By Brenda Goodman and Andy Miller Part Three of a series Ideally, anyone should be able to look at this map we created and learn what percentage of health care workers at their local hospitals have not yet been vaccinated against COVID-19. That may not be possible, however, because some hospitals say the data are incorrect. The…
By Brenda Goodman and Andy Miller Brenda Goodman is a senior news writer for WebMD. Andy Miller is editor and CEO of Georgia Health News. This is the first of a series. Tim Oswalt had been in a Fort Worth, Texas, hospital for over a month, receiving treatment for a grapefruit-sized tumor in his chest…
By Brenda Goodman and Andy Miller Brenda Goodman is a reporter for Medscape and WebMD. Andy Miller the editor and CEO of Georgia Health News. On August 22, 2018, the citizens of Willowbrook, Ill., had just one hour to learn that local EPA officials were investigating high levels of a toxic gas in the neighborhoods…
By Brenda Goodman and Andy Miller Brenda Goodman is a senior news writer for WebMD. Andy Miller is editor and CEO of Georgia Health News. It felt like Christmas when “Santa Rick” Rosenthal, who runs Northern Lights Santa Academy in Atlanta, snagged a rare slot to receive one of the first COVID-19 vaccines doled out…
By Brenda Goodman and Andy Miller Brenda Goodman is a senior news writer for WebMD. Andy Miller is editor of Georgia Health News. This article first appeared in WebMD. After 10 months of masks, social distancing, virtual school, fear for vulnerable loved ones, and loneliness, this is the news no one wanted to hear: The virus…
This article was jointly reported by Brenda Goodman of WebMD and Andy Miller of Georgia Health News Story updated Recent air testing in neighborhoods around a medical equipment sterilization facility in suburban Atlanta has detected significantly more cancer-causing ethylene oxide gas than when the plant was not operating last fall. The new, higher levels have…
Brenda Goodman is a senior news writer for WebMD. Andy Miller is editor and CEO of Georgia Health News. A series of lawsuits has been filed in metro Atlanta against two companies that use the gas ethylene oxide to sterilize medical equipment. The six lawsuits were filed on behalf of plaintiffs who said they were…
This story is jointly reported by Brenda Goodman of WebMD and Andy Miller of Georgia Health News One of Alexandria Pittman’s jobs at ConMed in Lithia Springs had her working near a dock where trucks would unload boxes of freshly sterilized medical supplies. Those supplies had been sterilized with a toxic gas called ethylene oxide…
Brenda Goodman is a senior news writer for WebMD. Andy Miller is editor and CEO of Georgia Health News. A new government report has rebuked the EPA for failing to tell residents about the health risks they face by living near facilities that release cancer-causing ethylene oxide gas. In 2018, the EPA made a list…
Brenda Goodman is a senior news writer for WebMD. Andy Miller is editor and CEO of Georgia Health News. A neighborhood west of Atlanta faces cancer risks that exceed what the government considers acceptable for airborne toxins, a study by the Georgia Environmental Protection Division (EPD) shows. The neighborhood, Westchase at Sandtown, in southern Fulton…