Environmental Health Information on Children

Considering all the risks they face, it is surprising that children grow up. Have you ever seen the green stuff a nursery school kid produces when his or her entire class has a cold? Ugh!

Besides being at risk from their cold-carrying playmates, kids are at risk because they've got some ugly habits, like putting things in their mouths, or putting them on fingers, toes and toys, or eating food off the floor, the arm of your TV lounge chair, the toe of your shoe or the cat. Did you ever notice that the real young ones really don't care when they eat sand from the sandbox the cat peed in? Bwaukkk!

Kids are at risk for another reason: they're exposed to more nasty stuff than adults are. You think they're just little people. After all, they're not too tall and you buy them really small clothes. But you're just fooling yourself if you think they don't have a big environmental health problem!

Children are exposed to more bad stuff than adults are partly because they're closer to the ground and because they put all kinds of yukky stuff in their mouths. It turns out that "pound for pound of body weight, children breathe more air, drink more water and eat more food than adults," according to The EPA Children's Environmental Health Yearbook Executive Summary. Yup. The little devils are gulping down more of whatever bad stuff is in the food, water and air than you do. EPA says that all the nasty stuff can have a greater and longer lasting effect on their little developing systems than on adults. The way I figure it, adults have already ruined themselves with all their bad eating, drinking, driving (and for some, smoking) habits.

EPA's Children's Environmental Health Yearbook covers asthma and other respiratory matters, childhood cancer, developmental and neurological toxicity, health effects of pesticides, and potential risk from contaminated surface and ground water.

Did you know that asthma is the leading chronic illness of U.S. children? People who suffer from asthma can't breath well because the airways in their lungs have narrowed. For those with extreme narrowing, asthma can restrict their activities. EPA has a stake in the asthma problem because of its interest in indoor and outdoor air quality. EPA, you may remember, is behind the regulations that govern industrial air pollution, ground-level ozone, particulate matter and toxic substances.

In 1992, childhood cancer was the fourth leading cause of death for the under 15 set in the United States. Some of the toxic substances in the environment are believed to be responsible for some of these deaths. The list of suspicious substances includes radon, tobacco smoke, asbestos, ultraviolet light, and some pesticides and hazardous wastes.

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