Trump’s sweeping nuclear energy and weapons agenda has prompted revisions of longstanding radiation standards.

The Nuclear Safety Protections in Federal Crosshairs

By Alicia Inez Guzmán, High Country News

Bradley P. Clawson spent more than three decades handling highly radioactive materials at Idaho National Laboratory, a nuclear energy testing and production hub outside Idaho Falls. His work ranged from shipping and receiving nuclear naval fuels to helping bring hundreds of canisters of leftover fuel to Idaho for storage after the catastrophic Three Mile Island meltdown. He often handled nuclear fuel in “hot cells,” immensely contaminated areas reinforced with thick concrete. 

Throughout, Clawson, a member of the United Steelworkers union, leaned on safety standards to argue for extra protections against radiation, including respirators and additional shielding. 

But Donald Trump’s sweeping agenda to expand nuclear energy and modernize nuclear weapons now includes easing the radiation standards that Clawson credits with keeping his exposure as low as possible. 

“They’re pulling away from what’s kept us safe all these years,” said Clawson, who retired in 2021 and now serves on the advisory board on radiation and workers under the Centers for Disease Control. He spoke to High Country News in an unofficial personal capacity.

Last May, Trump signed four executive orders aimed at reviving what he called an industry “atrophied” by regulation. The U.S. Department of Energy quickly began stripping away regulations designed to reduce the amount of radiation exposure workers can face at its national laboratories, cleanup sites, and energy infrastructure. 

Trump interprets God's will

The brilliance of their genius is simply dazzling

 

Protest in Ashaway on Wednesday

Trump said this in 2019

Where There’s Wildfire Smoke, There’s Poor Mental Health

We know wildfire smoke harms your body but that's not all

Charlestown will likely get another dose of smoke from Canadian and western fires this summer

By Emma Foehringer Merchant

On a mild day in mid-November, among a clutch of oaks and sycamores, more than a dozen people encircled a small fire. Some lay splayed on the ground or on blankets, others perched on camp stools. Many had their eyes closed, while others stared into the flames. California fire season is barely in the rearview mirror.

The group had gathered in Paradise, California, at a park that sits on land burned in the 2018 Camp Fire. That wildfire destroyed most of the town and killed 85 people. In the years since, the same region has experienced three other conflagrations that rank among the largest in California history; one joined the Camp Fire as among the deadliest. Within the circle sat Blake Ellis, the program manager of the ecotherapy program associated with California State University, Chico, who invited attendees to lean into their senses and pay attention to the smells, sounds, and feel of the fire.

The ecotherapy program, which is open to the public, offers “place-based, holistic healing practices” and leads guided therapeutic programs in nature, including those focused on rebuilding a relationship with nature and what Ellis calls “good fire.” “The intention is to slow down, relax, engage with your senses, and to be in nature and community with one another,” she added, and to help the brain write over traumas associated with fire and create neural pathways that connect it with more positive experiences. The ultimate aim is to build resilience within a community repeatedly impacted by devastating wildfires.

Over the last decade, wildfires and their smoke have spread into new regions and grown into a more menacing threat due to climate change. And recently, research has increasingly connected wildfire and smoke with worsening mental health outcomes, in part due to cellular changes in the brain. Papers suggest a link between wildfires and emergency room visits for anxiety disorders, increased rates of post-traumatic stress disorder and depression, and suicides in rural areas. More broadly, decades of research has tied air pollution to spikes in suicide attempts, depression, hospitalizations for mental illness, and other neurological conditions such as dementia.

HPV vaccination cuts cancer risk in men by about half, study suggests

But Donald Trump has his own cancer cure

Laine Bergeson

Cancers caused by the human papillomavirus (HPV) affect both men and women in large numbers, but prevention efforts initially focused on women (see related CIDRAP News story today). A retrospective cohort study published last week in JAMA Oncology suggests that vaccinating boys and young men with the nine-valent (nine-strain) HPV vaccine can meaningfully reduce their risk of related cancers, supporting the case for sex-neutral vaccination programs.

HPV vaccination has long been framed as a way to prevent cervical cancer in women, but the virus causes a range of cancers that affect men, including head and neck, anal, and penile cancers. In the study, researchers from the Nara Prefecture General Medical Center in Nara, Japan, looked at large-scale population data to evaluate the effectiveness of the nine-valent HPV vaccine in preventing these cancers in men. 

Here’s how Rhode Island can prepare for stronger wind storms.

Climate risk research tells us how the wind blows. 

By Steven M. Rothstein and Christopher S. Stark, Rhode Island Current

There is no doubt that more frequent and significantly stronger thunderstorms, combined with hurricanes, tornados, and wildfires are increasing the pressure on affordable insurance products to protect your assets. And on all of us. Because we need to work together to create a culture of resiliency in Rhode Island. 

