Baltimore City Council President Introduces Bill to Study the Health and Safety Risks of Oil Trains

Wednesday Jan 27th, 2016

Last night, the Baltimore City Council took its first step toward addressing the dangers of potentially explosive crude oil trains running through the city. Council President Jack Young introduced a bill that would require the first-ever city study of the health and safety risks posed by transporting crude oil by rail through Baltimore. Every member of the city council is a cosponsor of the ordinance (Bill 16-0621).

The bill would require the City Health Department to study the public health and safety risks oil trains pose to communities along rail lines. It also requires public outreach to inform residents of the study findings and directs city agencies to incorporate those findings into their incident response plans.

Read more at: http://chesapeakeclimate.org/press-releases/baltimore-city-council-presi...

Related Stories

Lead poisoning cases fell 19 percent in Baltimore last year, even as more children tested for exposure (Baltimore Sun)

The number of Baltimore children with lead poisoning fell 19 percent in 2017, even as more children were tested for exposure to the powerful neurotoxin.

Statewide, the number of Maryland children found to have elevated levels of lead in their blood held steady even as the number of children tested increased by 10 percent, according to a Maryland Department of the Environment report released Tuesday.

Read the entire story.

Azar Unveils Plan to Help Pregnant Patients Quit Opioids (MedPage Today)

States will get help from the federal government integrating services for pregnant and postpartum Medicaid patients with opioid use disorder under a pilot program announced Tuesday by Health and Hu

Trump declared an emergency over opioids. A new report finds it led to very little. (Vox)

To much fanfare last year, President Donald Trump ordered his administration to declare a public health emergency over the opioid epidemic. “As Americans, we cannot allow this to continue,” Trump said at the time. “It is time to liberate our communities from this scourge of drug addiction.”

When I’ve asked experts about these approaches, it’s not that any of them are bad. It’s that they fall short. For instance, Leana Wen, the former health commissioner of Baltimore (and soon-to-be president of Planned Parenthood), said that the Support for Patients and Communities Act “is simply tinkering around the edges.”

Read the entire story.

Visit the Newsroom