Rural News
Study Finds Rural Communities Quickly Realize Benefits Outpacing Costs of Broadband
Government Technology | Posted on June 13, 2018Researchers found using formulaic forecasts that three of the five counties would see the annual collective benefit from broadband great enough to surpass public investment in just one year. A fourth county, Sibley, would take just over a year to reach that mark and the last, Lake County, the least populous, taking just over six years.While the forecast points to a quick success, only one of the county has had access to broadband long enough to show concrete progress.
One in every 5 deaths in young adults is opioid-related in the United States
Science Daily | Posted on June 12, 2018Proportion of deaths that are opioid-related has increased by nearly 300 percent in 15 years
Wisconsin quarantines deer, elk farms after CWD positives
Minnesota Star Tribune | Posted on June 12, 2018Wisconsin officials have quarantined a deer farm and an elk farm after animals on both properties tested positive for chronic wasting disease. The Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection announced the quarantines Friday. The agency said in a news release that the National Veterinary Laboratory confirmed Thursday that a 15-year-old whitetail doe and a 2-year-old elk cow tested positive. The deer farm is located in Dane and registered to Brad Madigan. The elk farm, registered as Burton Buck Creek Elk, is in Richland Center.
NC bills aim to establish teaching hospitals in rural areas
Winston Salem Journal | Posted on June 12, 2018Bipartisan bills have been submitted in the state House and Senate that aim to address two major socioeconomic issues facing rural community hospitals.House Bill 998 would direct the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services to make recommendations by Oct. 1 for establishing incentives to expand medical education in rural counties.That would include assisting rural hospitals with gaining Medicare approval to become a teaching hospital, as well as incentivize medical residents and students to serve those rural areas after graduation.
For a small Colorado utility, 100% renewable energy is old news
Energy News | Posted on June 12, 2018Aspen Electric, the municipal utility serving the resort town of the same name, achieved 100 percent renewables in 2015, and it didn’t break the bank to do so. Residential rates for Aspen’s customers rank among the lowest in Colorado, while meeting a 100 percent renewable energy goal set by Aspen’s city council 13 years earlier. And this month, upgrades to a Nebraska wind farm, of which Aspen Electric is a major customer, will push the utility’s costs even lower – dropping about 15 percent annually, or $475,000.
Assistant to the Secretary Anne Hazlett Statement on Stop Youth Opioid Abuse Campaign
USDA | Posted on June 12, 2018Assistant to the Secretary for Rural Development Anne Hazlett issued the following statement: “Leaving no community untouched, the opioid epidemic has taken a monumental toll on many of the small towns and rural places that are the heartbeat of our country. The campaign to Stop Youth Opioid Abuse shows that at the root of this crisis, addiction is a disease driving good people to make shocking and destructive decisions. Addressing the opioid epidemic is a top priority for this Administration. With that leadership, USDA is committed to being a strong partner to rural leaders in building healthy, resilient and prosperous communities now and for generations to come.” At the direction of President Trump, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) has been keenly focused on addressing the opioid crisis in rural communities. So far, the Department has been convening regional roundtables to hear firsthand accounts of the impact of the crisis and effective strategies for response in rural communities; launched an interactive webpage on opioid misuse in rural America featuring resources for rural communities and individuals facing the crisis; and prioritized investments in two key grant programs to address the crisis in rural places.
As biomass energy gains traction, southern US forests feel the burn
Mongabay | Posted on June 12, 2018An estimated 50 to 80 percent of southern wetland forest is now gone, and that which remains provides ecosystem services totaling $500 billion as well as important wildlife habitat. Logging is considered one of the biggest threats to the 35 million acres of remaining wetland forest in the southern U.S., and conservation organizations are saying this threat is coming largely from the wood pellet biomass industry. \Touted as a renewable energy source, research shows wood pellets release more carbon dioxide than coal per megawatt of electricity produced and industry critics worry that incentivizing this energy source could actually be accelerating climate change. Experts argue that biomass energy effectively acts as a loophole for countries to under-report their carbon emissions and give a false impression of meeting Paris Agreement objectives. Research indicates pellet production plants also have a negative impact on air and water quality. But industry proponents say biomass energy is an important component of mitigating climate change and that regulations will ensure its sustainability.
Rural America has too few dentists — and too few patients who can pay
The Washington Post | Posted on June 12, 2018About 43 percent of rural Americans lack access to dental care, according to the National Rural Health Association, and West Virginia, among the poorest and most rural states, is at the center of the crisis. All but six of the state’s 55 counties include federally designated “Health Professional Shortage Areas,” “Medically Underserved Areas” or both. The state’s Oral Health Program found in 2014 and 2015 that nearly half of counties had fewer than six practicing dentists, just half of adult West Virginians had visited a dentist in the previous year, and more than one-fifth hadn’t seen a dentist in five years. By comparison, a U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study in 2015 found that 64 percent of all American adults ages 18 to 64 reported seeing a dentist in the previous year. The rate of total tooth loss is 33.8 percent among West Virginians over 65, compared with roughly 19 percent for all seniors nationally. One seemingly obvious solution is to persuade more dentists and other oral-health providers to come to places like West Virginia, a goal of various public efforts. The federal National Health Service Corps program, for example, offers up to $50,000 in loan assistance to doctors and dentists willing to work two years in a designated shortage area. And several states have passed or considered legislation authorizing “dental therapists” — midlevel providers akin to nurse practitioners — to provide certain kinds of primary dental care in areas where dentists are scarce. But while it is true that West Virginia has a dentist shortage, adding more providers will not solve the problem of rural oral health. People don’t go to the dentist if they can’t afford to, no matter how many dentists there are. “Affordability is the big thing,” said Richard Meckstroth, chair of the department of dental practice and rural health at West Virginia University.
Microbiome differences between urban and rural populations start soon after birth
Science Daily | Posted on June 11, 2018An analysis comparing the intestinal microbiomes of both infants and adults living in rural and urban areas of Nigeria has revealed that not only are there many differences in adults living in subsistence environments versus urban ones but also that these variations begin at a very young age.
Measuring broadband's return on investment
Daily Yonder | Posted on June 11, 2018A new study commissioned by the Blandin Foundation may help small communities put some hard numbers behind broadband’s public benefit. “Return on Investment: Measuring Impact of Broadband in Five Rural Minnesota Communities” looks at communities that have spent public funds on building out networks. The words “high speed” are critical. These communities have run fiber to homes and businesses or have plans to do so in the near future. Treacy’s estimates were based on formulas developed by other researchers. The resulting numbers are big. For the five areas in the study (Beltrami, Crow Wing, Goodhue, Lake and Sibley counties) the study showed a community benefit of about $150 million annually and another $450 million in the increase in real estate values. The estimates varied widely among the five communities, and they are far from a comprehensive picture of the potential impact of high quality broadband. But for communities wondering whether broadband is a good investment of public money, the implications are clear.