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A Superbug Nightmare Is Playing Out at an LA Hospital

by Casey Wood Posted on February 19, 2015

Mother Jones

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In today’s terrifying health news, the LA Times reports that two medical scopes used at UCLA’s Ronald Reagan Medical Center may have been contaminated with the potentially deadly, antibiotic-resistant bacteria Carbapenem-Resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE). Two patients have died from complications that may be connected to the bacteria, and authorities believe that 179 more patients have been exposed.

Most healthy people aren’t at risk of catching a CRE infection, but in hospitals this bacteria can be quite dangerous: CRE kills as many as half of all people in whom the infection has spread to the bloodstream. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are working with the CA Department of Public Health to investigate the situation, which is expected to result in more infections.

The problem isn’t just in Los Angeles, though. Last month USA Today reported that hospitals around the country struggle with transmissions of bacteria on these scopes—medical devices commonly used to treat digestive-system problems—and there have been several other under-the-radar outbreaks of CRE.

This is pretty scary stuff, considering that in the antibiotics arms race against bacteria, we are starting to fall behind. Due in large part to unnecessary medical prescriptions and overuse of antibiotics in our food supply, these superbugs are on the rise. In a study published last year that focused specifically on hospitals in the Southeastern United States, researchers reported that CRE cases had increased fivefold between 2008 and 2012.

As Mother Jones‘ Tom Philpott wrote recently, unless something changes, it will only get worse:

in a new report, the UK government has come out with some startling global projections. Currently, the report finds, 700,000 people die annually from pathogens that have developed resistance to antibiotics, a figure the report calls a “low estimate.” If present trends continue, antibiotic failure will claim 10 million lives per year by 2050, the report concludes. That’s more carnage than what’s currently caused by cancer and traffic accidents combined.

The CDC has, in recent years, amped up its efforts to contain the growth of antibiotic-resistant bacteria and ha developed a tool-kit to help educate both patients and medical practitioners. The Obama administration has increased funding in 2015 for CDC research into how to better detect these types of infections. It also expanded the National Healthcare Safety Network to track threats of superbugs and areas of antibiotic overuse.

But the CDC emphasizes that more must be done:

Can you imagine a day when antibiotics don’t work anymore? It’s concerning to think that the antibiotics that we depend upon for everything from skin and ear infections to life-threatening bloodstream infections could no longer work. Unfortunately, the threat of untreatable infections is very real.

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A Superbug Nightmare Is Playing Out at an LA Hospital

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This Train Plowing Through Snow Is Absolutely Astonishing

by BerryKDPPmmpcp Posted on February 6, 2015

Mother Jones

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There’s a strange corner of YouTube where train-spotters post their conquests in exhaustive detail. It’s one of the weirder YouTube holes I’ve been down in a while. But…oddly comforting. This video—of a Canadian National Railway locomotive making a meal out of snow drifts left by major blizzards in New Brunswick—is like something directly out of Snowpiercer, the 2013 dystopian ice age thriller set in a climate-altered future.

While certainly mesmerizing, there’s an important issue to note that has gone unremarked upon since the video went viral. It’s unclear what precisely the locomotive is carrying, but it’s definitely pulling tankers. Its cargo may very well be oil, given that its destination is St John, New Brunswick, the location of Canada’s biggest oil refinery, the Irving Oil Refinery. That refinery was the destination for the train laden with Bakken oil that derailed and exploded in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, in July 2013. The Lac-Mégantic accident killed 47 people and prompted calls across Canada and the United States for tougher safety standards for the booming oil-by-rail network.

Mark Hallman, director of communications for Canadian National Railway, refused to give specifics about the types of cargo being pulled by the train in the YouTube clip, calling it a “mixed freight” service. But Jayni Foley Hein, an expert on energy and transportation at the Institute for Policy Integrity, says crude is one likely possibility. “Its carrying the type of tankers that generally carry oil, and given its proximity to this refinery, it’s certainly a reasonable prediction,” she said.

Despite the soaring plumes of snow, Hallman told me that the train in the video was “totally safely operated,” adding, “That’s winter in Canada. That’s what we have to deal with.” The railway’s own “Customer Safety Handbook” says that operators should take special care in wintry, snowy conditions: “Many of the service disruptions center on accumulations of snow and ice,” says the handbook. “On the track, snow mostly constitutes a problem in switches, as well as at crossings—so once the snow is cleared, the problem is solved.” In general, winter hits railway lines hard, contracting the tracks and making fractures more likely, according to Canadian National Railway.

