NCEH Kids' Page

Welcome to the National Center for Environmental Health!
Our work is to figure out how your environment affects your health.
Most people think of nature when they think of the environment, but here,
we use "environment" to mean anywhere you live, work, learn, and play.

We are like detectives who try to solve mysteries. We start by looking for clues. We study the evidence. We talk to eyewitnesses. We check the suspect's record and use maps to follow the trail of evidence. Sometimes there's danger too.

We learn things in bits and pieces, and we put them together like a jigsaw puzzle. Each piece is important to the whole picture, so we can help improve the health of you, your family, your friends, and your neighbors. This booklet will tell you about some of the different puzzle pieces that we're trying to put together. The puzzle that we are trying to solve is how to keep people healthy in a healthy environment.

A note to parents and teachers: The NCEH Kids' Page has been created especially for children. We hope that you will use it to initiate dialogue about environmental health issues with your children/students. All of the topics discussed here are also covered in more depth on NCEH's general Web site, which can be found at www.cdc.gov/nceh.

This Web site is based on Take Your Children to Work Day, a booklet that NCEH created
in 1999 for its employees' children to describe the important work their parents do to
promote health and quality of life.

Special thanks to Joey Johnson for her fabulous original artwork!