Safety Standards

SUDDENLY, everyone from gun control advocates to big-city mayors is talking about using futuristic technology to make guns safer. Their idea is to encourage the design and sale of "personalized handguns" that can be fired only by their owners. Ideas for such guns include a computerized chip that recognizes the handgun owner's fingerprints and a radio transponder that would detect a ring worn by the user.Proponents argue that this "smart gun" technology would stop the misuse of firearms by children and render stolen weapons useless.

WASHINGTON -- The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration expanded head-protection standards yesterday to permit innovative air bags that some automakers have already installed.Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater said the agency had responded to the industry's voluntary improvements to vehicle safety by re-examining head-protection rules, scheduled to take effect in September, that required additional padding on the roof and roof pillars of new cars.Now the rules will include the air bags, in the hope that more carmakers will install them.

MOSCOW -- While the United States was busy worrying about Russian nuclear-weapons scientists hiring themselves out to predatory despots around the globe, another deadly danger was overclouded.Nuclear materials used for peaceful purposes here threaten the world virtually as much as those designed to blow it up -- and more immediately, at that. The accidental leak of radioactive gases from a nuclear power plant near St. Petersburg last week offered a grim reminder to anyone who had begun to forget the lessons of Chernobyl, where in 1986 the worst nuclear reactor accident in history left 31 dead and fears that thousands might have been affected by the fallout:Nuclear materials here are handled in a way many other nations would find almost cavalier.

BOSTON -- The Bush administration agreed yesterday to lift a suspension on proposed health rules that the Labor Department says are needed to limit chemical exposure faced by 8 million U.S. workers.But the department's victory was limited, and it did not ensure that the new health standards will take effect.With the suspension lifted, Labor Secretary Lynn Martin can continue procedures to make the proposed rules final. But critics say she has caved in to a controversial new Bush administration theory that workers may be better off in some cases if health and safety regulations are eased.

Mayor Martin O'Malley met yesterday with school bus drivers who have complained about poor vehicle maintenance and safety standards at First Student Inc., a national bus company that the Teamsters union is trying to organize. O'Malley told bus drivers that he supported their efforts to organize and improve bus service to some of the city's most vulnerable children, but he did not directly blame First Student. The majority of children who ride school buses in Baltimore are disabled. "You should never take a bus out if kids are going to be in danger," said O'Malley, who is campaigning to be the Democratic nominee in this year's gubernatorial race.

A Maryland doctors' group is pushing legislation to bolster the state's child safety seat laws, a move designed to better protect toddlers from head, neck and spinal injuries during accidents. The Maryland State Medical Society, also known as MedChi, wants the state to adopt recommendations made last year by the American Academy of Pediatrics. The recommendations include lengthening the amount of time young children have to stay in seats facing the rear of the car and raising the age that children should have to sit in the back seat.

Maryland health officials proposed Tuesday a ban on the sale of crib bumpers, which have been linked to the asphyxiation of at least two dozen infants across the country — a move that would make it the first state to prohibit the bumpers. The pads have little safety benefit and pose a small, but potentially deadly risk, according to members of a state task force formed this year to advise state health officials. "Crib bumpers are not part of the safe sleep ABCs — babies should sleep alone, on their backs in a crib," Dr. Joshua M. Sharfstein, secretary of the state Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, said at a news conference announcing the proposal.

U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood last week released the latest statistics on highway deaths and injuries with no small measure of pride. In 2009, the U.S. had its safest year on the roads with the fewest deaths since 1950 and the lowest death rate per miles traveled recorded since motor vehicles were mass produced in this country. Mr. LaHood and others in Washington were quick to credit their own safety initiatives. But they might also have expressed gratitude for the recession: Historically, traffic fatalities decline in period of economic decline (fewer jobs mean less commuting, fewer deliveries, etc.)

CHESTERTOWN, Md. - One of the world's foremost fireworks experts is a grandfatherly organic chemistry professor who teaches at tiny Washington College and enjoys afternoons on his back porch overlooking the peaceful Chester River. But when the crowds gather this weekend for the region's many crackling tributes to America's independence, John A. Conkling won't be among the revelers. He'll be in Geneva, where he is advising the United Nations on how to develop international standards for storing and transporting fireworks and other dangerous goods.

Just three days after being touted as the commander who would oversee reforms in the wake of a training shooting, the new head of the Baltimore Police academy informed top brass Friday that he intends to leave the agency. Maj. Joseph E. Smith III, a 25-year veteran, told the police commissioner that he planned to retire from the department and take an outside job, according to a police spokesman. Smith could not be reached for comment. "He said it was too big of an opportunity to pass up," said chief spokesman Anthony Guglielmi.