By Amos Budde, NCL Public Policy Intern

Providing preventative health care is one of the most important strategies for lowering our nation’s health costs.  We hear a lot about the 46 million Americans without health insurance, but rarely do we hear that more than twice that lack dental insurance.

The case for dental coverage is the same as for health care.  People without health care coverage often get sick with illnesses that could be treated at far less cost if caught early. When it comes to dental care, kids with minor tooth problems may end up with dental disease for the rest of their lives.  This can hurt their ability to stay in school or get a job. Adults with missing teeth find it hard to get jobs as well.

But poor dental health can also kill you.  The Washington Post ran a story about Deamonte Driver, a 12-year old who died of complications stemming from a toothache that could have been cured by an $80 tooth extraction.  Deamonte’s family had lost its Medicaid coverage, and few dentists would even take Medicaid patients anyway.  Bacteria from the tooth spread to Demonte’s brain, leading to hospitalization and two operations.  The total cost of the hospital care was about $250,000, and the hospital was still unable to keep him alive.

The National Consumers League, with our long history of work on health care, recently joined with several other groups including the American Dental Education Association, the Dental Health Foundation, and Oral Health America, in a campaign to underscore the importance of including dental care in health care reform.  The main points of the Open Letter to Congress we are asking concerned groups to join are these:

• Dental conditions become more serious and are more costly to treat without intervention.
• Untreated dental disease can have fatal and costly consequences.
• Access to dental insurance is extremely difficult for the nation’s poorest. Half of all states’ Medicaid plans provide no or extremely limited dental coverage.
• 130 million Americans, including 16 million children and 80 percent of seniors lack dental insurance coverage.  This is more than twice the total number lacking basic health insurance.
• Poor oral health can complicate diabetes; heart disease; pneumonia; and further study is needed to determine the documented link between gum disease and preterm low birth weight babies.

Having dental insurance can be the difference between simple tooth decay and losing your teeth, or the difference between a toothache and a serious operation.  Dental care is preventive care; it saves our hospitals and taxpayers the high cost of treating life-threatening complications and helps poor and middle class people get and keep jobs.

NCL has issued a statement of support for the confirmation of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court of the United States. Read why we’re encouraging the Senate to confirm her *here.

*Links are no longer active as the original sources have removed the content, sometimes due to federal website changes or restructurings.

by Barbara Shaibu, NCL Public Policy Intern

Barbara Shaibu is an NCL public policy intern this summer and hails from College Park, MD. She is a rising junior at the University of Pennsylvania, majoring in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics.

In South China on April 5th, 2009, a 17-year-old-worker, Liu Pan, was crushed to death by malfunctioning machinery in a stationery factory. Liu’s body was so disfigured from the accident that his parents had a hard time identifying him.

Liu had been illegally hired and working at Yiuwah Stationery Factory since age 15, below China’s legal age limit. The entertainment giant, the Walt Disney Company, finds itself on the hot seat because Yiuwah produces goods for the company.

In wake of the incident, the group China Labor Watch (CLW) investigated the conditions at the Yiuwah and alleges that systematic violations of labor rights are occurring at the factory. According to CLW’s report, not only were there underage workers, but workers—including children—were working in harsh and unsafe conditions.

According to CLW, Disney audited the factory in the past year but failed to notice several violations, including the presence of underage workers—some as young as 13. CLW alleges that in the factory untrained workers operate dangerous machinery, contracts are routinely violated, workers are forced to perform overtime, and maternity leave is often denied.

In response to the CLW’s report, Disney pledged to improve conditions in Yiuwah. A June 22nd New York Times article notes that Disney issued a statement announcing that it “had instructed its vendors and licensees to ‘cease new orders of any Disney-branded products in the Yiuwah factory’ until conditions were improved.”

The CLW accused Disney of categorically abandoning Yiuwah. However, Disney pledged to assist in making the much-needed changes to the factory. You can view CLW’s open letter to Disney at www.chinalaborwatch.org.

“We believe a victory at Yiuwah would be an important change in the way Disney does business in China,” said Li Qiang, CLW’s executive director. “It is very important to apply pressure for Disney to invest in improving conditions at [the factory] rather than canceling its orders.”

