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Scientific Data and Methods
The Office of Children's Health Protection (OCHP) has been working with others both inside and outside the Environmental Protection Agency to improve the scientific understanding of children's environmental health concerns. Some scientific data and methods project are as follows:
Toxicity and Exposure Assessment for Children's Health (TEACH)
Toxicity and Exposure Assessment for Children's Health (TEACH) is an EPA project that seeks to complement existing information on health risks to children from exposure to chemicals in the environment. TEACH will serve as a resource by consolidating children's health information from the scientific literature and improving access to that information through an interactive Web site. The TEACH Web site has two main components - a searchable database and Chemical Summary Forms.
These components are used to:
- compile and summarize publications from the literature on early life and childhood exposure and health effects from selected chemicals; and
- condense key findings from the scientific publications into a searchable format.
Risk Assessment
- Risk Assessment Portal
EPA has developed a new Web site that provides basic information about environmental risk assessments to the public. The site also offers links to key EPA tools, guidance, and guidelines used by scientists to help them develop risk assessments.
- Publication:
A Framework for Assessing Health Risks of Environmental
Exposures to Children (Final)
The framework identifies existing guidance, guidelines and policy papers that relate to children's health risk assessment. It emphasizes the importance of an iterative approach between hazard, dose response, and exposure analyses. In addition, it includes discussion of principles for weight of evidence consideration across life stages.
- Publication:
Child-Specific Exposure Factors Handbook (Final Report)
The Child-Specific Exposure Factors Handbook (EPA/600/R-06/096F) is an update of the Child-Specific Exposure Factors Handbook 2002 interim final. This final version reflects EPA's recommended set of childhood age groups identified in its recent Guidance on Selecting Age Groups for Monitoring and Assessing Childhood Exposures to Environmental Contaminants.
The Handbook provides a summary of statistical data on various exposure factors used in assessing children's exposures, including: drinking water consumption; soil ingestion and mouthing behavior; inhalation rates; dermal factors including skin surface area and soil adherence factors; consumption of retail and home-grown foods; breast milk intake; and activity pattern data.
Indicators
OCHP is working in the US and internationally to track trends, or "indicators," in children's environmental health. Specifically, OCHP is working to identify measures that can be tracked to better understand the potential impacts of the environment on children's health and, ultimately, to identify and evaluate ways to minimize these impacts.
Children's environmental health indicators can be effective tools for understanding children's environmental health in specific geographic areas. These indicators can be used to monitor environmental trends in order to identify risks to children's health, to measure progress towards stated goals, and to target actions where they are most needed. In addition, they can help raise awareness of children’s environmental health and inform policy making. Learn more about what OCHP and EPA are doing to help track indicators of children's environmental health and view recent publications on the topic.
Research
- The EPA and the National Institute of Environmental Health
Sciences have
established 14 Centers for Children's
Environmental Health and Disease
Prevention
Research dedicated solely to the study of
children's
environmental
health
hazards. These unique centers perform targeted
research
in children's environmental health and translate their scientific
findings into
intervention and prevention strategies by working with communities.
The first eight centers were established in 1998 to study the effects of environmental factors, such as pesticides and air pollution, on childhood asthma and children's growth and development. Four more Centers were established in 2001 to study the basis of neurodevelopmental and behavioral disorders such as autism. Additional Centers were established in 2004 and 2007 to investigate how exposure to mixtures of chemicals affects children's health. Each Center fosters community participation in one or more studies.
The EPA National Center for Environmental Research also supports extramural research grants and contracts on topics related to children's environmental health.
- The National
Children's
Study has been proposed and developed through
the
cooperation of the Environmental Protection Agency, the National
Institute of
Child Health
and Development, the National Institute of Environmental
Health
Sciences, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The
National
Children's
Study will
examine the effects of environmental
influences
on the
health and development of more than 100,000 children across the
United States,
following them from before birth until age 21. The goal of the
study is to
improve the health and well-being of
children. Endorsement of the National Children's Study (then called the
Children's
Longitudinal Cohort Study) was passed by the U.S. Congress and
signed into law
on October 17, 2000 as a part of the Children's Health Bill of
2000 (Public Law
106-310).
Around the world, several large infant/child prospective studies have been launched to examine environmental and biological determinants of common diseases. A workshop in September 2005 established the International Childhood Cancer Cohort Consortium (I4C) – a global alliance of longitudinal studies of children to enable investigations of the role of various environmental exposures in the etiology of childhood cancer. Because of its longitudinal design and large sample size, it will be easier to see associations considered statistically meaningful. Initially, this effort may provide valuable insights about he causes of childhood leukemia, and later may be helpful for studying other types of cancer as well as other rare childhood diseases.
On January 25, 2007, "Cohort Profile: The International Childhood Cancer Cohort Consortium (I4C)
" was published in the International Journal
of Epidemiology. The article discusses the formation of the I4C, its
purpose, what it covers, its sample size, and major areas of research. Learn
more about I4C by visiting the
National Children's Study Web site .
- In April of
2004, the American Academy
of
Pediatrics' Center for Child Health
Research published a supplement to the Journal
Pediatrics – The
Vulnerability, Sensitivity, and Resiliency of
the
Developing Embryo, Infant, Child, and Adolescent to the Effects of
Environmental Chemicals, Drugs, and Physical Agents as Compared to
Adults . The
supplement contains articles addressing the vulnerability and
sensitivity of
the developing embryo, infant, child and adolescent to the effects
of
environmental chemicals, drugs, and physical agents, including the
importance
of the stage of development and the magnitude of the exposure. EPA
provided
support for the Supplement.
