OPIOID VICTIMS IN PURDUE PHARMA SETTLEMENT
Opioid victims and their families say paperwork and state medical record laws make it hard to prove their claims and get their share of Purdue Pharma's $750 million bankruptcy settlement.
Some states require pharmacy records to be destroyed after a certain period of time for privacy reasons. Relatives face even more barriers in obtaining records of someone who died. Those who acquired opioids illegally wouldn’t generate any pharmacy paperwork at all. And physicians are only required to hold medical records for a certain number of years, varying by state.
Methodology:
I found the medical records retention laws by states through Cariend, a medical records managing company. I extracted the number of years medical facilities must retain patient records for each state and input this data into Flourish. The map visualizes the retention period by state using a color gradient. To provide more context, I customized the tooltips to summarize the key aspects of the law in each state. For example, the tooltips indicate whether the retention period is a minimum or exact number of years, whether it applies to hospitals, physicians, or both, and the statute or code establishing the requirement. Formatting the tooltips in HTML allowed me to structure the information clearly.
ABORTION LITIGATIONS IN U.S.
Since the Dobbs ruling, 27 states have banned or severely limited abortions. The laws reach far beyond terminating pregnancies, due to vaguely written statutes and confusion over the bans, legal experts and providers said. 19 of them face pending litigation.
Methodology:
To visualize abortion ban lengths and ongoing litigation across the United States, I compiled a spreadsheet with data on restrictions in each state. For those 19 states that have pending abortion litigation, I detailed the specific timeline of the status of any litigation challenging abortion laws in the state by inputting key dates for injunctions, court rulings, and ongoing cases.
Created by my colleague Jon and I, our map displays each state's current abortion ban length based on the gestational limit. When viewers click on a state with pending litigation, a popup timeline appears highlighting key dates in the legal battle over that state's abortion law. This is part of Bloomberg Law's abortion care story package.
OPIOID CRISIS IN MASSACHUSETTS
In Massachusetts, more than 16,000 confirmed opioid overdose deaths have occurred since 2012. Franklin, Bristol, Berkshire, Hampden and Suffolk counties have experienced the greatest increase in opioid-related overdose deaths among their residents in 2021, according to data from the Massachusetts Department of Public Health.
Methodology:
I meticulously compiled and analyzed data on opioid-related overdose deaths among Massachusetts residents spanning the years 2012 to 2021. Employing pivot table and other functions in Excel, I calculated the overdose death rates to create a heat map. Furthermore, I proficiently leveraged DataWrapper to generate three impactful data visualizations, facilitating a comprehensive understanding of the subject matter.
OPIOID SETTLEMENT FUNDS
As of March 31, municipalities across the state had received over $42 million from the settlement with opioid distributors — Cardinal, McKesson and AmerisourceBergen — and drug manufacturer Johnson & Johnson. According to data from the office of Attorney General Andrea Campbell, the top 10 municipalities to receive opioid settlement funds are Boston, Cambridge, Worcester, Springfield, New Bedford, Brockton, Fall River, Lynn, Lawrence and Taunton.
Methodology:
I gathered and consolidated seven datasets sourced from the office of Attorney General Andrea Campbell and effectively merge them into a master dataset within Excel. I used Flourish to generate a stacked bar chart to visualize the top 10 municipalities to receive opioid settlement funds in Massachusetts.
PROBLEM GAMBLING
During the first three days of mobile sports betting in Massachusetts (March 10-12), more than 8.1 million geolocation transactions were made from more than 400,000 accounts across the six mobile operators, according to GeoComply, a company that provides the Massachusetts Gaming Commission with geolocation and fraud detection services.
Nearly 6% of the state’s population of about 7 million established unique online sports betting accounts, which is almost double the percentage of similar population-sized states.
I created this bar graph on DataWrapper. This visualization aims to provide readers with an understanding of the prevalence of mobile gambling accounts among the population of Massachusetts, relative to other states of similar population size.
MAINE HARNESS RACING
The Maine State Harness Racing Commission, which regulates the long-standing betting sport, has sanctioned licensed owners, drivers and trainers more than 600 times since 2016 for violating rules aimed in part at keeping horses fit and able to compete, MSHRC data shows.
The largest number of fines was levied against owners, trainers and drivers who raced at two commercial tracks, Bangor Raceway and Scarborough Downs; the Scarborough Downs track closed in 2020. The state also found violations at First Track (Cumberland Fair), Fryeburg Fair Race Track, Farmington Fair, Windsor Fair, Skowhegan State Fair, Union Fair and Topsham Fair. Violations also were found at Oxford County Fair, which stopped racing in 2017, and Northern Maine Fair in Presque Isle, which stopped in 2020.
Methodology:
Upon receiving the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) response from the MSHRC, I established a comprehensive database encompassing drug and racing violations issued between the years 2016 and 2022. Employing meticulous data cleanings techniques like OpenRefine and Excel, I further refined the messy raw data. Utilizing pivot tables, I adeptly computed the frequency of violations across various race tracks and the cumulative fines accrued by the MSHRC throughout the years. This was a team project produced through Boston University's Data Journalism course by Professor Maggie Mulvihill.