Environmental Health Perspectives articles from October 2003

Environmental Health Perspectives archives from October 2003

Obesity in the 21st century.(Editorial)
October 1, 2003... The United States is in the midst of an epidemic of obesity. Children and adults alike are increasing in girth at rapid rates. In the past four decades, the prevalence of childhood overweight, characterized by a body mass index greater than the...

Preformed biomarkers in produce inflate human organophosphate exposure assessments.(Correspondence)
October 1, 2003... We read the recent report by Curl et al. (2003) concerning organophosphate (OP) pesticide exposures with considerable interest. It seems to have escaped their notice that OP pesticides yield the same dialkylphosphate (DAP) products in urine...

Pesticide exposures and children's risk tradeoffs.(Correspondence)
October 1, 2003... Evidence available thus far does not support the conclusion by Curl et al. (2003) that parents' choice of organic produce reduces children's risks. Choosing organic produce simply changes children's risks. In their article, "Organophosphate...

Organophosphate exposure: "response to Krieger et al. and Charnley.(Correspondence)
October 1, 2003... Our recent study of children's dietary exposure to organophosphorus (OP) pesticides (Curl et al. 2003) has elicited two very different responses from readers. In that paper we demonstrated a 6-fold difference in median dialkylphosphate (DAP)...

Corn and corn-derived products: sources of endocrine disruptors.(Perspectives: Correspondence)
October 1, 2003... Markaverich et. al (2002a, 2002b) recently reported the recovery of a mitogen from corn that disrupts sexual behavior and completely blocks estrous cyclicity in rats at 0.32 mg/kg/day. The agent is a tetrahydrofuran diol (THF-diol) that also...

Economics of enforcement.(Lead)
October 1, 2003... As one of its 467 objectives for improving the health status of Americans by the end of the decade, Healthy People 2010 calls for total elimination of elevated blood lead in children. That goal may be hard to achieve as long as thousands of...

Autism research made to order.(Genetic Research)
October 1, 2003... Over the past decade, many studies have suggested that the genetic risk for autism is related to several genes, but identification of a known autism susceptibility gene has eluded scientists. Now, using a new statistical method known as...

Framework convention gains ground.(The Beat)
October 1, 2003... On 16 June 2003, the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) was opened for signing. Within two months, 47 countries and the European Community had signed, indicating a good faith commitment to ratify the convention (so far, Norway...

ETS Reduces vitamin c in kids.(The Beat)
October 1, 2003... Researchers at the University of Puerto Rico have shown that even very low exposure to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) can significantly reduce concentrations of ascorbate (a form of the antioxidant vitamin C) in children. Compared to...

Pediatric Environmental Health primer.(The Beat)
October 1, 2003... In November 2003 the American Academy of Pediatrics will release the second edition of its Handbook of Pediatric Environmental Health, edited by Ruth Etzel. The handbook is geared toward helping clinicians identify, prevent, and treat childhood...

Green spaces raise chances of success.(Children's Health)
October 1, 2003... Trees and grass in urban settings are known to help mitigate some of the detrimental effects of the built environment, including poor air quality, noise pollution, and heat buildup. Now research by environmental psychologists from the...

How safe are swimming pools?(Asthma)
October 1, 2003... Breathing large doses of chlorine-based disinfectants is known to cause lung damage, but what about smaller levels, such as the 0.02-0.2 parts per million in the air surrounding indoor pools? According to a report in the June 2003 issue of...

Partnership for children's health and the environment.(ehpnet)
October 1, 2003... Compared to adults, children are disproportionately and uniquely vulnerable to environmental toxicants, a reality that the children's environmental health movement has sought to bring to the attention of policy makers and government agencies...

Labeling lindane.(The Beat)
October 1, 2003... Each year in the United States, up to 1 million prescriptions are written for lindane lotion and shampoo to treat lice and scabies, mostly in school-age children. To help consumers avoid adverse reactions associated with lindane, which include...