Global insured losses from natural catastrophes alone reached over $100 billion for the sixth consecutive year in 2025. In 2015, these numbers were between $27 billion and $37 billion across the globe. California wildfires alone in 2025 exceeded 2015 losses. 

In the coming decades, millions more homes and businesses along the East Coast will be threatened by wind damage. According to a 2023 study by the First Street Foundation, the average cost of damage in Rhode Island caused by extreme weather is projected to rise by more than 50% from $10 million to $15.6 million in 2053. 

Rhode Island’s 400 miles of coastline and several rivers have risen above flood stage in the past. That means an increased risk of waterborne diseases, mold growth, bacterial contamination, psychological trauma, and long-term effects on local economies in the years ahead, state officials say.

“More bombs, less of everything else” is a tough campaign platform.

Trump's Total War Budget

Noah Berlatsky

Donald Trump called for the culmination of a 45-year Republican dream and did so in a way designed to do maximum damage to the GOP — not to mention the country.

That dream is the utter destruction of the US safety net and the unlimited expansion of the US military.

“The United States can’t take care of daycare,” Trump blustered during a speech to faith leaders. “That has to be up to a state. We’re fighting wars. Medicaid, Medicare — they can do it on a state basis. We have to take care of one thing: military protection. But all these little scams that have taken place, you have to let states take care of them.”

Two days later, Trump proposed a 2027 fiscal year budget with a defense spending increase of 42 percent, or $445 billion, to a staggering total of $1.5 trillion. The budget calls for reducing non-defense spending by 10 percent through the elimination of “woke, weaponized, and wasteful programs” — including steep cuts to the Internal Revenue Service, Environmental Protection Agency, NASA, and defunding the National Endowment for Democracy. Trump also called for massive budget cuts to the National Institutes of Health.

Democrats have said the document is dead on arrival — though Trump hopes to pass a big chunk of it through reconciliation without Democratic votes.

The budget does not, at least initially, include cuts to Medicare, Medicaid, or Social Security. It also does not include funding for Trump’s war against Iran, which he also hopes to pass through a reconciliation process without Democratic support. But it points the way clearly toward a distinctively Republican future for America — one in which the populace is transformed into an impoverished mass of hunger and disease, emitting occasional hoarse pleas for castoffs from oligarchs.

Patty Murray, the top democrat on the Senate appropriations committee, said it is a “bleak and unacceptable” vision. It’s one that is likely to be incredibly unpopular, throwing a lead anchor to the GOP’s already rapidly sinking midterm prospects.

Which side are you on

Trump reveals existence of "Vatican Files' (seriously). They're stored next to the Epstein files in his gold-plated bathroom at Mar-A-Largo

SHOCKER: Trump’s nominee to head the CDC does not seem to be crazy and may actually be qualified

Trump nominates Brown Med School graduate Erica Schwartz, former deputy surgeon general, to head CDC

Stephanie Soucheray, MA 

Wikimedia Commons / Mike Olliver

Erica Schwartz, MD, JD, MPH, former Coast Guard officer, is Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Trump announced late this afternoon. 

“Erica graduated from Brown University for College and Medical School, and served a distinguished career as a Doctor of Medicine in the United States Military, the Greatest and Most Powerful Force in the World, and then served as my Deputy Surgeon General during my First Term,” Trump wrote in a lengthy Truth Social post. 

Trump also appointed Sean Slovenski as the CDC deputy director and chief operating officer, Jennifer Shuford, MD, MPH, as the CDC deputy director and chief medical officer, and Sara Brenner, MD, MPH, as senior counselor for public health to Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 

“These Highly Respected Doctors of Medicine have the knowledge, experience, and TOP degrees to restore the GOLD STANDARD OF SCIENCE at the CDC,” Trump said. 

Schwartz is set to inherit a chaotic and hollowed CDC, one that has seen public firings, the resurgence of measles across the nation, and legally disputed changes to routine vaccine recommendations. Polling also shows that Kennedy’s anti-vaccine “Make America Healthy Again” agenda isn’t sitting well with voters and may be a liability in the midterm elections for Republicans. 

The CDC is an agency within HHS.

Measles has arrived in Rhode Island

Thank you, Donald Trump and Bobby Jr.

RI Health Department notice:

The Rhode Island Department of Health (RIDOH) is advising the public that a confirmed case of measles has been identified in Rhode Island. This was a case in a male from Providence County in his 40s who had recent international travel and returned to Rhode Island on April 13.

He went to Atmed Treatment Center on April 15, and he was tested for measles. He is recovering at home.