A 10-year US Department of Transportation analysis of weather-related train accidents in America, from 1995 to 2005, found that the accidents related to snow and ice, when they did occur, often resulted in dangerous derailments. “During the winter months of December through March, the highest accident numbers arose from preexisting snow and ice conditions such as buildups that cause malfunctioning switches and derailments,” the report found.

After the Lac-Mégantic disaster, both the United States and Canada agreed to get rid of the older and more dangerous versions of the tanker involved in that tragedy, the “DOT-111.” (We covered the cons of this tanker extensively last May.) In mid-January, Canada announced it would take the tankers off the network years sooner than the United States will, putting the two countries at odds over increased safety measures on the deeply integrated system.

The dangers of carrying oil by rail have fueled a key aspect to the ongoing debate over the Keystone XL pipeline. When the US State Department issued its long-awaited environmental-impact statement on the project last year, one of its most significant findings was that if the controversial pipeline wasn’t built, oil-laden rail cars would pick up the slack. “Rail will likely be able to accommodate new production if new pipelines are delayed or not constructed,” it argued. (More recently, falling oil prices have led the EPA to question that line of reasoning.)

NBC recently reported that in America, trains spilled crude oil more often in 2014 than in any year since the government began collecting data in 1975.

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This Train Plowing Through Snow Is Absolutely Astonishing

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Greens get behind striking oil workers

by ConcepcEyler Posted on February 3, 2015

Greens get behind striking oil workers

By on 3 Feb 2015commentsShare

U.S. oil workers have launched a strike that has the potential to spread as the United Steelworkers union works to negotiate a new contract with the industry. Some environmental groups are signalling their support for the strikers, describing them as “highly skilled professionals that do their best to prevent the worst” while employed in an industry that is “high-risk … from cradle-to-grave.”

The strike, which USW called on Sunday, is the largest in 35 years. Workers at nine refineries and chemical plants — which process about 10 percent of U.S. gasoline — have walked off the job, shutting down one California refinery entirely. Union leadership is hoping for a new contract with companies that would cover workers at 63 plants. The union represents about 30,000 oil workers across the country; if all of those workers were to strike, it could, according to Bloomberg, disrupt 64 percent of U.S. oil processing.

USW Vice President Gary Beevers explained the reasons for the strike in a statement: “This work stoppage is about onerous overtime; unsafe staffing levels; dangerous conditions the industry continues to ignore; the daily occurrences of fires, emissions, leaks, and explosions that threaten local communities without the industry doing much about it; the industry’s refusal to make opportunities for workers in the trade crafts; the flagrant contracting out that impacts health and safety on the job; and the erosion of our workplace, where qualified and experienced union workers are replaced by contractors when they leave or retire.” The union has so far rejected five offers from Shell, which is leading the talks on behalf of other companies, including big ones like ExxonMobil and Chevron, since negotiations began on Jan. 21.

The anti-fossil fuel advocacy group Oil Change International weighed in yesterday. “On behalf of more than 100,000 supporters, the Board and Staff of Oil Change International stand in solidarity with these striking refinery workers, and the important issues they have raised,” wrote David Turnbull, the organization’s campaigns director. “So often as we fight Big Oil it can be hard to remember that the impacts of the industry and the fight for safer communities extend both inside and outside the fence lines.”

Environmentalist Bill McKibben, cofounder of 350.org (and a board member at Grist), also tweeted his support:

This round of negotiations comes as the oil industry seeks to cut costs as oil prices fall and domestic drilling becomes less and less economical. Prices at the pump could increase as a result of the strike — they already have a little bit for unrelated reasons. But America’s got so much cheap oil floating around that consumers probably won’t notice anything anytime soon.

Shell has been telling reporters it wants to resume negotiations “as early as possible.” The union met with the company yesterday, but said that no progress was made. The last big oil worker strike, in 1980, lasted three months.

Source:
U.S. refinery strike nears third day as Shell, union meet

, Reuters.

In Major Walkout, U.S. Oil Workers Demand Safety, Fair Treatment

, ThinkProgress.

Refinery Shuts as U.S. Oil Workers Strike Reaches Second Day

, Bloomberg.

