Category: News You Can Use

How to clean

~ susie

A very useful guide from the CDC:

“There is much to learn about the novel coronavirus that causes coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Based on what is currently known about the novel coronavirus and similar coronaviruses that cause SARS and MERS, spread from person-to-person with these viruses happens most frequently among close contacts (within about 6 feet). This type of transmission occurs via respiratory droplets. On the other hand, transmission of novel coronavirus to persons from surfaces contaminated with the virus has not been documented. Transmission of coronavirus occurs much more commonly through respiratory droplets than through fomites. Current evidence suggests that novel coronavirus may remain viable for hours to days on surfaces made from a variety of materials. Cleaning of visibly dirty surfaces followed by disinfection is a best practice measure for prevention of COVID-19 and other viral respiratory illnesses in households and community settings.”

Go read the rest.

A refresher on Colorado’s seat belt laws

~ susie
Photo by Chris Martin on Unsplash

This past July, law enforcement agencies across Colorado participated in a “Click It or Ticket” campaign. In an effort to increase seat belt usage across the state, officers were focused on enforcing the state’s seat belt laws, and increasing awareness of the importance of the belts. The campaign might be over, but it is still important all motorists and passengers buckle up before heading out. 

“It is such a simple gesture, but one that could save many lives,” says personal injury attorney Mac Hester of Mac Hester Law. “Every year, the statistics come out and involve too many preventable tragedies. It is difficult to understand how to get motorists to understand the importance of these safety devices.”

It is a problem seen in Colorado more than throughout much of the country. While the national average for seat belt use is 90 percent, it is only 86 percent in The Centennial State, which means many are not following the law. So, what are the laws on seat belts in the state?

All drivers and front-seat passengers are required to wear a seat belt any time a vehicle is on a street or highway. When adults break this law, law enforcement officers can cite them for the violation if the officer pulled the driver over for another traffic offense. This makes it a secondary offense. 

However, when there is a child under the age of 16 in the car that is not properly restrained, that is a primary offense. This means law enforcement can pull drivers over for this offense alone. 

Under Colorado’s Graduated Drivers Licensing (GDL) program, any driver under the age of 18 must wear a seat belt. So too, must all their passengers, regardless of their age. This is also a primary offense, meaning teenager drivers can be pulled over for this offense. 

When these laws are broken, the penalty is a $65 fine. When parents and caregivers have not properly restrained a child in the car, the fine is increased to $82. 

Changes to federal law may make roads more dangerous

~ susie
Photo by Orlando Leon on Unsplash

There are many federal laws that regulate the trucking industry and are intended to make the roads safer for everyone. One set of these rules is called the ‘Hours of Service’ rules. These rules dictate the amount of time long haul and short-haul drivers can be on the road. Now, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) is considering changing these rules. 

The current rules establish that truck drivers must drive for only 11 hours within a 14-hour time period of being on-duty. Once that period ends, drivers must then rest for ten consecutive hours before going back on duty. At least once every eight hours, truck drivers must also take a 30-minute break. The trucking industry has argued for years that these rules are unfair, excessively rigid, and costly.

Under the new rules, the FMCSA is considering changing many rules. These include:

  • Allowing drivers to use on-duty status for breaks rather than off-duty status. This would also tie the break requirement to eight hours of driving time without interruption for at least 30 minutes. 
  • Allowing drivers to split their ten hours of consecutive rest into two time periods. One of these periods would be for seven hours, while another would be for not less than two hours. 
  • Allowing one off-duty break at least 30 minutes long, but not more than three hours, with the break not being included in the driver’s 14-hour driving window.
  • Extending the two hours longer in adverse driving conditions.
  • Extending the distance short-haul drivers can travel to 150 air miles from 100.
  • Extending the hours short-haul drivers can be on the road to 14 instead of 12.

