Environmental Health Indicators Bridging the Chasm of Public Health and the Environment: Workshop Summary (2004) / Chapter Skim
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4 Needed Integration of Other Federal Agencies, State Agencies, and Nongovernmental Organizations to Build a Monitoring System
4 Needed Integration of Other Federal Agencies, State Agencies, and Nongovernmental Organizations to Build a Monitoring System
Pages 53-70
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From page 53... ...
The workshop highlighted that at the federal level alone, more than 50 agencies are directly or indirectly involved in collecting data that are useful to environmental health scientists. By coupling this with the work of international organizations, state and local agencies, industry, and nongovernmental organizations, there are many potential partnerships and a need for increased cooperation at all levels to move forward as an integrated network.
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From page 54... ...
The threats of catastrophic radiation pollution from nuclear power plants and the problems posed by greenhouse gas emissions also are of concern. In developing countries the major environmental concerns are the biological hazards of unsafe drinking water and unsatisfactory sanitation, as well as the hazards of inadequate housing and poor worker health and safety.
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From page 55... ...
Some environmental health indicators in New Zealand that can be pinpointed clearly are mortality from asbestos-related cancer (about 70 deaths per year from mesotheliomas and about 140 per year from lung cancer) (Kjellstrom and Smartt, 2000)
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From page 56... ...
Nevertheless, the United States can learn much by examining the environmental health problems and monitoring efforts of other countries. Good monitoring systems -- extremely good in some cases -- exist in other countries, and monitoring research in the United States could benefit from international collaborative efforts that would save time and energy and allow answers to be obtained rapidly.
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From page 57... ...
He noted that earth science techniques that have special applications in environmental health monitoring: remote sensing, geospatial analysis, and advanced analytical capabilities, particularly in the chemical and biological arenas. An example of the relevance of remote sensing for health is the use of the Landsat-7 satellite to detect the movement of atmospheric dust from Africa across the Atlantic Ocean to the Americas (see Figure 4.2)
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From page 58... ...
. The map provides useful information for many questions about arsenic including the following: What percentage of the population is affected by high levels of arsenic in drinking water?
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From page 59... ...
The third technique of interest, advanced analytical capabilities, refers to the USGS's ability to handle and exchange vast amounts of data. For example, the microscopic analysis of dust using scanning electron microscopes, transmission electron microscopes, X-ray diffraction, and reflectance spectroscopy helps detect potentially deleterious minerals, such as asbestos silica, coal dust, sulfides, and other particulates.
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From page 60... ...
Linking the possible effects of these contaminants in our water supply to public health represents an important area of collaborative research for the earth sciences and health communities. In addition to its laboratory methods, the USGS has an extensive field infrastructure that is devoted to collecting real-time water monitoring data, including more than 7,000 stream gages and 700 real-time water quality monitoring stations.
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From page 61... ...
Local environmental and public health workers inspect restaurants, respond to hazardous materials incidents, monitor water quality, and set up systems to ensure rational approaches for providing these services to the community. They organize responses to incidents involving nuclear power plants, earthquakes, and other disasters at the local level.
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From page 62... ...
Local environmental health officials had little capacity to answer questions posed by community residents about the possible relationship between the doubled output of pollution from the power plant and anecdotal increases in chronic diseases and acute episodes of asthma. In this instance, community members also raised concerns when a large tire fire broke out, causing a huge plume of smoke to settle over the community for more than a week, and later when a large construction project caused enormous dust clouds to descend over nearby residential communities.
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From page 63... ...
The proposed national health monitoring network should help address local environmental health issues by improving surveillance, increasing data generation, and linking data sources. Horton noted that it also will provide a more rigorous scientific basis for local environmental health work.
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From page 64... ...
For example, surveillance methods for addressing exposures to pollution from such sources as a tire fire, a power plant, or a construction site may already have been developed elsewhere in the nation and need not be reinvented locally. The techniques used in the geographical information systems of the USGS will be of great value at the local level in identifying health challenges and environmental exposures and in determining health linkages.
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From page 65... ...
Where do the chemical industry and the ACC stand on issues of environmental health monitoring and public health surveillance? They support the following: the concept of a comprehensive public health surveillance system that will help reveal disease trends in the United States and will help generate hypotheses for research on disease causation; improvement in the ability of state and federal public health agencies to monitor priority chronic diseases and risk factors for these diseases; and a system to aid in understanding chronic disease trends in the United States, in prioritizing public health issues, and in guiding resource allocation among states and federal agencies.
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From page 66... ...
, a web-based information service sponsored by the nonprofit organization Environmental Defense. Its goal is to help people easily find acceptable, usable information about environmental quality in their area, stated William Pease, of GetActive Software.
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From page 67... ...
In this case, Scorecard took data from the National Air Toxic Assessment, which provides estimates of the concentrations of hazardous air pollutants down to the census tract level across the United States, and intersected it with health effects information and risk assessment information from other data sources. Using basic screening-level risk assessment techniques, Scorecard generates an estimate of the added cancer risk associated with exposure to these air toxins for every census tract in the country, relative to similar census tracts.
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From page 68... ...
ROLE OF THE MEDIA IN INFORMING THE PUBLIC ABOUT ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH MONITORING To gain public support for a national environmental health monitoring system, the concept must be widely understood and its potential benefits recognized, stated Morris "Bud" Ward of Morris A
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From page 69... ...
Even a small percentage increase in market share of the audience is important, because each increment of market share brings an enormous increase in advertising rates for air time. Until five years ago, key players who advised stations on what to air during "Sweeps Week"
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From page 70... ...
It counts among its members most of the print journalists who cover environmental news regularly, and it offers serious continuing education in environmental journalism. A counterpart in the broadcast community is the Radio and Television News Directors Foundation in Washington, DC, which has as its members about 750 local television and radio station editors who cover environment in particular.
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