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How to Avoid Hitting Animals While Driving (Without Putting Yourself In Danger)

by ArtOWIZnfycjs Posted on January 15, 2015

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How to Avoid Hitting Animals While Driving (Without Putting Yourself In Danger)

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When "Top Chef" Star Tom Colicchio Went to Washington

by Shelley9010 Posted on January 12, 2015

Mother Jones

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On a fall day in a congressional office bedecked with University of Oregon (Go Ducks!) paraphernalia, Tom Colicchio and Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.) were getting on like old college buddies.

Up on Alaska’s Mohawk River, the congressman insisted, you can still spear salmon with a pitchfork. “I was in Juneau half an hour and caught 30 fish,” countered Colicchio, the smooth-domed celebrity chef, who’d chosen a navy blazer for the occasion. “I said, ‘Nah, this isn’t fun anymore, this is boring.'” But Colicchio, the head judge on Bravo’s Top Chef and founder of the New York City restaurants Gramercy Tavern, Craft, and Colicchio & Sons (his boys are 3, 5, and 21)—wasn’t here simply for the pleasantries.

More than 700 chefs had already signed a petition supporting a DeFazio-sponsored bill, currently stalled in the House with 67 cosponsors, that would require food manufacturers to disclose their GMO ingredients. A subset of the signatories were on the Hill to lobby legislators and staffers. “As chefs, we know that choosing the right ingredients is an absolutely critical part of cooking,” the petition reads. “But when it comes to whether our ingredients contain genetically modified organisms, we’re completely in the dark.” The chefs were joined by reps from activist groups—including Food Policy Action, the Center for Food Safety, a national campaign called Just Label It, and the Environmental Working Group—to address the issues of transparency, food safety, and the massive amounts of money ($36 million in the last election) the food industry has spent fighting GMO-labeling initiatives.

Invited to observe the meeting with DeFazio, I took advantage of the chance to give Colicchio a light grilling. Here are a few tidbits Colicchio gave me on some of his favorite topics:

On states rights: “We typically label things not because they’re dangerous. If they’re dangerous, we take them out of the food supply. But we believe everything in our processed foods should be labeled.â&#128;¨ Like some labels say “modified food starch.” Why modified? It’s been altered. I’m not asking for a skull and crossbones—simply a line in the ingredient list that says ‘GMO corn.’ That’s it!

“We’re not debating the science of GMOs, but I would say there’s an ever-increasing environmental issue because of the overuse of herbicides. If you look at the health of the soil, if you care about the environment, how much carbon is in the ground, you wanna know what’s in your food.â&#128;¨ This is a recent development, where people in the food industry are starting to care about the policies behind these issues. Typically consumers who care about food, they’re not thinking about policy. Like when they go to a farmers market, they’re probably paying more—there are policies that are keeping those foods more expensive than processed ones. I don’t quite understand how people who care about states’ rights all of the sudden don’t believe states have a right to label. Those same people will say the states have a right to raise animals a certain way. Where did all the states’ rights people go? I want them! They’re somewhere in this building!”

On customer confusion: “I always use this example: It’s summer, and you go into the supermarket and see all the beautiful strawberries. One is labeled local. One is labeled organic and ‘made in Chile’—it’s GMO free, but people don’t know that. People will go, ‘Oh, that one’s local, so I’ll buy that.’ That lack of transparency puts the organic farmer at a competitive disadvantage.”

On getting his kids thinking about (and actually eating) good food: “I find that the trick to get them to eat is to bring them shopping. I started gardening this year, and they are so interested in watching stuff grow. And I want to teach them patience, because they’re so focused on immediate response of hitting a button and something happens. My older son really loves food and really cares about it. He isn’t into policy yet, but we had a food policy booth set up at Lollapalooza, and he manned it this year because I couldn’t get there. I had to entice him with lots of free music.”

On his own childhood dinners: “We had a family that had to be at the table at a certain time every single night. I don’t think I was a picky eater. I don’t remember. The only thing I do remember is my older brother would constantly steal the food off my plate.”

