State Enacted Body Art Legislation: 2024 Sessions
October 11, 2024 For the 2024 state legislative sessions that began in January 2024, state legislators introduced 64 bills related to body art. Of these bills, 19 were passed and enacted into law. Body art legislation covered topics such as barb...
State Enacted Food Safety Legislation: 2024 Sessions
September 19, 2024 For the 2024 state legislative sessions that began in January 2024, state legislators introduced 250 bills related to food safety. Of these bills, 41 were passed and enacted into law, with another 11 eligible for signing by th...
Back on the Hill Again, Virtually
May 28, 2024 During the hectic federal budget month of May, we were again talking to Congress, this time virtually.Republican appropriators from the House of Representative came out with their top line fiscal year (FY) 2025 budgets鈥�$711 billion ...
We Were Back on Capitol Hill Advocating for You
May 15, 2024 We were again advocating for environmental health on Capitol Hill, this time to promote funding for the Human Foods Program within the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).Government Affairs Director Doug Farquhar met with 17 congress...
Our Visit to the CDC Vector-Borne Laboratory
April 30, 2024 On Wednesday, April 24, our CEO Dr. David Dyjack and Government Affairs Director Doug Farquhar visited the CDC Vector-Borne Disease Laboratory in Ft. Collins, Colorado. Dr. Sue Visser, deputy director for Policy and Extramural Pro...
State Voices Amplified During 2024 Hill Day
April 8, 2024 We held our 7th Annual Hill Day on March 28, 2024, with a new twist. This was the first year that instead of only including our board members, we facilitated the opportunity for our members to join us. We are pleased to report that...
President Biden Fiscal Year 2025 Budget Proposal Released
March 18, 2024 President Biden released his fiscal year (FY) 2025 budget proposal on March 11, outlining the Administration鈥檚 priorities for the upcoming fiscal year, including amounts to fund environmental health programs at the Cen...
Congress to Approve Fiscal Year 2024 Funding for Several Federal Agencies
March 4, 2024 Congress released the massive $467.5 billion fiscal year (FY) 2024 appropriations package for the Agriculture, Commerce-Justice-Science, Energy-Water, Interior-Environment, Military Construction-VA and Transportation-HUD budgets. T...
Federal Funding: Congressional Update
February 26, 2024 As we move into the sixth month of the federal fiscal year (FY 2024) with no final agreement and the continuing resolution (CR) expiring, Congress needs to act鈥攅ither to enact the appropriations bill or another CR.No one in Con...
2023 State Legislation on Body Art
January 9, 2024 A total of 60 pieces of legislation related to body art were introduced in 19 states and Puerto Rico during the 2023 legislative sessions. Of these 60, 9 were enacted in California, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, New Hampshire, Tennessee. ...
2023: Our Year in Review for Government Affairs
January 5, 2024 Washington, DC, remains as chaotic as ever. Congress spent more time trying to figure out a speaker than floor time on appropriations. The House of Representatives is as far behind as it has ever been on passing the fiscal year (...
House and Senate Have Until January 19 to Finalize Fiscal Year 2024 Appropriations
December 18, 2023 Congress is much closer to finalizing the fiscal year (FY) 2024 appropriations than the last blog posted on the topic in July, but they still have a ways to go. Top-Line Spending Levels and Other Fund...
Concurrent Disaster Response Success Story
This success story describes how the Environmental Division of the Town of Addison, Texas faced the challenges of a winter storm during COVID-19 in the context of ensuring food safety, public health, and providing warming stations and power to a...
2023 Update on State Food Safety Legislation
October 3, 2023 The following table provides a summary of bills related to food safety that have been introduced by state legislations in 2023.Food Safety Topic# of Bills IntroducedRetail food67Food freedom66Food safety51Meat, seafood, or poultr...
Opinion: Compound Risks and Complex Emergencies Require New Approaches to Preparedness
This article calls for a need to redesign institutions to be proactive, agile, and socially just when confronted with compound risks that have become increasingly likely. This resource includes: Risk reduction framework and funding Pandemic l...
COVID-19, the Built Environment, and Health
This article discusses features of the built environment that affect the risk of COVID-19 and identify elements of the pandemic response with implications for the built environment and for long-term public health. This resource includes: Influe...
Compounding Hazards and Intersecting Vulnerabilities
This report discusses study findings that measure how COVID-19 affected extreme heat vulnerability during the summer of 2020. This resource includes: Examination of socio-demographic characteristics and pandemic related factors Examined vulne...
The COVID-19 Crisis Worsens With the Occurrence of Climate Extremes and Disasters
This article examines the impacts of climate disasters and COVID-19 in Africa and provides suggestions for countries to strengthen their emergency department by boosting the staff component, provide adequate technical support and develop detaile...
Changing Vulnerability for Hurricane Evacuation During a Pandemic
This article examines data from workshops involving emergency management and public health experts to support planning for hurricane evacuation and sheltering. This resource includes: Policy integration findings Expanded protections for popula...
Supporting Wildfire Response During a Pandemic in the United States
This article reviews the development and application of a COVID-19 Incident Risk Assessment Tool. The tool includes summary of usage statistics, examples of real use on wildfire incidents, and report feedback from users. The tool was used to fil...
Potential Impact of Earthquakes During the 2020 COVID-19 Pandemic
This article analyzes the potential impact that seismic events may have on the infection rate within regions afflicted by both epidemics and earthquakes. It also explores open software packages that can be employed to simulate the impact of futu...
The United States COVID-19 Pandemic in the Flood Season
This article outlines a tool that assesses the compound risk of COVID-19 at the county level. The article found that the number of flood insurance house claims can proxy the displaced population accurately with more spatiotemporal detail, and th...
