Tag: Health & Science

Coal company blames previous owner for safety reputation

Patriot Coal is responding to recent actions from the federal Mine Safety and Health Administration. Yesterday, Thursday MSHA released a statement stating that the agency had labeled two West Virginia coal mines and one in Kentucky as pattern violators, meaning they’ve repeatedly broken federal health and safety regulations.

The POV screening is the first one conducted since MSHA’s revised Pattern of Violations rule went into effect on March 25, 2013. These revisions improve MSHA’s ability to act when it finds a pattern of violations.

After no mine was placed on POV for the first 33 years after the Mine Act went into effect, these POV notices mark the third year in a row that MSHA has used this critical tool to protect miners from serious hazards.

One of the mines is the Brody Mine No. 1 in Boone County owned by Patriot Coal. MSHA says:

  • “Brody Mining’s Brody Mine No. 1 received 253 S&S violations during the review period. An MSHA audit of Brody Mining’s records found that injuries of miners resulted in 1,757 lost work days at the mine, 367 of which were from eight lost-time injuries that Brody Mining failed to report to MSHA. The company was also audited during the 2012 POV screening process. In that audit, MSHA found 29 injuries Brody Mining failed to report and 724 unreported lost work days.”

Patriot says the company does not deserve this status because some of the citations were inherited from the previous owner.
Patriot gained control from Brody Mining on December 31, 2012. In a statement, officials at Patriot said several of the violations and the severity measure cited in the POV finding took place under the prior owner.

Patriot says after the purchase, the Company submitted a Compliance Improvement Plan to MSHA and that  the Brody mine compliance performance has improved by 40 percent.

Patriot claims to have replaced all former officers and key mine-level managers at this mine. Patriot says MSHA approved a Corrective Action Plan submitted in September.

Company officials say they intend to vigorously contest the POV finding. 

The other mine placed on POV status is Pocahontas Coal Co.’s Affinity Mine in Raleigh County, where two men died within two weeks of each other in February. MSHA says:

  • “Pocahontas Coal Company’s Affinity Mine received 124 S&S violations during the review period, a quarter of which MSHA cited as involving high negligence or reckless disregard for the health and safety of miners. Two miners died in separate accidents during the review period; the fatalities occurred within two weeks of each other and both involved scoops. Affinity Mine received 35 closure orders during the review period, the third highest in the country.”

The third is Tram Energy’s Mine No. 1 in Floyd County, Ky. MSHA says:

  • “Tram Energy’s Mine No. 1 received 120 S&S violations during the POV review period—more than half of those violations involved elevated levels of operator negligence. MSHA issued 40 closure orders at Tram Energy during the POV review period, the most of any mine in the country. The company has incurred approximately $170,000 in civil penalties since it began operating in 2012. All but $666 is unpaid and delinquent.”

In 2010 29 men were killed in the Upper Big Branch explosion. The then Massey owned mine had been cited for 639 violations in the 15 months prior to the explosion, and yet was never put on POV status. Before MSHA was required to issue a ‘potential pattern of violations” status.
Under the revised rule MSHA no longer has to wait for contested citations to play out in court.

Manchin leads effort to reschedule hydrocodone

Senator Joe Manchin held a conference call this morning to discuss the announcement that the Food and Drug Administration is recommending hydrocodone be reclassified.

  The FDA is recommending to the Department of Health and Human Services that hydrocodone drugs like Vicodin or Lortab be reclassified from a Schedule III to a Schedule II controlled substance.

Under this category, it’s acknowledged that the drug has a high potential for abuse, can cause severe psychological or physical dependence, and should be used with severe restrictions.

Manchin believes the rescheduling may curtail the frequent prescribing of the drug, making it less available to those who would abuse it.  

“Hopefully it’s going to help, it’s not going to cure our prescription problem that we have, but it will sure help and everyone that’s on the front line fighting prescription drug abuse has come forward and shown that something was much needed and it’s going to be a tremendous help to reducing the amount of pills that are on the street,” Manchin said.