On his earliest cooking mishap:â&#128;¨ “I would bake a lot with my grandmother. I grew up in a four-family home in New Jersey. There were two homes on the plot and my grandparents lived in the other building. So I made this blueberry pie and I had to walk it a couple hundred yards to the side house. We’re on the second floor, and my grandmother insisted that I put it in a brown paper bag and hold it straight. I kept saying, “Oh, it’ll be okay.” I run home, upstairs. I take it out, big moment, and the blueberries all flew out of the pie!”

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When "Top Chef" Star Tom Colicchio Went to Washington

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Friends Don’t Let Friends Walk Drunk

by ShaniMoorjamaz Posted on December 29, 2014

Mother Jones

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The champagne’s been flowing since noon. You did the 12 grapes at midnight thing, danced to the requisite amount of Beyoncé, and it’s time to collapse. Car keys are off-limits, obviously, but you’ve heard all those Uber holiday pricing horror stories, and the train is bound to be a sweaty shit show. What’s more festive than weaving one’s merry way home from a New Year’s party, right?

Not so fast. It turns out New Year’s Day is the deadliest day to hoof it home, according to a 2005 study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety that looked at every pedestrian death from traffic collisions between 1986 and 2002. Nearly half of the fatal accidents that occurred on a January 1 took place between midnight and 6 a.m. And on an even more sobering note, 58 percent of pedestrians who died that day were legally drunk, according to their blood alcohol levels at time of death.

But maybe people have gotten way better at ambulating under the influence since 2002? I asked the IIHS to crunch the most recent data available from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Turns out, not much has changed. Between 2008 and 2012, more pedestrians died in traffic crashes on New Year’s Day (and Halloween) than on other days of the year. IIHS also found that 59 percent of pedestrians killed on New Year’s Day were drunk, compared to 34 percent of pedestrians in fatal crashes every other day of the year.

There’s no mystery here: Drunk walkers are much more likely to engage in risky behavior like crossing against a sign, jaywalking, or lying down in the roadway, says Dan Gelinne, a researcher at University of North Carolina’s Highway Safety Research Center. “Intoxicated pedestrians frequently cannot fulfill the perceptual, cognitive, and physical skills required to cross safely in the complex traffic patterns seen in most urban cities,” wrote New York University School of Medicine researchers in a 2012 review paper in the journal Trauma.

Of course, NYE teetotalers still have drunk drivers to contend with. In nearly half of the traffic crashes that killed pedestrians in 2012, the driver or the walker (or both) had consumed alcohol, according to the NHTSA. But get this: Pedestrians in these crashes were more than twice as likely as drivers to have had a blood alcohol level greater or equal to 0.08 grams/deciliter, or above the legal driving limit—34 percent of walkers versus 14 percent of the drivers.

“Watching a sporting event on TV, you’re bound to see at least one ad reminding people not to drive after drinking,” says Gelinne. “The risks associated with drinking and walking aren’t as clear to the average person.” Freakonomics author Steven Levitt compared the risks of drunk driving versus drunk walking in his 2011 book SuperFreakonomics. “You find that on a per-mile basis,” he writes, “a drunk walker is eight times more likely to get killed than a drunk driver.”

If you’re lucky enough to survive the impact, healing from wounds becomes trickier when you have booze in your system. “Alcohol impairs the ability to fight infections, repair wounds, and recover from injuries,” says Elizabeth Kovacs, the Director of the Alcohol Research Program at Loyola University’s Stritch School of Medicine. Alcohol impairs the white blood cells responsible for clearing out debris and “eating garbage” on skin wounds, she says.

If you do miss the last train home and walking becomes unavoidable, try to remember these tips from a trauma surgeon: Don’t wear dark colors, stay out of the road as much as possible, and walk in a group (ideally with some sober folks sprinkled in).

Better street lighting and lower speed limits near popular hangouts would help too, says Gelinne, along with campaigns encouraging bartenders to cut the taps when solo customers start getting sloppy. In San Francisco, the Vision Zero campaign aims to eliminate all traffic deaths by 2024 by restructuring high-risk roadways and lowering speed limits. Los Angeles and New York have taken similar measures, thanks in part to $1.6 million in grants to promote pedestrian safety from the US Department of Transportation. IIHS’s Russ Rader points to new car technology like Subaru’s EyeSight camera system, which automatically hits the brakes if it thinks there’s a pedestrian in your path, as a good step forward, though a tiny fraction of cars are currently equipped with these features.

