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June 2008 Children's Health News
“Nurturing Mother Earth: Our People’s Destiny” is the title of the 8th National Tribal Conference on Environmental Management which will be held on June 23-27, 2008 in Billings, Montana. This conference is cosponsored by EPA and the Montana/Wyoming Tribal Leaders Council. It is designed to assist Tribal Environmental Professionals, Tribal Administrators, Tribal Health Professionals, and EPA representatives in developing, implementing and evaluating Tribal environmental programs to meet Tribal environmental needs and improve Tribal environmental management capacity. The Conference includes six Workshop Tracks: Waste and Energy: Our Footprints; Water: Nations of the Water People; Climate: The Seasons are Changing; Health and Traditional Lifeways: Walking a Good Path; Law, Policy and Environmental Justice:Going by the Rules and Being Fair; and, Air:Nations of the Winged Ones. For additional information including the Conference Agenda, please visit: http://www.ntcem8.org/.
US Children's Lead Exposures An article entitled US Children's Lead Exposures, 2008: Implications for Prevention has been published in Environmental Health Perspectives on-line. The paper will be published in a future print issue of EHP, a journal published by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. The article reviews the sources of lead in U. S. children’s environments, their contributions to children’s blood lead levels (BLLs), source elimination and control efforts, and existing federal authorities. The context is the U. S. public health goal to eliminate pediatric elevated blood lead levels (EBLs) by 2010.
Help Promote Children’s Health and Protect the Environment! As part of their ongoing efforts to improve children's environmental health, NEEF partnered with the Society for Public Health Education to offer a webinar "Reconnecting Kids with Nature for Health Benefits". The webinar was extremely well received by the 150 participants in the live event and is now available online at http://www.neefusa.org. Free continuing education credit hours are available. Chemical Exposures Webinar The Clinical Directors Network, Inc. (CDN) is hosting a webinar titled “Chemical Exposures - Integrating Environmental and Occupational Health into the Primary Care Setting". For more information go to http://www.cdnetwork.org.
HUD MAKES $1 BILLION IN GRANTS AVAILABLE THROUGH 35 PROGRAMS The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has published its Fiscal Year 2008 "SuperNOFA," an annual funding notice that makes available more than $1 billion in grants through 35 programs. HUD intends to offer an additional $1.5 billion in homeless grants later in the year through a new electronic application process that will significantly streamline funding of thousands of homeless assistance programs nationwide. To make funding opportunities available to the public as soon as possible, HUD is posting its SuperNOFA electronically through www.grants.gov in advance of the Federal Register publication on May 12, 2008. Applicants are strongly encouraged to read funding notices thoroughly and to follow the registration information available in the General Section of the SuperNOFA published in the Federal Register on March 19, 2008. For more view the HUD News Release.
Special Journal on Human Health and Mercury The Journal of Environmental Research (Vol. 107, No. 1, May 2008) has published a special issue on Human Health and Exposure to Mercury, containing selected papers from the Eighth International Conference on Mercury as a Global Pollutant.
Dollars and Sense: Teaching Sun Safety to Children Saves Lives and Money A study analyzing the cost effectiveness of the SunWise Program was published in the May 2008 issue of Pediatrics. The study is unique because few studies to date have analyzed the cost-saving benefits of school-based health programs, and no study, to our knowledge, has analyzed sun safety programs. The primary message of the cost-benefit analysis is that teaching children about sun safety saves lives and money. Additional information is also available at www.epa.gov/sunwise/evaluation.html.
Noise Pollution The Other Environmental Health Issue The EPA’s Office and Air and Radiation is initiating a new NOISE Awareness campaign to alert youth, parents, teachers and health care professional about the adverse affects of noise pollution on human health, particularly children. Studies have shown that there are direct links between noise and health. Problems related to noise include stress related illnesses, high blood pressure, speech interference, hearing loss, sleep disruption, and lost productivity. Noise Induced Hearing Loss (NIHL) is the most common and often discussed health effect, but research has evidenced that exposure to constant or high levels of noise can warrant countless adverse health affects. To learn more, go to www.nonoise.org.
Conference on Policy Analysis in Indian Country A conference on making policy from Traditional Perspectives in Indian Country will be held in Tsaile, Navajo Nation (AZ), June 19-20, 2008. The conference will address issues such as: How do Indigenous people create a policy analysis process based on Indigenous worldviews that sustains supports and preserves traditional values and norms in contemporary policy settings? And, how do Indigenous people create a shared governance policy framework that is also understood by non Indigenous society? For more information contact: mtbenally@dinecollege.edu or visit www.dinecollege.edu/policy.php.
Post-doc with Montana State University (MSU) and Crow Nation Applications are being solicited for a postdoctoral fellowship working with a well-established community-based participatory research project, Messengers for Health on the Apsáalooke Reservation. This fellowship provides an opportunity to spend up to two years engaged in action-based research including a policy-level intervention with the Indian Health Service Crow Service Unit and a community-level intervention in women’s cancer prevention. For more information visit the MSU web site.
Funding Opportunity The U.S Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is seeking applications proposing an observational exposure measurement study to identify and characterize the determinants of exposure for early lifestages (i.e., very young children <3 years of age) to chemicals in their environment. Applications are due July 15, 2008. More information on this unique opportunity.
Scientific and Ethical Approaches for Observational Exposure Studies The EPA report, Scientific and Ethical Approaches for Observational Exposure Studies document (EPA 600/R-08/062), has been completed. The document provides EPA and non-EPA researchers with consolidated and up-to-date information that will further assist them in meeting their goal of conducting observational human exposure studies based on sound science and the highest ethical standards.