According to Manchin the Department of Health and Human Services is expected to pass along the recommendation to the Drug and Enforcement Administration which will immediately begin the reclassification process. Manchin has been fighting to reschedule the painkillers for nearly two years.

Drug firms told to reveal W.Va. shipment records

A Boone County judge has ordered four pharmaceutical drug distributors to reveal their shipments to West Virginia pharmacies over the past five years.…

A Boone County judge has ordered four pharmaceutical drug distributors to reveal their shipments to West Virginia pharmacies over the past five years.
 
Circuit Judge William Thompson acted Thursday in a lawsuit filed last year by former state Attorney General Darrell McGraw. The suit accused the companies of helping to contribute to the state’s pain pill abuse epidemic.
 
The Charleston Gazette  reports Cardinal Health, Anda Inc., AmerisourceBergen Drug Corp. and J.M Smith Corp. must disclose within 30 days every state pharmacy where they’ve delivered drugs.
 
West Virginia leads the nation in the rate of fatal drug overdoses. A report released this month by the Trust for America’s Health says that rate is now six times higher than it was about a decade ago.
 

Manchin proposes delay to ACA individual mandate

Senator Joe Manchin is proposing a delay in a key component to the federal Affordable Care Act, the individual mandate. Manchin defended his legislation…

Senator Joe Manchin is proposing a delay in a key component to the federal Affordable Care Act, the individual mandate. Manchin defended his legislation saying it allows the administration more time to fix glitches in the enrollment system, but a left-leaning policy group in Charleston maintains a delay will have significant negative impacts on West Virginians.

The individual mandate requires all Americans sign up for health insurance through the federal health care exchange by April 1, or face a penalty of $95 or 1 percent of their annual income, whichever is greater.

The penalty will be collected by the IRS and increases to more than $300 after the first year.

Manchin, however, said it’s too soon to punish Americans who are unable to sign up for health care because of problems with the federal enrollment website. He’s proposing that date be pushed back from April 1 to January 1, 2015.

“This should be a transition year,” he said in a conference call Thursday. “We’re seeing all the problems that they’re having rolling this thing out. It’s going to have some problems and they’re going to have to work through that, but people shouldn’t be facing a fine because they can’t log in.”

But Brandon Merritt, health policy analyst for the West Virginia Center on Budget & Policy, said the individual mandate is key and without it the Affordable Care Act will fall apart.

“The idea of the Affordable Care Act is to provide insurance to those who don’t have insurance and to help control the costs of insurance that has been creeping up for decades now,” Merritt said. “So, the individual mandate is what holds this together.”

Without that mandate, Merritt said healthy individuals won’t purchase plans, preventing more individuals from buying coverage and leaving insurance companies with a pool of sickly customers.

“Essentially what happens is that those who don’t seek as much treatment in any given year are helping cover the costs of those who do seek more treatment, and so under the Affordable Care Act, if the individual mandate is delayed likely what would happen is that only those who are sicker and going to require more care throughout the year are going to be the ones who purchase more health insurance,” Merritt said. “What that does is skews the risk pool so the health insurers essentially get set up with a sicker population that requires more treatment and is going to cost them more money.”

The more providers have to pay to cover their customers, the higher premium rates will climb thus preventing even more individuals from being able to access health care.

Manchin said that notion in Washington is being pushed by the insurance companies.

“I think everybody wants insurance if it’s affordable,” he said. “It’s part of who we are as Americans, but on the other hand, you have to have a marketable product. That’s where the insurance industry has to work with the administration and it has to be market forces that are driving it.”

Republicans have proposed similar delays in the hopes of preventing the ACA from taking root at all.

Manchin said his intention is not to get rid of the ACA in its entirety, but to put more pressure on the Obama administration and the industry to offer an affordable, quality product to consumers and to prevent Americans from being penalized before it is available.