Bottom line: As you ring in 2015, if you can’t call a cab or squeeze onto the subway, your best option is to grab a pillow and stay put. Or reconsider your choice of merriment-enhancement for the night. As it happens, the safest day of the year to walk down the street is 4/20. Make of this what you will.

Additional reporting by Brett Brownell.

Icons by Luis Prado and Dan McCall from the Noun Project.

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Friends Don’t Let Friends Walk Drunk

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29 Coal Miners Died in a 2010 Explosion. Congress Still Hasn’t Fixed the Problem.

by CathrynTorgerso Posted on November 21, 2014

Mother Jones

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Last week, a federal grand jury indicted former Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship for allegedly conspiring to violate mine safety standards in the run-up to the 2010 explosion that killed 29 workers at the Upper Big Branch Mine. The four-count indictment describes a culture of negligence under Blankenship’s watch, in which essential safety measures were ignored as the company sought to squeeze every last cent out of the ground. Blankenship, who left Massey in 2010, pleaded not guilty Thursday.

But the indictment also came as a sobering reminder: In the four years since the disaster, little has been done to make the mining industry safer. Legislation designed to rein in the worst offenders and give regulators teeth was beaten back by big business. Meanwhile, tens of millions of dollars in safety fines have gone uncollected.

“We’ve taken some actions after the various accidents that have taken place, but unfortunately, Congress can apparently only legislate in this area after someone dies,” said Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), who sponsored mine-safety legislation in the wake of the Upper Big Branch explosion.

“I’ve been there after the accidents, I’ve been standing with many of these politicians—they all pledge they’re gonna do something for the families, that they care about the miners. And then everybody goes back to business as usual.”

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29 Coal Miners Died in a 2010 Explosion. Congress Still Hasn’t Fixed the Problem.

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Washington Voters Just Passed the Gun Law Congress Couldn’t

by KindraIQMpdpf Posted on November 5, 2014

Mother Jones

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Most post-election coverage has focused on how Republicans drubbed Democrats in the battle for Congress, but there was another resounding victory on Tuesday worth noting, and it wasn’t a partisan one. Universal background checks for gun buyers became law in Washington state, the first such measure to be passed by popular vote in any state in recent memory.

And popular it was, supported by 60 percent of voters. They agreed that buying weapons at gun shows or on the Internet should no longer be possible without basic regulations. “Our goal has never been about finding a single solution that will end gun violence once and for all,” said Seattle Mayor Ed Murray after Initiative 594 passed. “Instead, our goal has been to enact a sound system of commonsense rules that can, by working in concert, make an enormous difference.” Murray noted that states with expanded background checks—now 18 of them, plus Washington DC—have fewer women killed in domestic violence situations, fewer law enforcement officers shot, and fewer suicides with firearms. The editors of the Seattle Times said the wide margin of victory showed that “voters feel the grim, relentless toll of gun violence.”

It was fresh on their minds. Public gun rampages—which tend to draw outsized media attention—have been on the rise the last several years, with the latest taking place at a Seattle-area high school on October 24. Three victims died, two others were gravely injured, and the perpetrator shot himself to death, as so many of them do. Local polling right at that time appeared to show an increase in support (which had already been strong) for I-594. The last time a similar measure was passed by popular vote was in Colorado in 2000, in the wake of the Columbine massacre. (It’s worth noting that the hardcore gun lobby’s opposition in Colorado back then included the same strain of Nazi rhetoric that was trotted out in Washington state this time.)

Washington state’s vote was the clearest electoral test yet beyond Congress for the gun-reform movement that rose out of the devastation at Sandy Hook Elementary School two years ago. Everytown for Gun Safety, backed by billionaire Michael Bloomberg, and Americans for Responsible Solutions, founded by former congresswoman and mass shooting survivor Gabrielle Giffords, both devoted major funds and other strategic assets to the fight. The primary stated goal of these groups is to function as a formidable counterweight to the National Rifle Association and its political influence; if the passage of I-594 (as well as the defeat of a counter initiative) is any indication, they’ve gained some serious momentum in their less than 24 months of existence. Everytown now has 2.5 million supporters, according to the organization’s former executive director Mark Glaze. “The movement now has plenty of money and plenty of talent, and that’s a big difference from just a few years ago,” Glaze told me on Wednesday. “As the NRA will tell you, intensity trumps money much of the time. In this case they lost on both counts.”