A July 30th letter suggests that Disney has listened. In the letter, Disney’s Senior Vice President of Corporate Responsibility Jennifer Anopolsky said the company is making great progress in bringing about change at Yiuwah, citing several improvements: an improved age verification program, the addition of new safety equipment, and worker safety training. Yiuwah is now also paying workers the correct minimum wage, providing vacation and rest days, and covering workers with injury insurance, according to Disney, which has also hired a company to monitor the factory’s progress.

Assuming they are implemented correctly, the National Consumers League applauds these corrections but we wonder how many other Yiuwah’s are out there. The death of Liu Pan raises many questions about working conditions elsewhere in China. And, despite a major labor law enacted a year and half ago, conditions for Chinese workers appear to be worsening nationwide.

Earlier this month, the Washington Post ran *a piece on the terrible working conditions of kiln workers in Pakistan. People spend their entire lives under grueling labor and breathing toxic fumes.  Entire families are indebted to the kiln owners, and the pay is so low that they have little opportunity of ever repaying their debts.  If they move to work at another kiln, their debt follows them. If they try to escape their life of virtual serfdom, they are chased down.The article interviewed a kiln worked named Abdul Wakil, who explained, “The problem is that you can never earn enough to leave. If your wife needs an operation or the rainy seasons lasts too long, you have to borrow from the kiln owners… the debt stays with you, sometimes for your whole life.”

Even children are pulled into this system of bondage through debt.  As young as six, kids are taken out of school to help work on the kiln. Wakil’s son, age 7, is already rolling up mud balls for his father. The article describes the life of Zarfran Khan, “a bright-eyed, 8-year-old quarry boy.”  “I liked school,” he says, “but I don’t go there anymore.”

Born into a life of perpetual debt, these kids never have the option of an education or of trainings in other skills. Knowing only the life of a kiln worker, they end up starting their own families in the same dangerous places, and the cycle repeats itself.

The National Consumers League established the Child Labor Coalition (CLC) in 1989 to end the exploitation of children in the workplace.  It is a top priority for us to spread awareness of the child exploitation in workplaces around the world. NCL and the American Federation of Teachers currently co-chair the CLC.

Progress is being made on child labor rights in the region, as earlier this week the *Dehli High Court in India asked the government to start action to eliminate child labor from the state of Delhi in six months. This is an important step to end child labor exploitation, and we think that this could end up being a model for other state and national governments in the region. We hope that the Pakistani government can place a higher priority on ending child labor exploitation, so that kids like Zarfran will be able to get an education and escape their lives of perpetual poverty.

*Links are no longer active as the original sources have removed the content, sometimes due to federal website changes or restructurings.

by Lauren Perez, NCL Communications Intern

We recently looked at the dangers in agricultural work for youth workers, one of NCL’s Five Worst Teen Jobs of 2009. This time we will look at the dangers in constructions and working from heights. The construction industry contains some of the most dangerous jobs; one out of every five work place fatalities is in the construction industry.

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health reports that 14 percent of youth occupational fatalities occur in the construction industry, and the *Fair Labor Standards Act has limited the type of jobs youth may perform in the construction industry. This act requires that youth under the age of 16 may only perform office or sales work and are also limited in the number of hours and times of day they may work. Teens aged 16 and 17 may work in the construction industry and on construction sites, but they are restricted from performing tasks that are too hazardous, like driving a motor vehicle, operating power-driven machines, working on roofing operations and demolition.

Falls are one of the most common accidents in the construction industry. In 2005, 32 percent of work-related deaths were from falls. Labor laws prevent minors aged 16 to 17 from working on roofs, but they may still work at heights such as ladders, scaffolding and towers. In 2007, the last year for which there is a report, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that 16 youth workers aged 16 to 19 suffered fatalities from falling. That year, a 19-year-old worker died when he fell 10 feet. The employee was helping on a home remodel and was standing and working on a beam, *which broke underneath him. The Department of Labor states that any time a worker is at a height of four feet or more, the worker is at risk and needs to be protected. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration provides information on construction standards and regulations that teen workers should be aware of.

Next time, we will take a look at another of the Five Worst Teen Jobs: driving and operating forklifts, tractors, and all-terrain vehicles.

*Links are no longer active as the original sources have removed the content, sometimes due to federal website changes or restructurings.