6. Monitoring of Human Exposures
Congress should fund developmental research and monitoring
of human exposures including:
- the use of exposure measures for risk assessment
- documentation of exposures to mixtures of pollutants
- examination of exposure patterns in specific populations
- the impact of both acute and chronic exposure
- the potential for gene-environment interactions.
7. Health Benefits of the Natural Environment
A partnership between health agencies and environmental
agencies should study the health benefits of the natural
environment. Both physical and psychological health benefits
should be addressed.
8. Health Implications of Global Changes and Ecological Trends
The Administration should create programs to study the health
implications of global changes and ecological trends including:
- climate change, to understand trends and adaptive/mitigation
strategies
- links between environment and emerging/reemerging
diseases (i.e., West Nile virus, red tide)
- links between loss of ecosystem integrity and biodiversity
and health impact, including cultural impacts
- links between energy policies and use (e.g. utilities and
transportation) and health.
9. Environmental Impacts on Children
The Administration should continue and expand efforts to
understand and learn how to mitigate environmental impacts
on children including:
- conducting national longitudinal cohort studies
- establishing centers of excellence in children’s environmental
health
- coordinating efforts on asthma, developmental disabilities
and childhood cancer.
10. Environmental Health Disparities
The Administration should develop research initiatives that
are aimed at understanding the role of environmental health
disparities between different racial/ethnic and economic
groups in the U.S. and internationally. Such initiatives would
focus on:
- the impacts in specific groups (e.g. metals and persistent
pollutant exposures to Alaskan natives)
- the development of interventions to prevent those impacts.
11. Environmental Genomics/Proteinomics
The Administration should initiate a federal effort to establish
and coordinate centers for environmental genomics and
proteinomics that would:
- include social and ethical issues as well as genetics, statistics
and information technology
- make all information available online to researchers.
12. Health Impacts of the Built Environment
The Administration should establish a research program
on the health impacts of the built environment, with broad
participation by health, housing, transportation, and environmental
research agencies and non-federal partners that would
address such issues as urban ecology, urban sprawl (land use and
transportation planning), and buildings (homes and institutions,
including green buildings).
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