(Washington, DC) – Representative Nancy Pelosi today joined the Pew Environmental Health Commission (PEHC) in calling on the new administration to make public health and disease prevention major priorities, especially for conditions linked to environmental factors.
Pelosi stated, "Preventing disease is a major responsibility of our country’s public health system, one that needs to be expanded to include preventing illnesses that may be linked to environmental hazards. Increased monitoring and tracking of diseases and environmental exposures is needed to improve the health of all Americans."
The report released today by the PEHC calls on President-elect Bush and Congress to work together to create a Nationwide Health Tracking Network that would identify and track environmental hazards to public health and the incidence of such chronic diseases as asthma, cancer and various forms of birth defects.
As a member of the House Labor-Health and Human Services-Education Appropriations Subcommittee, Congresswoman Pelosi has worked successfully to increase funding for the nation’s environmental health labs. "The Commission’s proposal to establish a health tracking network has the potential to drastically reduce the billions of dollars currently spent to treat chronic diseases by providing new information to help prevent many of these diseases," added Pelosi.