NCEH in Partnership with Connecticut
The National Center for Environmental Health (NCEH) is part of the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). NCEH’s work
focuses on three program areas: identifying environmental hazards,
measuring exposure to environmental chemicals, and preventing
health effects that result from environmental hazards. NCEH has
approximately 450 employees and a budget for 2004 of approximately
$189 million; its mission is to promote health and quality of life
by preventing or controlling diseases and deaths that result from
interactions between people and their environment.
NCEH and partners in Connecticut collaborate on a variety
of environmental health projects throughout the state. In
fiscal years 2001–2004, NCEH awarded more than $4 million
in direct funds and services to Connecticut for various projects.
These projects include activities related to national
environmental public health tracking, biomonitoring, and childhood
lead poisoning prevention. In addition, Connecticut benefits from
national-level prevention and response activities conducted by
NCEH or NCEH-funded partners.
Identifying Environmental Hazards
NCEH identifies, investigates, and tracks environmental hazards
and their effects on people’s health. Following are examples of
such activities that NCEH conducted or supported in Connecticut.
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Addressing Asthma from a Public
Health Perspective—NCEH is funding the Connecticut
Department of Public Health (CT DPH) to develop
asthma-control plans that include disease tracking,
science-based interventions, and statewide partnerships to
reduce the burden of asthma in home, school, and occupational
environments. Funding began in fiscal year 2000 and continues
through fiscal year 2004.
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National Environmental Public
Health Tracking Program: Planning and Capacity-Building—NCEH
is funding CT DPH to develop a comprehensive plan for a
coordinated and integrated environmental public health tracking
network (EPHTN). EPHTN will link reporting of health-effects
data with human exposure and environmental data. The
Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection (CT DEP)
will partner with CT DPH to develop this program. CT DEP and CT
DPH have several surveillance systems and databases that will be
explored for linkage opportunities. The planning process will
include a more complete inventory and summary of databases and
information streams. Funding began in fiscal year 2001 and ends
in fiscal year 2005.
Measuring Exposure to Environmental
Chemicals
NCEH measures environmental chemicals in people to determine how
to protect people and improve their health. Following are examples
of such activities that NCEH conducted or supported in
Connecticut.
Funding
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Antiterrorism Funding to Increase
State Chemical Laboratory Capacity—In fiscal year 2003, CDC
provided more than $1.1 million to Connecticut to help
expand chemical laboratory capacity to prepare for and respond
to chemical-terrorism incidents and other chemical emergencies.
This expansion will allow full participation of
chemical-terrorism response laboratories in the Laboratory
Response Network.
In addition, NCEH funds laboratory development and the purchase
of state-of-the-art equipment in Connecticut’s public health
laboratory to develop a network of chemical laboratories and
transfer technology to measure chemical agents.
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Biomonitoring Grants—In
fiscal years 2001 and 2002, NCEH awarded planning grants to
Connecticut to develop an implementation plan for a state
biomonitoring program. In this way, the state could make
decisions about which environmental chemicals within its borders
were of health concern and could make plans for measuring levels
of those chemicals in the Connecticut population.
Services
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Helping State Public Health
Laboratories Respond to Chemical Terrorism—NCEH is working
with Connecticut’s public health laboratory to prepare
state laboratory scientists to measure chemical terrorism agents
or their metabolites in people’s blood or urine. NCEH is
transferring analytic methods for measuring chemical-terrorism
agents (including cyanide-based compounds and other chemicals)
to Connecticut. In addition, NCEH instituted a
proficiency-testing program to measure the compatibility of the
state’s analytic results with results from the NCEH laboratory.
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Newborn Screening Quality
Assurance Program—NCEH provides proficiency-testing services
and dried-blood-spot, quality-control materials to monitor and
help assure the quality of screening program operations for
newborns in Connecticut. The importance of accurate
screening tests for genetic metabolic diseases cannot be
overestimated. Testing of blood spots collected from newborns is
mandated by law in almost every state to promote early
intervention that can prevent mental retardation, severe
illness, and premature death.
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Lipid Standardization Program (LSP)—NCEH
provides a lipid research laboratory in Connecticut with
accuracy-based standardization support for analytic measurement.
This laboratory is involved in one or more ongoing lipid
metabolism longitudinal studies or clinical trials that
investigate risk factors and complications associated with
cardiovascular disease. The LSP, supported by NCEH’s Lipid
Reference Laboratory, provides quarterly analytic performance
challenges and statistical assessment reports that allow program
participants to monitor performance over time and thus ensure
the accuracy and comparability of study results and findings.
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Preventing
Health Effects that Result from Environmental Hazards
NCEH promotes safe environmental public health practices to
minimize exposure to environmental hazards and prevent adverse
health effects. Following are examples of such activities that
NCEH conducted or supported in Connecticut.
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Childhood Lead Poisoning
Prevention Program—The Connecticut Childhood Lead
Poisoning Prevention Program (CT CLPPP) has received NCEH
funding since 1991. In 2001, the program screened 66,333
children for lead poisoning. The number of children under age 6
years with elevated blood lead levels has decreased from 3,000
in 1997 to 1,977 in 2001. These decreases in blood lead levels
are due to state program efforts funded in part by NCEH.
CT CLPPP is using NCEH funds to upgrade its statewide
surveillance system and promote blood lead screening and
follow-up among children receiving Medicaid. Funds are also
being used to increase primary prevention of childhood lead
poisoning to children under 6 years of age and to pregnant
women.
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Environmental Health Specialists
Network (EHS-Net)—EHS-Net is an NCEH-funded cooperative
agreement with eight partner states, including Connecticut.
As part of this program, Connecticut has participated in the
prioritization, development, and implementation of several
research projects including a study of egg-handling practices in
restaurants published in the July 2004 Journal of Food
Protection. Connecticut helped develop a new environmental
outbreak evaluation instrument and participated in a study of
policies and food-handling practices linked to foodborne
outbreaks in restaurants. Several areas were identified in which
further emphasis might reduce egg-associated Salmonella
enterica serotype Enteritidis infections in accordance with
Healthy People 2010 goals.
Connecticut is participating in a beef-handling study and a
hand-hygiene study. These studies help food safety program
managers and policymakers develop, implement, and evaluate
strategies to prevent foodborne disease at the retail level.
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Resources
NCEH develops materials that public health professionals, medical
care providers, emergency responders, decision makers, and the
public can use to identify and track hazards in the environment
that pose a threat to human health and to prevent or mitigate
exposure to those hazards. NCEH’s resources cover a range of
environmental public health issues, including air pollution and
respiratory health (e.g., asthma, carbon monoxide, and mold
issues), biomonitoring to determine whether and how much of
substances in the environment are getting into people, childhood
lead poisoning, emergency preparedness and response for chemicals
and radiation, environmental health services, environmental public
health tracking, international emergency and refugee health,
laboratory sciences as applied to environmental health, radiation
studies, safe chemical weapons disposal, specific health studies,
vessel sanitation, and veterans’ health.
For more information about NCEH programs, activities, and
publications and other resources, contact the NCEH Health Line
toll-free at 1-888-232-6789, e-mail
NCEHinfo@cdc.gov, or visit
the NCEH Web site at
www.cdc.gov/nceh.
September 2004
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