- In October 2000 EPA released the Strategy for Research on Environmental Risks to Children. The strategy provides a framework for research needs and priorities to guide programs over the next five to 10 years. The Strategy for Research on Environmental Risks to Children includes a stable, long-term, core program of research in hazard identification, dose-response assessment, exposure assessment, and risk management, as well as problem-oriented research that addresses current critical needs identified by EPA Program Offices and Regions.
Exposure
- On February 8, 2006, EPA announced the release of
the final document, "Guidance on
Selecting Groups for Monitoring and Assessing Childhood Exposures
to
Environmental
Contaminants
(2005)."
This
document
provides
guidance to
EPA
scientists on selecting age
groups to consider when assessing childhood
exposure and potential dose to environmental contaminants.
- The National
Health
and Nutrition
Examination
Study (NHANES) has
published
the
National
Report
on
Human
Exposures
to
Environmental
Chemicals. This
study used biomonitoring to assess
human
exposures to
a set of 116 environmental pollutants. (Biomonitoring is
the
assessment
of human
exposure by measuring the chemicals or their
metabolites
in
human specimens,
such as
blood or
urine.)
This study
included
exposures to
children as
well
as adults. The study is becoming an annual survey,
so that in
the future it will be possible to determine how environmental
exposures are
changing
over
time.
- EPA hosted
a national
"Workshop
to Identify Critical
Windows of
Exposure for Children's Health" in September 1999. The workshop
considered the importance of the timing of exposure to toxic
chemicals, and how
time of exposure affects the observed outcomes. Such information is
valuable
in determining when children may be the most susceptible to the
effects
of
toxic
chemicals
in
the
environment.
The
workshop
addressed
effects to
the
respiratory, immune, reproductive, nervous, cardiovascular, and
endocrine
systems, as well as general growth and
cancer. The
conclusions
of
the
workshop
were published in the June 2000
supplement to the
journal Environmental Health Perspectives.
- The EPA held a peer-involvement workshop in July 2000 on considering developmental changes in behavior and anatomy when assessing exposure to children. The workshop addressed defining and characterizing the important facets of child development and how to best estimate childhood exposures given the limitations in existing exposure information. The results of the workshop may help to define a minimum set of early life stages that EPA would consistently utilize in its exposure and risk assessments. The Summary Report of the Technical Workshop on Issues Associated with Considering Developmental Changes in Behavior and Anatomy when Assessing Exposure to Children is available as an EPA Risk Assessment Forum publication.
Cancer
- EPA has completed Guidelines for Carcinogenic Risk Assessment and Supplemental Guidance for Assessing Cancer Susceptibility Resulting from Early-Life Exposure to Carcinogens. The Supplemental Guidance contains an analysis of studies and a possible approach for how quantitative scientific data could inform risk assessments when exposure to carcinogens occurs during childhood is considered.
- EPA hosted the first-ever national conference on "Preventable Causes of Childhood Cancer" in September 1997. Approximately 300 scientists, government officials, representatives of advocacy organizations and other members of the public participated. Health experts presented their perspectives on a broad range of issues including the special vulnerability of children to environmental toxicants, studies on the role of parental occupational exposures, trends in childhood cancer, and methods used to study environmental factors in childhood cancer. A detailed research agenda and the scientific presentations from the conference were published in the June 1998 supplement of the journal Environmental Health Perspectives. This research agenda is intended to provide a blueprint for closing gaps in knowledge, and thus for guiding prevention of childhood cancer.
Ethics
- In October 2006, Environmental
Health Perspectives published the mini-monograph “Ethics in Children's
Environmental Health Research,” based on a papers submitted to a symposium
hosted by the Children
's Environmental Health Network.
- Ethical Considerations for Research on Housing-Related Health
Hazards
Involving Children, a study published by the National Academy of Sciences
and funded by the
U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the
Environmental Protection Agency and the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention, explores the ethical issues posed when conducting research designed
to identify, understand, or ameliorate housing-related health hazards among
children. View a four-page Report
Brief (PDF) on the study
from
September
2005.
Other
- OCHP sponsors projects that result in papers, reports, and studies on children's environmental health. View the papers, reports, and studies, listed in chronological order from the most recent.
- The Office
of Children's Health
Protection
is a participant
in
the
World
Health Organization's (WHO) Task
Force
for the Protection of Children's Environmental Health .
The Task Force's current and proposed
activities include:
developing a
manual
on children's
environmental
health;
preparing
a plan
of
action
for
countries; providing advice on
specific threats;
preparing and disseminating training materials; and promoting research
on
emerging issues. Working with the WHO is a valuable activity
for
promoting
children's
environmental
health
science, since the
scientific basis
to
protect
children's
environmental health is
developed and needed around
the
globe.
The World Health Organization sponsored the International Conference on Environmental Threats to the Health of Children: Hazards and Vulnerability
on March
3-7,
2002 in Bangkok,
Thailand.
The
objectives of this conference were to address new scientific data
and research
on children's vulnerability; discuss how to improve the current
health
conditions
of children; increase awareness in the health, education,
and
environmental sectors; and promote action on the protection on
children's
environmental health around the world.
- The
European Environment Agency
and
the WHO Regional Office for
Europe
have jointly developed the report Children's
Health and Environment: A Review of Evidence
. This publication provides an overview of
the
available evidence of the relationship between the physical
environment and
children's health. It identifies both research needs and policy
priorities to
protect children's health
from environmental hazards.
- In December 2000 EPA announced the Voluntary Children's
Chemical
Evaluation Program (VCCEP), which is designed to provide data
that will
enable the public to understand the potential health risks to
children
associated with certain chemical exposures. The pilot phase of VCCEP
is
currently
underway,
and
volunteers from the
chemical industry have
sponsored 20
of the 23 chemicals listed for consideration in the pilot. The
initial phase
of the pilot (tier 1) is in progress for the sponsored
chemicals.