The NRA and its allies also spent millions on the fight—and feared the outcome they now face. “We are very concerned that Bloomberg’s group will replicate this and we will have ballot initiatives like this one across the country,” a NRA spokesperson told The Olympian just prior to the vote.

The gun lobby has long tapped allies in statehouses to block firearms regulations, but the Washington experience may have just revealed a potent threat to that modus operandi. Next up? Glaze says Nevada, Arizona, Oregon, and Maine are strong prospects. Ballot initiatives tend to be expensive (and aren’t allowed in all states), but expanded background checks look to be a solid bet, consistently drawing overwhelming support in national polls. Circumventing state legislators may not be the easiest route, notes Glaze, “but when a majority of people want something badly enough, they can still get it.”

For more of Mother Jones’ reporting on guns in America, see all of our latest coverage here, and our award-winning special reports.

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Washington Voters Just Passed the Gun Law Congress Couldn’t

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Should Doctors Ask You About Your Guns?

by MargareKorth Posted on July 29, 2014

Mother Jones

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In Florida, it’s illegal for a physician to ask you if you own a gun. Pediatrician Aaron Carroll thinks this is ridiculous:

When pediatricians ask you about using car seats, they’re trying to prevent injuries. When they ask you about how your baby sleeps, they’re trying to prevent injuries. When they ask you about using bike helmets, they’re trying to prevent injuries. And when they ask you about guns, they’re trying to prevent injuries, too.

….When I ask patients and parents whether they own guns, if they tell me they do, I immediately follow up with questions about how they are stored. I want to make sure they’re kept apart from ammunition. I want to make sure they’re in a locked box, preferably in a place out of reach of children. Doing so minimizes the risks to children. That’s my goal.

When we, as physicians, ask you if you drink or smoke, it’s not so that we can judge you. It’s so we can discuss health risks with you. When we ask you about domestic violence, it’s not to act like police detectives. It’s so that we can help you make better choices for your health. When we ask you about what you eat or whether you exercise, it’s so we can help you live better and longer. We’re doctors; it’s our job.

I don’t often disagree with Carroll, but I think I might here. Not about Florida’s law: that really is ridiculous. The state may have an interest in making sure doctors don’t give demonstrably bad advice, but it certainly doesn’t have a legitimate interest in preventing them from asking simple, fact-oriented question. This represents prior restraint on non-commercial speech, and as such it’s beyond the pale.

That said, should physicians ask about gun ownership? I’m not so sure. Carroll says he only wants to discuss “health risks,” and that’s appropriate. Doctors have expertise in the area of human health: that is, the biology and physiology of the human body. But that’s not the same thing as the safety of the human body.

Not only do doctors have no special professional expertise in this area, but it’s simply too wide open. Does your car have air bags? Do you ever jaywalk? Have you checked your electrical outlets lately? Is your house built to withstand an earthquake? Do you know how to work safely on your roof? Do you make sure to watch your kids in the pool? Are you planning any trips to eastern Ukraine?

I could go on forever in this vein. These are things unrelated to human physiology. If you define them all as health risks, you’re simply defining every aspect of life as a health risk, and therefore your doctor’s concern. That goes too far, and I don’t blame people for sometimes reacting badly to it. There are certainly gray areas here, but generally speaking, if I want advice about my health, I’ll see a doctor. If I want advice about gun safety, I’ll talk to a gun pro. I think it might be best to leave it this way.

FULL DISCLOSURE: My view is almost certainly colored by the fact that I’m all but phobic about doctors. I hate visiting them, I hate talking to them, and I hate the fact that they never seem to really, truly respond to what I tell them. I would be very annoyed if a doctor suddenly veered off and started quizzing me about general safety issues.

I’m keenly aware that this is an obvious overreaction on my part, and I do my best to restrain it when I’m actually talking to a doctor. Nonetheless, it’s there.

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New rules aim to stop rash of oil train spills and explosions

by EUEJeanaikai Posted on July 23, 2014

New rules aim to stop rash of oil train spills and explosions

By

John Wathen / Public Herald

Today, the U.S. Department of Transportation proposed new rules for improving safety standards around transporting large quantities of flammable materials by rail. The chief concern here is the movement of crude oil and ethanol, which the federal government has been ramping up through recent decisions to expand the exploration and extraction of domestic oil and gas.

