Building a better helmet

Naloxone could be the secret to curing New England's heroin consumption. Trying to expand access to the life-saving overdose antidote is the real obstacle.

Bangladesh has often struggled maintaining safety in the workplace. But a new effort ensures that Bangladeshi workers are trained about how to better follow security and safety restrictions to create a safer working environment.

A overview of 2014's Fixes columns - connecting the dots between 60 or so ways that people are trying to change the world.

The Canadian federal government has identified bullying as a national problem. Roots of Empathy, based in Toronto, encourages empathy in elementary kids by having them interact with babies.

New York City suffered from fires that erupted in overcrowded, run-down apartments. Then the city sleuthed through residential records and found that landlords who foreclosed let their properties fall apart and ignored safety-code violations. Greater Toronto wants to expand upon New York City’s method by using transportation surveys, census data and computer data to build transit lines.

When adults are asked what values they think youth sports actually reinforce most, they say competitiveness and the importance of winning. The Positive Coaching Alliance provides teaching tools that help coaches redefine the idea of “winning” from something that is reflected on a scoreboard to something that is reflected in a child’s character.

Girls in India are sometimes forced into the prospects of child marriage, prostitution, or slave labor; alternatively, families often teach girls to be wives and mothers. To empower girls to make their own choices, Yuwa, an NGO based in India, introduces girls to sports for social development. Yuwa also promotes educational workshops for girls, where girls can discuss women’s rights and their thoughts about their own bodies.

The Homeless World Cup is the premier soccer tournament for homeless players. Programs around the world use soccer as a means of building a sense of community, sublimating negative energies, and encouraging personal growth.

A school in New Zealand took the rules out of recess. They found that when the kids were mentally engaged during play time activities they were less likely to have problems, such as bullying within the classroom.

Despite significant increases in funding and advances in biomedical research, the rates of new treatments and drugs for illnesses that reach the market every year have plummeted. A group called the Myelin Repair Foundation, along with several other foundations, uses an intensely goal-directed and collaborative method to tackle the bottleneck.