Investigative Journalism in the Public Interest
Investigative Journalismin the Public Interest
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Following questions about its data, the Deepwater Horizon Unified Command is now reporting more than 300 cases of illness among cleanup crews working on the Gulf oil spill, an increase from 86 cases in a report a week earlier. A BP employee speaking for the response team said the increase was due partly to a backlog in the recording of incidents.
Louisiana and Alabama are reporting more illnesses related to the oil disaster in the Gulf than the Deepwater Horizon response team has recorded. Total health complaints in Louisiana alone have risen 35 percent since a previous report was issued last week.
BP has paid millions in damages from the Gulf oil spill, but nothing yet for claims of injury. A spokesman says the company is still evaluating those claims.
Federally-funded scientists predicted a "larger than average" dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico this year. It's unclear whether the oil spill is contributing to it.
Counties along the Gulf Coast have been frustrated in their efforts to have BP cover their expenses from the oil spill. Even money that BP has given to the states has been slow to trickle down.
Hundreds of state agencies have failed to tell the federal government about health professionals they disciplined, ProPublica has learned, meaning frontline workers who have a record of on-the-job misconduct, incompetence or criminal acts aren't flagged to potential employers.
The Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture issued its first livestock quarantine, keeping 28 beef cattle off the market because they may have been exposed to contaminated wastewater from hydraulic fracturing for natural gas.
If you ask the CDC how many workers have been sickened while cleaning up the Gulf oil spill, CDC says to ask OSHA. OSHA says to ask BP. BP says to ask Unified Command, which hasn't yet responded to our requests.
The Exxon Valdez disaster was a missed opportunity for answering questions about worker health now being asked in the Gulf. Both Exxon and the government say they haven't done research on long-term health problems among that spill's cleanup workers.
EPA responds to our earlier post about BP's continued use of dispersants. Here's the response from the agency's press secretary.
BP has pledged millions for research on its oil spill in the Gulf, but scientists worry about how well the money will be spent. A report says Gulf Coast governors are demanding that the money be given to universities in their own states.
BP has posted an accounting of 485 injuries and illnesses reported by cleanup workers in the Gulf of Mexico. But there's no breakdown of illnesses possibly connected to exposure to oil or dispersants.
The head of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration says the safety course for oil cleanup workers on boats in the Gulf will increase from four hours to eight. The expanded preparation will include training on chemical hazards.
Finding a judge to hear federal cases against BP could be daunting because of conflicts of interest. More than half of the senior judges in the Gulf districts have ties to the oil industry, AP reports.
Homeowners who are refused mortgage modifications are sometimes given a reason that is false. Some loan servicers say that mortgage investors won’t allow the modification, but that is seldom the case.
The Deepwater Horizon oil spill is merely the biggest and most widely reported of oil spills in the Gulf this year. The number of spills nationwide also seems to be on the rise, raising questions about oversight.
As oil continues to spew into the Gulf of Mexico, BP, cleanup crews and the EPA differ on the health risks for workers there. One EPA official likened the situation to the World Trade Center cleanup.
The EPA has given BP 24 hours to choose less toxic dispersants to apply to the Gulf oil spill, a published report says. The products being used appear to be more toxic and less effective than other approved dispersants.
The oil dispersants that BP is using after the Deepwater Horizon disaster are more toxic than other such products, EPA data indicate. The dispersants have not been allowed in Britain for more than a decade.
Workers cleaning up the Exxon Valdez spill in 1989 reported the same health problems the workers in the Gulf are now reporting, and oil company officials are making the same excuses about why those problems aren’t important.
BP has been tightly restricting public access to details about the oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. And in some cases, the federal government has deferred to the oil company when asked for information.
Despite repeated regulatory sanctions across more than a dozen states, Allied Home Mortgage Capital Corp. continues to be a major FHA lender. Borrowers in Louisiana, West Virginia allege that Allied brokers misled them and diverted funds.
For more than a year, the local chapter of Habitat for Humanity has insisted there were no defects in the Chinese drywall it used to build nearly 200 houses for victims of Hurricane Katrina. But a house-by-house canvas by reporters from the Sarasota Herald-Tribune and ProPublica found several homeowners who reported serious problems.
James Cole, who served in the Clinton administration, will be nominated for the No. 2 spot in the Justice Department. Currently a white-collar criminal defense lawyer, Cole may be best known for his investigation of former House Speaker Newt Gingrich in 1996.
BP has found itself at the center of several of the nation's worst oil and gas–related disasters in the last five years. It has been fined for a deadly refinery explosion in Texas, a pipeline leak in Alaska, and for manipulating propane prices.
Louisiana Sen. David Vitter has battled an EPA assessment that could label formaldehyde a 'known' carcinogen. The formaldehyde industry has been a generous campaign donor to Vitter.
Labor unions representing California nurses are attacking key parts of a bill that would overhaul the state’s system for investigating and disciplining health workers accused of misconduct.
No matter what happens to Gov. David Paterson or any of his aides who have resigned or may resign, they will all still be entitled to their state pensions. The New York State Constitution has protected pensions for state employees since 1940, though there are moves to change that.
In the days after Hurricane Katrina, somebody shot Donnell Herrington in the Algiers Point neighborhood. More than four years later, a man from a neighborhood militia is being implicated in the shooting, which the victim says was racially motivated.
Some states have begun to grapple with a serious public health issue: Which patients should be given access to lifesaving treatments if more people need it than the system can handle? The issue of effectively deciding who should live and who should die is anathema to physicians whose main job is to save lives.
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