Leaded gas out of Africa.(The Beat)
October 1, 2003... In one of the first tangible results of the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development, countries across Africa are working to eliminate leaded gasoline from their markets by joining the UNEP-sponsored Partnership for Clean Fuels and Vehicles...

Safer school buses.(The Beat)
October 1, 2003... The EPA's Clean School Bus USA program aims to reduce diesel exhaust exposure for the 24 million U.S. children who ride school buses and help school bus fleets meet stringent engine standards that take effect in 2007. The program, launched in...

New arrival: CERHR monograph series on reproductive toxicants.(NIEHS News)
October 1, 2003... The sheer number of environmental chemicals known or suspected to be reproductive toxicants--from the ingredients in paints and organic solvents to lead, pesticides, plastics, tobacco smoke, alcohol, and even hair treatments--can puzzle,...

NIEHS fights fat.(NIEHS News)
October 1, 2003... Obesity is an enormous public health threat for Americans of all ages, but is an especially serious problem for children and minorities. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently estimated that 15% of all children and 25% of black...

Environmental tobacco smoke increases school absenteeism.(Headliners)
October 1, 2003... Gilliland FD, Berhane K, Islam T, Wenten M, Rappaport E, Avol E, Gauderman W J, McConnell R, Peters JM. 2003. Environmental tobacco smoke and absenteeism related to respiratory illness in schoolchildren. Am J Epidemiol 157:861-869. ...

Obesity a weighty issue for children.(Focus)(Cover Story)
October 1, 2003... Oh, to be a child in America: Morning cartoons with a breakfast of sugar-coated cereal, hours on the sofa munching chips and playing video games, matinee movies enjoyed with mega-sized servings of soda and popcorn, frozen dinners followed by...

Adjusting for youth: updated cancer risk guidelines.(Spheres of Influence)
October 1, 2003... For several decades, scientists have gathered evidence suggesting that young children are more sensitive to the cancer-causing effects of some chemicals than adults. Now the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has taken the unprecedented...

Dedicated outdoor air systems: Rx for sick buildings.(Innovations)
October 1, 2003... It's been 27 years since bacteria spread by a hotel air-conditioning system sickened 221 people and killed 34 at an American Legion convention in Philadelphia, sounding a wake-up call to the American public about the link between indoor air...

A threat to teen workers: disinfectants and occupational illness.(Science Selections)
October 1, 2003... Three out of four U.S. adolescents work at some time during their junior and senior years of high school. Youth workplace injury and illness may be underreported because the majority of teen employees work part-time, even during the summer;...

Pesticides in pregnant women: some cumulative exposures exceed safe levels.(Science Selections)
October 1, 2003... Following passage of the 1996 Food Quality Protection Act, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) created new guidelines for assessing risks associated with pesticide exposure. In contrast to earlier risk assessment methodologies, the...

Livestock drugs infiltrate dust: another hazard for farmers.(Science Selections)
October 1, 2003... Recent research has investigated how human and veterinary drugs enter the environment at subtherapeutic concentrations and what the downstream effects of this contamination may be. Now German researchers led by Gerd Hamscher of the Hannover...

Metabolic profiling: application to toxicology and risk reduction.(NIEHS Extramural Update)
October 1, 2003... The NIEHS, with the NIH Office of Rare Diseases, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Paradigm Genetics, and Waters Corporation, cosponsored an international conference tided Metabolic Profiling: Application to Toxicology and Risk Reduction....

Gene-environment interaction in neurodegenerative disease. (Fellowships, Grants, & Awards.
October 1, 2003... There is provocative evidence that environmental exposures to certain neurotoxicants (heavy metals, pesticides, fungicides) may play a role in the development of neurodegenerative movement disorders such as Parkinson disease (PD) and...

International bioethics education and career development award. (Fellowships, Grants, & Awards.
October 1, 2003... The Fogarty International Center (FIC), in partnership with the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM), the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), the...

