Center for Disease Control Essay ⋆ Environment Essay Examples ⋆ EssayEmpire

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The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), located in Atlanta, Georgia, is one of the 13 major operating components of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the primary U.S. government agency for protecting the health and safety of all Americans. The CDC strives to objectively measure and inform the U.S. public, Congress, partners, and stakeholders about the state of the public’s health. Since it was founded in 1946 to help control malaria, the CDC has remained at the forefront of public health efforts to prevent and control infectious and chronic diseases, injuries, workplace hazards, disabilities, and environmental health threats. According to the CDC, it is globally recognized for conducting research and investigations to improve people’s daily lives and respond to 21st century health emergencies such as emerging infectious diseases (such as SARS, monkeypox, and pandemic influenza); terrorism; environmental threats (such as hurricanes, wildfires, and toxic chemical spills); and lifestyle choices (such as tobacco use, poor nutrition, and lack of physical fitness).

The component of the CDC that works to prevent illness, disability, and death from interactions between people and the environment is the National Center for Environmental Health (NCEH). The NCEH is especially committed to safeguarding the health of populations that are particularly vulnerable to certain environmental hazards, such as children, the elderly, and people with disabilities. According to the NCEH, its main activities include public health surveillance, applied research, epidemiologic studies, laboratory and statistical analyses, behavioral interventions, operations and systems research, communication and education, standards, and training and technical assistance for officials of state and local health agencies in preventing and responding to public health challenges.

For the past three decades, the NCEH has provided an ongoing assessment of the U.S. population’s exposure to environmental chemicals using biomonitoring. NCEH scientists have been determining which environmental chemicals enter people’s bodies, how much of these chemicals are present, and how the amounts of these chemicals may be related to health. Chemicals or their metabolites were measured in the blood and urine of a random sample of National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) participants, aged 6-59 years.

the level of the original chemical of concern. Participants were selected within the specified age ranges to be a representative sample of the U.S. population with respect to gender and race/ethnicity. The environmental chemicals currently being measured by NCEH reflect people’s exposures to metals, tobacco smoke, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins and dibenzofurans, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), phthalates, phytoestrogens, pesticides, herbicides, and insecticides.

One example of how NCEH’s biomonitoring surveillance data serves as a powerful public health tool involves the levels of lead measured in blood before and after the United States began its phase-out of lead in gasoline in 1975. Although the human exposure data collected during the 1976-91 time-frame demonstrated a substantial decline in blood lead levels of the entire U.S. population, certain socio-demographic factors continued to be associated with higher blood lead levels, including younger age, male gender, non-Hispanic black race/ethnicity, and low income level. These data were especially critical due to the neurodevelopmental effects associated with low-level environmental exposure to lead and spurred scientists to scrutinize the environment for other sources of lead exposure.

Bibliography:

Jackson, “Will Biomonitoring Change How We Regulate Toxic Chemicals?” J. Law Med. Ethics (v.30/3, 2002);
J. L. Pirkle, et al., “The Decline in Blood Lead Levels in the United States: The National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES),” JAMA (v.272/4, 1994).