“It is important to understand that these proposed changes have not been made into law just yet,” says personal injury attorney Davis Haines of Haines Law, P.C. “The FMCSA asked the public for their comments on the rules and so, anyone who had strong feelings about them one way or the other had an opportunity to submit their comment on the Federal Register Notice. The FMCSA will now consider all comments when making their final decision.”

All from a fall

~ susie
Not mine, but one like mine.

So I got the report on the MRI from my rowing-machine fall. Several new herniations, one of which is linked to the pain in my knees that just won’t go away. They want to know how people get hooked on painkillers? Make the co-pays for physical therapy too high for ordinary people to pay, and voila! Take a pill!

My only other option right now is to get cortisone injections in my spinal column, and I had really bad reactions the last two times I had cortisone shots. One ruptured a ligament in my ankle an hour after I got it, and the other one caused severe pain in my knee that never went away. So there you go.

And by “option,” I mean the one the lawsuit or my own insurance will pay for. A better option, at least for me, is prolotherapy for the ligaments supporting my spine, but that’s really expensive and insurance won’t cover it. Oh well.

They don’t actually want us to get well, in case you haven’t figured it out.

Growth in vehicle safety technology promises rewards; brings dangers

~ susie

5-door Volt

If you have had any exposure to vehicle advertising in the last two years, you have likely seen demonstrations of impressive advances in vehicle monitoring and driver warnings and aids.  Lane departure alarms, automatic braking, and blind spot monitoring all promise to reduce the chance that you will be involved in a collision.

However, recent research conducted by AAA has revealed that many vehicle owners have a limited understanding of the advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) included with their vehicles, but that such a limited understanding does not prevent them from relying heavily on those systems.  Eighty percent of drivers of vehicles with blind spot monitoring systems did not understand that those systems were limited in their ability to detect pedestrians and cyclists.  Forty percent of drivers of vehicles equipped with either forward collision avoidance or automatic braking systems did not understand the limitations of the systems and perhaps more alarmingly, confused the two and mistakenly believed that forward collision avoidance would stop the car.

“This research shows that drivers today have vehicles with systems that, if properly relied on, could drastically reduce vehicle accidents, injuries, and deaths,” said Peter G. Billings, a New Haven Car Accident Attorney with the law firm of Billings, Barrett & Bowman, LLC.  “However, drivers have failed to educate themselves on the limitations of those systems, thereby exposing themselves and others to the possibility of even more danger.”

Drivers owe a duty of care to others with whom they share the road; not just other drivers, but cyclists and pedestrians as well.  Relying on these advanced driver assistance systems without completely knowing how they work or what their limitations are, and choosing to not use the same level of care and caution in operating their vehicle that they would without those systems breaches that duty.  This puts others in danger and exposes the driver to claims of negligence in the event of an accident.

In order to ensure that the systems with which your vehicle is equipped provide the most assistance without compromising your driving practices, do the following:

1) Never rely solely on an automated system.  Automated technology has come a long way and will undoubtedly continue to develop, but no currently-available production system completely replaces the judgment and ability of the driver.  Deferring to an automated system puts you and others in jeopardy and greatly increases the likelihood of an accident.

2) Educate yourself on the systems in your vehicle.  It may seem obvious, but fully understanding the aids with which your car is equipped will allow those systems to provide the full benefit for which they were designed.  Knowing what a particular system can and cannot do will keep you from relying on it in a manner for which it was not intended, and possibly save you and others from injury.

3) Only use automated systems to support your situational awareness, not to supplant it. Every driver on the road is responsible for knowing what is going on with their vehicle, what is going on around them, and to look out for others.  Being of aware of your situation at all times while operating a vehicle is critical to avoiding accidents. Advanced driver assistance systems can provide a driver a more fully developed situational awareness, but it cannot replace it.

Overall, drivers should avoid being lulled into a false sense of safety when it comes to these systems.  Use them to assist you in being a safer driver and making those on the road with you safer as well. Using them as a way to avoid the responsibility of being a fully engaged and careful driver is a recipe for a lawsuit.  