Challenges for the Disaster Workforce During a Compound Hurricane-Pandemic
This article identifies how emergency management planning for both the changing dynamics of COVID-19 and hurricane season may change under a compound threat. COVID-19 and the increase of natural disasters occurring pushes new considerations to b...
The COVID-19 Pandemic and Wildfire Smoke
This article identifies the potential for dangerous interactions between COVID-19 and smoke pollution This resource includes: Strategies to manage the combination of public health threats Recommended for environmental and public health officia...
Orchestrating Performance of Healthcare Networks Subjected to the Compound Events of Natural Disasters and Pandemic
This article combines wildfire data with varying courses of the spread of COVID-19 to evaluate the effectiveness of different strategies for managing patient demand. It shows that losing access to medical care is a function of the relative occur...
The Mental Health Impacts of Successive Disasters
Experiencing a natural disaster at the same time as a global pandemic is associated with negative impacts on mental health. This article studies resiliency at the individual and community levels to understand problematic impacts following a disa...
Studying Social Workers' Roles in Natural Disasters During a Global Pandemic
This article shares practice and research recommendations for a social worker relating to therapeutic interactions, social justice, and public health during disasters. Social workers are viewed as a source of reliable information about safety, r...
Caring for the Forgotten Children: Rebuilding Puerto Rico After Hurricane Maria, Earthquakes, and COVID-19
This article focuses on mental health resiliency within child and adolescent groups as well as the general community members. Communities have vulnerabilities that are often displayed when being impacted by disasters and it is important to learn...
Dueling Emergencies: Flood Evacuation Ridesharing During the COVID-19 Pandemic
This paper examines the complexity behind the decision-making relating to rideshare during an emergency like COVID-19. Sharing resources during disaster events like vehicles, supports the expansion of critical capacity and enables inclusive disa...
Nonprofit Response to Concurrent and Consecutive Disaster Events in Puerto Rico
This article examines how nonprofit organizations are prominent stakeholders when working in community-level recovery efforts. It explores the role of nonprofits to facilitate dynamic information flows, fill in critical service delivery gaps lef...
Mutual Aid: A Grassroots Model for Justice and Equity in Emergency Management
This article provides lessons for a more equitable approach to emergency management. Grassroots mutual aid programs regained prominence when supporting equitable approaches to emergency management during many concurrent disasters in 2020. Disast...
Concurrent Threats and Disasters: Modeling and Managing Risk and Resilience
This article provides a literature review of how policymakers were prompted to reassess operations and management strategies that support society鈥檚 critical functions like infrastructure, healthcare services, supply chains, and emergency respons...
The Pandemic and All-Hazards Preparedness Reauthorization Act
September 5, 2023 The Pandemic and All-Hazards Preparedness Reauthorization Act (PAHPRA) undergoes review and is reauthorized by Congress every 5 years, the first time in 2018 and again at the end of September 2023. Congress has mark...
FDA Appoints Deputy Commissioner for Human Foods Program
August 29, 2023 The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has announced the appointment of James 鈥淛im鈥� Jones as the first-ever deputy commissioner for the Human Foods Program. As deputy commissioner of the Human Foods Program, J...
House and Senate Appropriators Remain Far Apart on Fiscal Year 2024 Budgets
August 25, 2023 Congressional appropriators remain where they were earlier this summer regarding budgets that affect environmental health. Not much movement on the appropriation budgets for the Centers for Disease Control and...
The Impact of Natural Disasters on the Spread of COVID-19
This journal article discusses es how natural disasters and infectious disease disrupts human health and livelihood. It modeled a concurrent disaster scenario on the impact of infection related fatalities. This resource contains information on: ...
House and Senate Continue to Work on Fiscal Year 2024 Appropriations
July 24, 2023 The appropriation bills for Fiscal Year 2024 are being finalized, with the House Appropriations Committee passing the FY 2024 Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies appropriations bi...
Fiscal Year 2024 Appropriations Moving Forward, Albeit Slowly
June 26, 2023After the recent debacle over the debt ceiling, Congress is once again working on the fiscal year (FY) 2024 budget. The Senate is using the agreed-to FY 2023 amount set by the debt ceiling and the House of Representatives is followi...
Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023
June 6, 2023 On Saturday, June 3, 2023, President Joe Biden signed the Fiscal Responsibility Act (FRA) of 2023, which raises the debt ceiling to allow the U.S. federal government to continue to pay its bills. The deal suspends the deb...
Iowa and South Carolina Redesign Their Public Health Agencies
May 19, 2023 No one needs to point out that the nation鈥檚 public health system does not always function well, and the same can be said for environmental health. States are learning that cutting budgets and resources lead to subpar serv...
Fiscal Year 2024 Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Bill
May 18, 2023The House Appropriations Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies marked up the fiscal year (FY) 2024 appropriations bill on May 18, 2023. The committee approved a party line ...
We Were Back in Washington, DC, in Early May
May 17, 2023 Our director of Government Affairs was back at the nation鈥檚 capital in early May to advocate for the inclusion of the environmental health workforce in the Public Health Workforce Loan Repayment Program. We...
We Advocate for Support of FDA Food Safety Efforts
May 11, 2023 We met with congressional appropriators last month to discuss the importance of Food and Drug Administration(FDA) budgets for food safety to state, local, tribal, and territorial environmental health agencies. Our...
51暗网 Meets With the FDA Commissioner
April 10, 2023We were in our nation鈥檚 capital the first week of April visiting the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Headquarters in White Oak, Maryland.Executive Director Dr. David Dyjack, Director of EZ Rance Baker, Director of Government Af...
51暗网 in Washington, DC, 2023
March 2, 2023Our sixth annual Hill Day was held on Thursday, February 23. The 51暗网 Board of Directors and several of our members met with 53 members of the U.S. Congress from both the House of Representative and Senate and both parties who serve...