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3 New Studies Link Bee Decline To Bayer Pesticide

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It's springtime, and farmers throughout the Midwest and South are preparing to plant corn—and lots of it. The USDA projects this year's corn crop will cover 94 million acres, the most in 68 years. [...] Nearly all of that immense stand of corn will be planted with seeds treated with neonicotinoid pesticides produced by the German chemical giant Bayer. Read More »

A Few Ways The Government Shutdown Could Harm Your Health (And The World’s)

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There’s going to be a lot — a lot — of coverage today on the federal shutdown, what it means and how long it might go on. I thought it might be worth quickly highlighting how it affects the parts of the government that readers here care most about: public health, global health, food safety and the spread of scary diseases. Read More »

A Real Stand Against Antibiotic Resistance Starts At The Farm, Not The Hospital

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The US government made history on September 18th when President Obama signed an executive order establishing a task force to combat antibiotic resistance at the federal level. The order outlined general goals such as tracking the use of antibiotics and creating incentives for drug development. Some applauded the announcement, while pointing out other countries’ continued failure to do the same...

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Agroecology Should Be At The Core Of USDA’s Mission

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The comment period recently closed on the USDA’s Research, Education, and Economics (REE) Action Plan Draft, which responded to informal and formal consultations with internal and external advisors and stakeholders, and “lessons learned from implementation of Farm Bill provisions.” It refines the initial REE Action Plan, which was released in February of 2012. Read More »

Antibiotic Resistance Ups Salmonella Hospitalizations: CDC

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Because of antibiotic resistance, 42 percent of patients stricken with salmonella tied to a California chicken farm have required hospitalization, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Wednesday. Read More »

Antibiotic Resistance: How Industrial Agriculture Lies With Statistics

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...The website of the Alliance, a coalition of corporations and trade associations that make up a who's who of industrial agriculture, says the organization wants "to engage in dialogue with consumers who have questions about how today's food is grown and raised." It appears, however, that the organization is more concerned with countering increasing awareness of the public health and environmental harms associated with industrialized agriculture...

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Beepocalypse Redux: Honeybees Are Still Dying — And We Still Don’t Know Why

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More than five years after it was first reported, colony-collapse disorder is still killing honeybees around the world. If scientists can't pinpoint the cause, the economic and environmental damage could be immense Read More »

Best Health and Fitness Tools for Linux

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In our busy work schedule as Linux professionals or home-users, it becomes essential to keep track of our health as studies have shown that continued usage of sitting in front of a PC is absolutely not recommended for long hours. It hampers the productivity. While we already covered productivity tips and tools for Linux earlier, today we are going to look for some Linux tools that will help you to stay healthy while working on Linux. There are plenty of mobile apps to help keep us stay fit and healthy by getting us used to ergonomic habits. You can always use them, but you can always benefit from some native Linux apps. In this article, we have compiled a list of the best health Linux apps we could find...

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CDC Calls Back Staff To Handle Salmonella Outbreak

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An outbreak of Salmonella Heidelberg has spread to 18 states and has sickened nearly 300, prompting the return of some 30 CDC staffers furloughed during the government shutdown to work on the case. Read More »

CDC Closes Labs After Anthrax, Bird Flu And Small Pox Scares

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Days after the discovery of small pox vials in a NIH medical laboratory in Bethesda, the Center For Disease Control announced Friday that labs connected to anthrax and bird flu scares would be temporarily closed...

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Documents Reveal How Poultry Firms Systematically Feed Antibiotics To Flocks

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Major U.S. poultry firms are administering antibiotics to their flocks far more pervasively than regulators realize, posing a potential risk to human health.  Internal records examined by Reuters reveal that some of the nation’s largest poultry producers routinely feed chickens an array of antibiotics – not just when sickness strikes, but as a standard practice over most of the birds’ lives...

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Drug-Resistant Bacteria On Chicken: It’s Everywhere And The Government Can’t Help

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Two important, linked publications are out today, both carrying the same message: The way we raise poultry in this country is creating an under-appreciated health hazard, and the government structures we depend upon to detect that hazard and protect us from it are failing us. Read More »

Food Fraud: Labels On What We Eat Often Mislead

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Despite trend in local, "authentic" foods, many aren't what they seem. Read More »

G-8 Conference Highlights Importance Of Open Data In Ag

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The G-8 Open Data For Agriculture Conference kicked off with an announcement from USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack on the new virtual community launched on Data.gov. Read More »

GeekWire Summit 2014, Part 4: How The US Chief Information Officer Saved Tech In Government

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Not so long ago, the US government’s approach to technology was a hot mess.  That’s what I learned from Steven VanRoekel at Geekwire Summit 2014, in what might be his last public appearance as U.S. Chief Information Officer...

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