Calendar.(Announcements)(Calendar)
October 1, 2003... 2003 November 1-8 November, Sat-Sat. International Scientific Conference on Water-Related Diseases. Abuja, Nigeria. Information: International Scientific Conference on Water-Related Diseases, Howard University, Mail Service Center,...

Child Health and the Environment.
October 1, 2003... By Donald T. Wigle Oxford:Oxford University Press, 2003. 396 pp. ISBN: 0-19-513559-8, $55 cloth. It is amazing how many books are now available for the new field of pediatric environmental health. For health practitioners, the American...

New books.(Announcements)
October 1, 2003... Conflicts in International Environmental Law R. Wolfrum, N. Matz Heidelberg, Germany:Springer-Verlag, 2003. 213 pp. ISBN: 3-540-40520-8, $73 Cytotoxic Cells: Recognition, Effector Function, Generation, and Methods M. V....

Embracing the local: enriching scientific research, education, and outreach on the Texas-Mexico border through a participatory action research partnership.(Commentary)
October 1, 2003... Cameron Park, Texas, is a colonia (an isolated, unincorporated rural settlement without municipal improvements) on the Texas--Mexico border in the Lower Rio Grande Valley, in Cameron County near Brownsville, Texas. Cameron Park has a population...

Risk management and precaution: insights on the cautious use of evidence.(Commentary)
October 1, 2003... Risk management, done well, should be inherently precautionary. Adopting an appropriate degree of precaution with respect to feared health and environmental hazards is fundamental to risk management. The real problem is in deciding how...

Historical pesticide exposure in California using pesticide use reports and land-use surveys: an assessment of misclassification error and bias.(Research)
October 1, 2003... We used California's Pesticide Use Report (PUR) and land-use survey data to conduct a simulation study evaluating the potential consequences of misclassifying residential exposure from proximity to agricultural pesticide application in health...

Antibiotics in dust originating from a pig-fattening farm: a new source of health hazard for farmers?(Research)
October 1, 2003... Pig-house dust originates from feed, bedding, feces, and the animals themselves. If the animals receive drugs such as antibiotics, residues of these substances may occur in manure, in the air, or on surfaces of the respective animal house. In a...

Measurement of brevetoxin levels by radioimmunoassay of blood collection cards after acute, long-term, and low-dose exposure in mice.(Research)
October 1, 2003... We developed a radioimmunoassay (RIA) using a sheep anti-brevetoxin antiserum to evaluate detection of brevetoxin on blood collection cards from mice treated with the brevetoxin congener PbTx-3. The RIA has high affinity for PbTx-3...

Short-term exposure of chinook salmon (Oncoryhnchus tshawytscha) to o,p'-DDE or DMSO during early life-history stages causes long-term humoral immunosuppression.(Research)
October 1, 2003... We evaluated the effect of short-term exposures to a xenobiotic chemical during early life-history stages on the long-term immune competence of chinook salmon (Oncoryhnchus tshawytscha). Immersion of chinook salmon eggs in a nominal...

Age- and sex-dependent distribution of persistent organochlorine pollutants in urban foxes.(Research)
October 1, 2003... The colonization of urban and suburban habitats by red foxes (Vulpes vulpes) provides a novel sentinel species to monitor the spread of anthropogenic pollutants in densely populated human settlements. Here, red foxes were collected in the...

Associations of renal function with polymorphisms in the [delta]-aminolevulinic acid dehydratase, vitamin D receptor, and nitric oxide synthase genes in Korean lead workers.(Environmental Medicine)
October 1, 2003... We analyzed data from 798 lead workers to determine whether polymorphisms in the genes encoding [delta]-aminolevulinic acid dehydratase (ALAD), endothelial nitric oxide synthase (eNOS), and the vitamin D receptor (VDR) were associated with or...

