Analyze

The authors offer a review of themes within occupational health and environmental public health surveillance over the past decade. In reviewing the history of public health surveillance, the authors highlight key acts of Congress in the 1970s that have made the development of “modern” occupational health and environmental health surveillance possible—but which also failed to develop into a cohesive and well-connected data management systems across federal agencies. Separate agencies were tasked with different data collection, management and intervention tasks in ways that fragmented the surveillance system to the point of ineffectiveness.

The authors argue that effective surveillance for occupational and environmental health demands development of a clear purpose for collecting data and having the data available to make meaningful analysis possible. They turn to the CDC’s childhood lead prevention program to demonstrate these points.

Nanjala Nyabola, a Kenyan journalist and author tweeted: 'There were two anti-police brutality protests in Nairobi today. The one featuring white people made it's way to the US embassy undisturbed. The one led by working class and poor folks ended in teargas and arbitrary arrests.'

On March 25, 2020 the Kenyan government imposed a curfew to limit movement in Nairobi to prevent the spreading of COVID-19. In the ensuing months, the police 'enforced' the curfew by killing as many people as COVID-19 in Nairobi. The police have had a long and bloody history in Nairobi. Missing Voices Kenya have documented the shocking number of people who have lots their lives to police brutality over the years. Although groups in poor neighbourhoods such as Mathare have long held protests against police violence, the recent murder of George Floyd in the US has lent momentum to this movement. Thus, these groups took to the street to walk to the apartment where Yasin Moyo, a 13 year old playing on his balcony was killed by police, to demand that Black lives mattered- everywhere. The protests ended in the police tear gassing protestors.

A separate group comprising of many white protestors marched to the US Embassy to protest extrajudicial killings in the US and Kenya. From reports I have been reading about the protests on Twitter, these groups were left unharmed by the police. It is thus important that we recognize the the situatedness of protests agains police violence in different parts of the world, and the specific histories and contexts that shape each one of them, while recognizing their common themes.