Maryland’s senators approved a bill that would ban polystyrene foam food containers and cups starting next year.If the bill eventually becomes law, Maryland would be the first state to enact a ban on the products. Some local governments in Maryland — most recently Anne Arundel County — have banned them. [node:read-more:link]

Party leaders will submit a handful of bills, that would allow bulk importation of medications from Canada, regulate pharmacy benefit managers – the middlemen who can exclude certain medications from insurance plans – create more transparency in drug prices, and permit individuals to import drugs from Canada. [node:read-more:link]

It’s taco night at the Lindskoog household in this suburban community 20 miles west of Boise. Nate Lindskoog has seasoned the red meat sizzling in his cast-iron skillet with a mixture of chili powder and Himalayan pink salt. In a few minutes, he will wrap it in corn tortillas and top it off with lime-soaked avocados. The 36-year-old father of six isn’t making carne asada with meat he bought from a butcher or at the grocery store. [node:read-more:link]

New York lawmakers are planning to introduce a bill that would allow children as young as 14 to get vaccinated without their parents' consent. Proposed by Assemblywoman Patricia Fahy and Sen. Liz Krueger, the bill would enable older children to protect themselves from preventable diseases such as measles, meningitis and human papillomavirus in the event their parents opt out of vaccinating them. [node:read-more:link]

The same Main Street winds through the old mountain mining towns of Cumberland, Benham and Lynch, crosses a river and runs alongside a creek. The early 20th century coal mining boom drew people to this remote corner of southeast Kentucky, until coal’s dizzying decline sent them away. Today, Main Street hints at a roaring past and the potential for change.Poor Fork Arts & Crafts, which sells Appalachian handcrafted and vintage items, the Back Street Bar and a senior center sit alongside empty storefronts, vacant lots and boarded-up spaces. [node:read-more:link]

The Washington House has passed a bill that would require physically or mentally disabled workers to be paid the same minimum wage that other workers in the state receive.Under current law, employers can receive special certificates from the state's Department of Labor and Industries to pay wages below the minimum wage for workers with disabilities. In the application, employers must not the nature of the disability and how it affects the work performed, and the pay rate may not be less than 75 percent of the minimum wage unless a lower rate is determined to be justified. [node:read-more:link]

A case before a federal appeals court could upend an historic adoption law meant to combat centuries of brutal discrimination against American Indians and keep their children with families and tribal communities. For the first time, a few states have sued to overturn the federal Indian Child Welfare Act, which Congress enacted in 1978 as an antidote to entrenched policies of uprooting Native children and assimilating them into mainstream white culture.Now, in a country roiled by debates over race and racial identity, there’s a chance the 41-year-old law could be overturned by the U.S. [node:read-more:link]

Canada has released a new food guide, and one thing is noticeably missing - a daily dose of dairy. [node:read-more:link]

The gap between America’s rural poor and non-poor, like in urban America, continues to widen. The difference in rural America, however, is that the gap is widening faster than in any of the nation’s grittiest cities or suburban counties.That’s the conclusion of two recent reports by the U.S. [node:read-more:link]

Rural America needs a new deal, or at least a better deal, and if it’s green all the better. Farm loan delinquencies are rising to levels not seen since the Farm Debt Crisis of the 1980s, from which the rural Midwest never really recovered. Nearly a third of Iowa farmers growing corn and soybeans caught up in a trade war with China are said to be under extreme stress, according to Iowa State University. They’re the younger ones.Rural communities are draining young people. Two-thirds of Iowa’s 99 counties are losing population and prospects as manufacturing jobs leach out of the Midwest. [node:read-more:link]