Hearing loss in workers exposed to carbon disulfide and noise.(Environmental Medicine)
October 1, 2003... Simultaneous exposure to carbon disulfide and noise may have a combined effect on hearing impairment. In this study we investigated hearing loss in 131 men with exposure to noise [80-91 A-weighted decibels; dB(A)] and [CS.sub.2] (1.6-20.1 ppm)...

Measurement of offline exhaled nitric oxide in a study of community exposure to air pollution.(Environmental Medicine)
October 1, 2003... As part of a large panel study in Seattle, Washington, we measured levels of exhaled nitric oxide (eNO) in children's homes and fixed-site particulate matter with aerodynamic diameters of 2.5 [micro]m or less ([PM.sub.2.5]) outside and inside...

Comparable measures of cognitive function in human infants and laboratory animals to identify environmental health risks to children.(Review)
October 1, 2003... The importance of including neurodevelopmental end points in environmental studies is clear. A validated measure of cognitive function in human infants that also has a homologous or parallel test in laboratory animal studies will provide a...

Cumulative organophosphate pesticide exposure and risk assessment among pregnant women living in an agricultural community: a case study from the CHAMACOS cohort.(Children's Health)
October 1, 2003... Approximately 230,000 kg of organophosphate (OP) pesticides are applied annually in California's Salinas Valley. These activities have raised concerns about exposures to area residents. We collected three spot urine samples from pregnant women...

Integrated pest management in an urban community: a successful partnership for prevention.(Children's Health)
October 1, 2003... Pesticides, applied in large quantities in urban communities to control cockroaches, pose potential threats to health, especially to children, who have proportionately greater exposures and unique, developmentally determined vulnerabilities,...

Acute occupational disinfectant-related illness among youth, 1993-1998.(Children's Health)
October 1, 2003... Working youths face many safety and health risks. Among these risks are those posed by disinfectant exposures. In this study we describe acute occupational disinfectant-related illness among youth. Data on U.S. children younger than 18 years...

Time trends of persistent organic pollutants and heavy metals in umbilical cord blood of Inuit infants born in Nunavik (Quebec, Canada) between 1994 and 2001.(Children's Health)
October 1, 2003... Inuit inhabitants of Nunavik (northern Quebec, Canada) consume great quantities of marine food and are therefore exposed to high doses of food chain contaminants. In this study, we report the time trends of persistent organic pollutants,...

Vitamin D receptor Fok1 polymorphism and blood lead concentration in children.(Children's Health)
October 1, 2003... Variation in blood lead concentration is caused by a complex interaction of environmental, social, nutritional, and genetic factors. We evaluated the association between blood lead concentration and a vitamin D receptor (VDR) gene polymorphism....

Prenatal PCB exposure, the corpus callosum, and response inhibition.(Children's Health)
October 1, 2003... The present study reports the association between prenatal exposure to polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), the corpus callosum, and response inhibition in children who are 4.5 years old. Children (n = 189) enrolled in the Oswego study were tested...

Assessing the effects of endocrine disruptors in the National Children's Study.(Endocrine disruptors: mini-monograph)
October 1, 2003... Children are uniquely vulnerable to toxic chemicals in the environment. Among the environmental toxicants to which children are at risk of exposure are endocrine disruptors (EDs)--chemicals that have the capacity to interfere with hormonal...

Exposure assessment for endocrine disruptors: some considerations in the design of studies.(Endocrine disruptors: mini-monograph)
October 1, 2003... In studies designed to evaluate exposure--response relationships in children's development from conception through puberty, multiple factors that affect the generation of meaningful exposure metrics must be considered. These factors include...

An approach to assessment of endocrine disruption in the National Children's Study.(Endocrine disruptors: mini-monograph)
October 1, 2003... In this article we consider the importance of assessing endocrine disruption in a large new cohort that has been proposed, the National Children's Study (NCS). We briefly review evidence that endocrine disruption is a potentially important...