The last confirmed case of measles in Rhode Island was in January 2025. In addition, customers and staff at Panadería El Quetzal, 445 Hartford Ave., Providence, on April 15 between 4:30 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. may have been exposed.

RIDOH has worked with Panadería El Quetzal and Atmed Treatment Center to notify staff and other people who may have been exposed.

RIDOH is working to identify and contact those people. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Division of Global Migration Health (DGMH) was notified because people on the same flights as these individuals may have been exposed.

Anyone who was believed to have had contact with this patient during his infectious period are being contacted and provided with instructions on steps to help prevent any spread. As is protocol, RIDOH is taking additional measures in consultation with CDC.

Those who could have been exposed and begin to develop symptoms of measles should call their healthcare professional before visiting an office, clinic, or emergency department. Visiting a healthcare facility may put others at risk and should be avoided if possible.

Anyone who has had measles in the past or has received two doses of the Measles, Mumps, and Rubella (MMR) vaccine is unlikely to develop measles even if exposed.

 The best way to protect against measles is with the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine. MMR is safe and effective.

Chemical Threats Nearby? Trump’s EPA Doesn’t Want You to Know.

EPA wants to gut recently enhanced safety requirements for hazardous facilities.

By Liza Gross

Charlestown is no stranger to chemical accidents,
such as this fire at Kenyon Industries on Route 2

This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News, a nonprofit, non-partisan news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment. Sign up for their newsletter here.

Raschelle Grandison had just walked out her front door to grab something from her car on a chilly March morning in 2019 when she stopped dead in her tracks. 

Grandison stared in disbelief at what looked like a nuclear mushroom cloud approaching the Houston home she shared with her mother, who ran outside to see what was wrong. They were still watching the giant black cloud hurtling toward their neighborhood from the Houston Ship Channel when the shelter-in-place alerts started blaring. 

“It was just terrifying because when you shelter in place, you’ve got a cloud over you, you can’t leave, you can’t go anywhere and nobody can come in,” Grandison said. “It’s just you and God at that point.”

Bradford Dyeing explosion.
Charlestown-Westerly town line

A massive fire had started at a bulk-liquid storage facility run by the Intercontinental Terminals Co. about 5 miles away after a faulty pump released naphtha, a highly flammable hydrocarbon used to make gasoline and plastic, from an 80,000-barrel tank. 

The flames spread to 14 surrounding tanks, and the apocalyptic cloud menaced the Houston skyline for three days before emergency crews put the fire out. By then, a containment wall had failed and released hundreds of thousands of barrels of toxic compounds into nearby waterways, harming birds and their habitat.

Close to 180 million Americans live near one of the country’s 12,000 facilities capable of producing a “worst-case scenario” chemical disaster. A third of these facilities operate in areas where natural hazards like wildfires, hurricanes and sea level rise could disrupt power supplies or damage infrastructure to trigger a catastrophic accident. These risks grow as the planet warms, the Government Accountability Office reported in 2022, when it advised the Environmental Protection Agency to require plants to plan for climate-supercharged natural hazards.

But Donald Trump, whose 2024 campaign received more than $25 million in donations from the oil and gas industry, is trying to keep fenceline communities in the dark about these risks.

PRIMARY CARE WOES --- Will We Solve Rhode Island's Problem?

Bureaucracy versus medicine

By Dr. Steven Fera for Save Our Health Care 

To the rescue?

Primary care in this country is at a critical juncture. The causes are multiple, but government reforms, demands of private payers and corporate employers, the burden of pre-authorization, and the introduction of electronic medical record (EMR) systems are all important contributing factors.

In the 1990s, managed-care plans emerged which greatly increased insurance company profits at the expense of the physician. Hospital executives and entrepreneurs have capitalized by organizing physicians into groups called Accountable Care Organizations, collecting a substantial percentage of collected income. Nowadays, physicians are required to use electronic medical records, which has transformed daily workflow. 

In many cases, patient visits are dominated by time spent engaged in data entry, which requires searching for the correct medical diagnostic code (currently there are over 69,000) and billing code, along with including sufficient medical “information” to qualify for payment. The companies that developed them are reaping significant profits from hospitals and physician practices. Whether this enhances quality or simply undermines the doctor-patient relationship depends on who you ask.

Over the past decade or so, the costs of practice have outpaced increases in reimbursement. Moreover, administrative demands have steered a majority of physicians into employment models, where they have often found that “protocols” and “productivity” were more important metrics than “quality,” leading to both physician and patient dissatisfaction. A rewarding and successful doctor-patient interaction requires time, a luxury many practitioners can no longer afford within the constraints of shorter patient visits.