The EPA’s Commitment to Children’s Environmental Health: History and Current Challenges

2022 ◽  
Vol 112 (1) ◽  
pp. 124-134
Author(s):  
Marianne Sullivan ◽  
Leif Fredrickson ◽  
Chris Sellers
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Environmental Health ◽  
Advisory Committee ◽  
Environmental Protection Agency ◽  
Research Policy ◽  
Health Protection ◽  
Children's Health ◽  
Children’S Health ◽  
Environmental Harm ◽  
Children’S Environmental Health

Children’s environmental health (CEH) has a 25-year history at the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), during which the agency has advanced CEH through research, policy, and programs that address children’s special vulnerability to environmental harm. However, the Trump administration took many actions that weakened efforts to improve CEH. The actions included downgrading or ignoring CEH concerns in decision-making, defunding research, sidelining the Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee, and rescinding regulations that were written in part to protect children. To improve CEH, federal environmental statutes should be reviewed to ensure they are sufficiently protective. The administrator should ensure the EPA’s children’s health agenda encompasses the most important current challenges and that there is accountability for improvement. Guidance documents should be reviewed and updated to be protective of CEH and the federal lead strategy refocused on primary prevention. The Office of Children’s Health Protection’s historically low funding and staffing should be remedied. Finally, the EPA should update CEH data systems, reinvigorate the role of the Children’s Health Protection Advisory Committee, and restore funding for CEH research that is aligned with environmental justice and regulatory decision-making needs. (Am J Public Health. 2022;112(1):124–134. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2021.306537 )

Thailand: country report on children’s environmental health

2020 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 71-77
Author(s):  
Siriwan Chandanachulaka
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Health ◽  
Anthropogenic Activities ◽  
Children's Health ◽  
Children’S Health ◽  
Rapid Urbanization ◽  
Country Report ◽  
Health Networks ◽  
Environmental Threats ◽  
Children’S Environmental Health ◽  
Mortality Ratio

AbstractThailand is the home of 66.4 million people of which 17.21% are children aged 0–14 years. The total population of children has decreased from 20.23% in 2009 to 17.21% in 2018. The mortality ratio of infants and children under 5 years of age has also steadily decreased between 2008 and 2017. Urbanization, globalization, and industrialization appear to be the main contributors to the transition from infectious to chronic non-communicable diseases. The main types of environmental exposure to children are water, sanitation and hygiene, air pollution from traffic in inner cities, chemical hazards from pesticides which result from agricultural activities in countryside areas, heavy metal contaminants such as lead and arsenic from anthropogenic activities, e.g. from industrial zones, mining, electronic appliance waste, and ongoing climate change. It is concluded that economic development and rapid urbanization in Thailand have resulted in environmental degradation and pose a risk to children’s health. Future development and implementation of measures to improve children’s environmental health (CEH) in the country are needed. Some examples include research specific to environmental threats to children’s health; international environmental health networks to share experience and expertise; and solutions to solve the problems.

scholarly journals Children’s Environmental Health: A Systems Approach for Anticipating Impacts from Chemicals

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (22) ◽  
pp. 8337
Author(s):  
Elaine A. Cohen Hubal ◽  
David M. Reif ◽  
Rachel Slover ◽  
Ashley Mullikin ◽  
John C. Little
Keyword(s):  
Health Outcomes ◽  
Environmental Health ◽  
Early Life ◽  
Systems Approach ◽  
Consumer Products ◽  
Children's Health ◽  
Children’S Health ◽  
Chemical Management ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Children’S Environmental Health

Increasing numbers of chemicals are on the market and present in consumer products. Emerging evidence on the relationship between environmental contributions and prevalent diseases suggests associations between early-life exposure to manufactured chemicals and a wide range of children’s health outcomes. Using current assessment methodologies, public health and chemical management decisionmakers face challenges in evaluating and anticipating the potential impacts of exposure to chemicals on children’s health in the broader context of their physical (built and natural) and social environments. Here, we consider a systems approach to address the complexity of children’s environmental health and the role of exposure to chemicals during early life, in the context of nonchemical stressors, on health outcomes. By advancing the tools for integrating this more complex information, the scope of considerations that support chemical management decisions can be extended to include holistic impacts on children’s health.

scholarly journals What Do Childcare Providers Know about Environmental Influences on Children’s Health? Implications for Environmental Health Literacy Efforts

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (10) ◽  
pp. 5489
Author(s):  
Brenda D. Koester ◽  
Stephanie Sloane ◽  
Elinor M. Fujimoto ◽  
Barbara H. Fiese ◽  
Leona Yi-Fan Su
Keyword(s):  
Health Literacy ◽  
Environmental Health ◽  
Environmental Influences ◽  
Significant Risk ◽  
The United States ◽  
Children's Health ◽  
Children’S Health ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Environmental Health Literacy ◽  
Childcare Providers

Children are uniquely vulnerable to toxicant exposures in their environment, which can have long-lasting impacts on their health. Childcare providers are an important population to target for environmental health literacy, as most children in the United States under five years of age spend a significant number of waking hours in non-parental care. There is an increasing body of evidence that children are exposed to toxicants in the childcare environment, and yet little is known about what childcare providers know about environmental influences on the health of children in their care. We conducted semi-structured interviews with 36 home- and center-based Illinois childcare providers to better understand their knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors as they relate to environmental influences on children’s health. We found that the majority of providers had a low level of understanding of potential sources of exposure in the childcare environment, and they did not feel that environmental exposures posed a significant risk to children. Future efforts to increase environmental health literacy should focus on raising awareness and knowledge of environmental health issues for childcare providers before addressing ways that providers can reduce or prevent toxicant exposures to children in their care.

scholarly journals Problems of legislation and law enforcement in the field of children’s health care

2020 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 171-177
Author(s):  
Andrey P. Fisenko ◽  
Anna G. Timofeeva ◽  
Rimma N. Terletskaya ◽  
Svetlana R. Konova
Keyword(s):  
Law Enforcement ◽  
Preventive Care ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Health Protection ◽  
Children's Health ◽  
Children’S Health ◽  
Scientific Publications ◽  
Legal Norms ◽  
Legal Enforcement

Introduction. The protection of children’s health is considered to be the most important among the state priorities. The aim of the study was to study the problems of legislation and legal enforcement in the field of children’s health protection to develop proposals for further improvement of its management. Materials and methods. Analysis of information in abstract databases of scientific publications and assessment of existing legislative framework related to children’s health protection in the Russian Federation. Results. The following issues were identified: lack of mechanisms for implementing the principle of priority of children’s health protection; violation of children’s rights when providing them with medical and preventive care within the framework of mandatory medical insurance and when providing paid medical services; insufficient quality of preventive medical examinations and preventive work in outpatient clinics and educational institutions. Existing standards of time for a patient to visit a pediatrician have been shown to have a negative impact on the quality of medical (including preventive) care for children. The need to create a regulatory framework for the legitimate introduction of the “early assistance” technologies and to establish a system of medical and social support for children in difficult situations had been justified. Issues of school medicine and regulation of juvenile labor require a legislative solution. Conclusion. The enhancement of existing legislation in the field of children’s health should consist not only in new legal mechanisms development and new laws adoption but also in improving the effectiveness of existing legal norms, i.e. improving law enforcement practices.

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