How the United States Weather Bureau was Started

“Hearing from All Sides” How Legislative Testimony Influences State Level Policy-Makers in the United States

Background This paper investigates whether state legislators find testimony influential, to what extent testimony influences policy-makers’ decisions, and defines the features of testimony important in affecting policy-makers’ decisions.   Methods We used a mixed method approach to analyze responses from 862 state-level legislators in the United States (U.S.). Data were collected via a phone su...

Health System Reform in the United States

In 2010, the United States adopted its first-ever comprehensive set of health system reforms in the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Implementation of the law, though politically contentious and controversial, has now reached a stage where reversal of most elements of the law is no longer feasible. The controversial portions of the law that expand affordable health insurance coverage to most U.S. cit...

The Weather Bureau and the Cranberry

In this country the cranberry is indigenous to the marshes, chiefly in the Northern States; but some wild cranberries are found as far south as North Carolina, both in the swamps of the mountain region in the northwestern portion of that State and near the coast, in Pender County. They are also found to a slight extent in some portions of northern Europe, especially in Finland and the Scandinav...

Infectious Disease in a Warming World: How Weather Influenced West Nile Virus in the United States

Weather-related mortality: how heat, cold, and heat waves affect mortality in the United States.

BACKGROUND Many studies have linked weather to mortality; however, role of such critical factors as regional variation, susceptible populations, and acclimatization remain unresolved. METHODS We applied time-series models to 107 US communities allowing a nonlinear relationship between temperature and mortality by using a 14-year dataset. Second-stage analysis was used to relate cold, heat, an...