New recommendations for rear-facing child seats aim to reduce fatalities

~ susie
Top 10 Best Infant Head Support For Car Seat 2018 (Babies Car Seat Head Support)

Car crashes are the leading cause of death for children.  With the advancements in materials and designs, it would seem as though this should not be the case.  However, researchers believe that one of the contributing causes is the practice of switching a child from a rear-facing seat to a front-facing seat around the age of two and are now recommending that children remain in rear-facing seats until the child reaches the seat’s weight limit.

“Parents love when their children reach milestones, and turning that child around so that he or she can see out the front of the car is one of those milestones,” said John J. Sheehan, a Boston Car Accident Lawyer with the Law Office of John J. Sheehan.  “However, this research indicates that just a little more patience can ensure that your child is as safe as possible in a car.”

The need for safety seats or boosters does not end at an early age.  Children should be in either a child seat or in a belt-positioning booster seat until the lap and shoulder belts fit the child properly, most often, when the child reaches 4 feet 9 inches in height.  The reason is simple: use of correct child seating lowers the risk of death or serious injury by seventy percent.

Following these recommendations can be important not only for the safety of your child, but for the possibility that your child is injured in an accident.  

In any accident where parties seek to assign fault, each will look for opportunities to try and limit the ability of the other to make claims for injuries.  Many times, the sides are looking for situations where a party’s actions contributed to their injuries, either partly or fully. This concept, known as “comparative negligence”, allows a judge or jury to reduce the damages assigned to one party by a percentage equal to the extent the other party’s actions contributed to their injuries.

In Massachusetts, the law is known as “modified comparative negligence”.  With modified comparative negligence, if a party was injured but their own actions constitute 51 percent or more of the fault, the party is totally barred from any recovery.  The idea is to only allow a plaintiff to recover damages where they are responsible for half of the blame or less. However, even if a party is only 20 percent to blame, they are still only entitled to 80 percent of the value of their overall damages.

This rule means that individuals should always act, to the extent possible, as any other reasonable person would.  In Massachusetts, this would mean heeding the advice of experts to only turn children around in their car seats when the weight limit is exceeded and keep those children in booster seats until they can safely sit in the seat.  

No one wants to put their child at risk.  Following these recommendations will ensure that your child remains as safe as possible, and ensure that if they are injured in a vehicle, that you actions cannot be used against you.

It’s never too soon to create a financial plan

~ susie
20180919-IMG_5390.jpg

Assuming you still have a job and you’re not slammed with an emergency bill, that is:

The month of May was Disability Insurance Awareness Month. Among other things, it highlighted the importance of every working person having a financial plan that made allowances for things like long-term disability. One out of every four 20-year-olds in the workplace today will experience a sickness or health condition that keeps them from working. But at least 51 million adults in the United States do not have any plan other than receiving Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI). And that could be a problem for them later.

Not having money set aside for a medical emergency can leave people in a financial crunch. And the odds that is going to happen is better than most people think. In the first four months of 2018 alone, 1.5 million Americans experienced a disabling injury or illness that kept them from work. And nearly half of adults in the country do not have the financial means to pay the bills if something happened to them and they could not work for even a few months. Unfortunately, most long-term disabilities keep a person from working for a year or more.

“Only one-third of employees have long-term disability insurance through their employer,” says Alexandria personal injury attorney David Laborde of Laborde Earles Law Firm. “While SSDI can help, it likely will not be enough to cover someone’s full expenses when they are no longer able to work.”

While it may seem hopeless and discouraging to those that do not have long-term disability insurance through their employer, there is a solution. That is to simply create a financial plan that can step in when unfortunate circumstances arise. That can be a simple plan that sets aside some money every month, or it can include making a small investment in supplemental long-term disability insurance.

Disability Insurance Month may already be over, but that does not mean that people should stop thinking about their financial future. The time to create a plan is now, before an extenuating circumstance arises. That way if the time does come, people can focus more on their own health and wellness instead of worrying about how they are going to pay the bills.