“A lot of my colleagues keep saying delay, delay, delay. They want to delay it and never start it,” Manchin said. “Well, this is such a mammoth undertaking that you have to start down the road of (trying to work) within the marketplace, figure out where the problems are and if they can be fixed or not.”

Merritt doesn’t believe Manchin is trying to sabotage the bill’s implementation, but still, his analysis is blunt, saying straight out the senator’s plan won’t work. Merritt said now is not the time to tread lightly on a subject that affects thousands of West Virginians.

“While I understand Senator Manchin’s approach to say let’s try to find a common ground, I don’t think this is the compromise we really want to see because this is going to have negative impacts not just politically, but here in West Virginia with those who are unable to get insurance and those who do get insurance on the private market will see increased premiums,” he said.

“So, it’s really going to hit us here at home if we delay this aspect of the Affordable Care Act. I think it’s really important that we put it bluntly to say that this is a bad idea.”

When asked if the bill would receive a signature if it made it to the President’s desk, Manchin said he was unsure, but he hopes the bipartisan support will force the President to consider it.
 

The problem with chicken poop and rain

Environmental groups are reacting to a ruling from a federal judge which says the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has no legal right to force a West Virginia chicken farmer to obtain pollution permits for runoff from her Hardy County farm.

U.S. District Judge John Preston Bailey ruled that the runoff entering the Chesapeake Bay watershed from Lois Alt’s poultry farm is stormwater and therefore not subject to regulation under the Clean Water Act.

Alt admitted  that pollutants from the poultry  houses are being discharged into the South Branch of the Potomac River, but objects to a requirement to operate under a permit. The farm bureaus called EPA’s attempt to require a permit  an illegal overreach of authority.

Several organizations supported the EPA’s efforts including Potomac Riverkeeper, West Virginia Rivers Coalition, Waterkeeper Alliance, Center for Food Safety, Food and Water Watch and Earthjustice. The groups said ina press release that the court’s decision could have devastating impacts on the health of the watershed. The groups say they’re exploring legal options.
 

State legislators concerned with head injuries

There’s been a lot of attention on how head injuries are affecting football players, and athletes, on all levels—including when they are very young. Stakeholders concerned about this issue hope new protocols will sufficiently prevent serious injuries.

Last year, the state legislature passed a measure that provides protocols for head injury protections for student athletes in West Virginia. These guidelines require coaches to have course training on head injuries and concussions, as well as being mandated to remove players from competition who are suspected of having concussions. It’s something that State Senator Ron Stollings said there’s a specific mission with these new rules.

“I think this bill is a good bill, we will see it being implemented as we speak. Me, being a volunteer physician on Friday nights, I have to take that educational piece myself. It’s a good thing,” said Stollings.

Also under the guidelines, a concussion and head injury sheet must be signed and returned by the athlete and the athlete’s parents before practice or competition begins, to make officials aware of previous injuries. If a player has been removed from a game due to a head injury, that person may not return to action until he or she has written clearance from a licensed health care professional.

Gary Ray with the West Virginia Secondary Schools Activities Commission said these new guidelines give “teeth” to his organizations, and other interested parties, in protecting students. But he says parents must also play a role.

“I was guilty when I played sports, you didn’t want to tell mom or dad because you might not get to play the next day. You’ve got to let people know, you’ve got to communicate. Mom and Dad work with their child, they need to make sure they are in constant communication with the school if they feel this is an issue,” said Stollings.

Senator Stollings said he wants to make sure that all medical professionals like him, who administer to athletes during games, are protected from excess liability issues.

“I think just basically saying that volunteer physicians while at a volunteer event, Friday night football, that you would have coverage by the Board of Risk and Insurance Management,” said Stollings. “I’d like it to be spelled out in statute, that we’re covered, a volunteer physician.”

One final requirement of the new guidelines is that when students do suffer a concussion or head injury in a practice or game, a report must be sent from the school to the WVSSAC within 30 days of the injury. The report must state whether an evaluation, done by a medical professional, verifies that a concussion has occurred. This report must also state how many days it’s been between the injury and athlete’s return to competition.

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