The new rules, summarized here, focus on upgrades for train tank cars, new speed limits for trains carrying flammable fuels, improved braking operations, and more rigorous testing for the movement of volatile liquids. A recent rash of train crashes and oil spills, notably in North Dakota, Pennsylvania, Alabama, and Lynchburg, Va., prompted the new safety standards.

In a recent review of data from the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, Politico found that train wrecks have done more than $10 million in damage as of mid-May this year, which is nearly triple the damage for all of 2013.

In a press statement, Department of Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx called the proposal “our most significant progress yet in developing and enforcing new rules to ensure that all flammable liquids, including Bakken crude and ethanol, are transported safely.”

The Bakken oil mention is in reference to the train explosion last year in North Dakota, worsened by the fact that Bakken crude is more flammable than most all other oils. The Transportation department anticipates an increase in the volume of Bakken oil being shipped throughout the U.S., and across longer distances. On average, Bakken crude oil shipments travel over 1,000 miles from point-of-origin to refineries on the coasts.

According to the department’s website, 9,500 rail-carloads of crude moved through the country in 2008. Last year, there were 415,000 rail-carloads.

Given that many of those trains pass through or near communities of color and low-income, environmental justice organizations have long been concerned about the movement of goods by rail, especially chemicals and volatile liquids.

“For African Americans, we’ve gone from the ‘underground railroad’ being a route to freedom, to today’s railway system being a source of pollution and hazard,” said Jacqueline Patterson, director of the NAACP’s Climate Justice Initiative. “Coal trains come through communities of color leaving a trail of coal dust on our cars and in our lungs.”

The U.S. spilled more oil from trains in 2013  than in the previous four decades combined.

From McClatchy:

Including major derailments in Alabama and North Dakota, more than 1.15 million gallons of crude oil was spilled from rail cars in 2013, according to data from the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.

By comparison, from 1975 to 2012, U.S. railroads spilled a combined 800,000 gallons of crude oil. The spike underscores new concerns about the safety of such shipments as rail has become the preferred mode for oil producers amid a North American energy boom.

In light of this, “Any effort to regulate one of the threats facing oft-vulnerable communities — in this case trains carrying oil that are like ticking time bombs — is stridently welcomed,” Patterson said.

The National Environmental Justice Advisory Committee (NEJAC) has advised the federal government on how to improve its “goods movement” infrastructure for years. It released a report offering recommendations on this in 2009. The report focused not just on the goods moved, but also on the impacts of rail and freight transportation itself, as it moves through communities beset by poverty and poor access to quality healthcare. Reads the report:

[Goods] movement related‐ activities can have negative impacts on air quality and public health. Adjacent communities bear the burden of such activities resulting from the growth and demand for goods. Across the country there are many communities near goods movement infrastructure that consist of large populations of low‐income and minority residents.

NEJAC recently sent a letter to Environmental Protection Agency chief Gina McCarthy imploring her to check on whether the other federal cabinet agencies, including the Department of Transportation, are meeting with residents of the communities where trains are moving materials through, and asking for the agencies to create strategies to protect the health of those communities.

The Transportation department’s proposed rules focus more on the hazardous materials being carried. But they would also require carriers to perform a new analysis for routing trains that would be based on 27 safety and security factors. They would also require existing rail tank cars to be retrofitted to meet new performance requirements; those that can’t be retrofitted would be retired or repurposed.

The rail industry, of course, is freaking out about the new safety proposals. From Amy Harder at The Wall Street Journal:

Railroads, oil companies and railcar owners have been expecting new federal rules meant to improve the safety of oil shipments in the wake of several fiery train accidents. The proposed regulation could impact several industries. The railroads have been worried that slower speed limits could cause major gridlock, while oil companies have fretted that new rules about tank car volumes might prevent them from shipping all the crude they wanted.

I guess, but business as usual could mean more explosions and spills, which communities would pay for with their health and lives. It’s the same bellyaching the oil and gas industry had when the Obama administration imposed new safety regs after the BP oil disaster. These industries have to understand that it’s healthier and less expensive to be safe than it is to be sorry.

Brentin Mock is Grist’s justice editor. Follow him on Twitter at @brentinmock.Find this article interesting? Donate now to support our work.Read more: Climate & Energy

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New rules aim to stop rash of oil train spills and explosions

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