Academic Organizations
  • Pediatric Environmental Health Specialty Units (PEHSUs) The PEHSU’s provide education and consultation for health professionals, public health professionals and others about children’s environmental health. AOEC coordinates the activities for all of the PEHSUs. Primary funding for the PEHSUs comes from the ATSDR and EPA.
Asthma and Respiratory Health
  • Breathe California – Beginning in 1904, Breathe California has worked to reduce the impact of lung disease through prevention, education, advocacy and patient services.
  • Centers for Disease Control and Prevention – Center for Disease Control’s National Asthma Control Program
  • EPA’s AirNow – EPA’s AirNow Website contains local ambient air quality information and ozone maps.
  • Fresno Asthmatic Children’s Environment Study (FACES) – This website describes the work of UC Berkeley researchers on the health effects of air pollution on children with asthma in the Central Valley. The site links to newsletters and scientific publications detailing their research findings.
  • Tobacco Prevention Toolkit – Theory-based and evidence-informed resources created by educators, parents, and researchers aimed at preventing middle and high school students’ use of tobacco and nicotine.
  • University of California, Kearney Agricultural Research and Extension Center – The site contains information on the latest research demonstrating the effects of ozone air pollution on plants. There is also information specific to the San Joaquin Valley’s air quality and pollution-related games and information for school children.
  • U.S. EPA Asthma Science Notebook – This page uses interactive media including videos, podcasts, interviews, etc. to describe environmental contributions and risk factors for asthma. It also details disparities in asthma prevalence and EPA approaches to reducing population-level risk.
California-Based Children’s Environmental Health and Disease Prevention Research Centers
Chemical Fact Sheets
  • EPA’s Office of Pollution Prevention and Toxics provides Chemical Fact Sheets and technical summary documents. Some of these fact sheets are available through the Internet.
  • ToxFAQs is a series of summaries of hazardous substances being developed by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry Division. Each fact sheet provides answers to frequently asked questions about exposure to substances found around hazardous waste sites and corresponding human health effects.
Climate Change
  • Viviendo Verde: En este espacio podrás encontrar herramientas que te ayudarán a conocer más y a activarte en la protección del medio ambiente y a combatir los efectos nocivos del cambio climático. Ayúdanos a proteger a nuestras familias, a nuestras comunidades y a nuestra Madre Tierra.
  • Climate Change, Health, and Equity: A Guide for Local Health Departments: From the Public Health Institute, this report overviews of climate science, health impacts of climate change and health equity. It discusses what local health departments can do to include climate change and health equity into assessment and surveillance, intersectoral collaboration, community engagement and education, climate and health communications, preparedness and more. This companion U.S. brief,  released by APHA and The Lancet, hones in on the health impacts of climate change in America.
  • Let’s Talk Health and Climate: Webinar, from the Alliance of Nurses for a Healthy Environment, provides nurses with communication tools, such as message framing and tested language, to cultivate an effective voice for building institutional leadership and support for climate solutions in the U.S..
Consumer Resources
  • California Safe Cosmetics Program Product Database: The California Department of Public Health developed a searchable cosmetics database that allows professionals and consumers to access information about specific products, companies, or chemical ingredients, and learn about how chemical exposure can affect health. The information is based on a California cosmetics law requiring companies to report products containing ingredients known or suspected to cause cancer or reproductive harm.
  • Clearya + CDPH’s CSCP Uncover Toxic Fragrance – A new collaboration between Clearya and the California Dept. of Public Health’s California Safe Cosmetics Program (CSCP) makes it easier for online shoppers to see what chemicals of concern are hidden in cosmetics containing “fragrance,” even when those ingredients are excluded from the labels.
  • Environmental Working Group Cosmetics Database: This site contains a searchable database that provides safety ratings for cosmetics, as well as shopping guides for purchasing safer and more environmentally-friendly consumer products.
  • Household Hazards: How Everyday Products Make Us Sick by Paul Blanc: Dr. Blanc is a professor of medicine and holds the endowed chair in Occupational and Environmental Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco. His column on household hazards appears in Psychology Today.
  • U.S. EPA Design for the Environment: Helps consumers, businesses, and institutional buyers identify cleaning and other products that perform well, are cost-effective, and are safer for the environment. They maintain a categorized list of all products that have a DfE label under their Safer Products Labeling Program.
Environmental Justice
General Health
  • Protecting the Health of Children: A National Snapshot of Environmental Health Services: The goals of this study were to 1) determine what services are necessary to protect children, 2) identify if and how well government agencies offer those services to the public and 3) hear from community members and service providers about their experiences. APHA collected feedback from experts to identify 210 environmental health services that should be provided to children across the country. APHA conducted a national scan of state departments of health and environmental quality websites, indicating gaps in services that would be of direct benefit to the health of children.
  • Kids Environment, Kids Health: A resource for kids, parents, and teachers to find fun and educational materials related to health, science, and the environment. Created by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.
  • Save Insects: A child’s website dedicated to engaging children in preserving the habitats of insects and connecting to the natural world.  Her Living Greenways Campaign provides concrete projects that promote habitat conservation. A great example of how even children can be involved in improving our environment.
  • The Children’s Environmental Health Network (CEHN): CEHN is an organization with a strong basis in pediatrics and environmental health science. Their website reviews important new research relevant to pediatric environmental health. Each summary contains the abstract, link to the full text, and an analysis of the policy implications.
  • CDC National Center for Environmental Health: The NCEH homepage houses a comprehensive index of specific environmental hazards, and includes information related to emergency management, health studies, and laboratory investigations on environmental health issues.
  • Harvard University Center on the Developing Child: Seeks to leverage growing scientific knowledge on health, learning, and behavior to explain the early roots of lifelong impairment. The Center is also committed to translating  science to develop innovative programs and science-based policies that promote healthy development and reduce preventable disparities in well-being. The site features publications, videos, and reports on the science of early childhood, interventions, global child development, and foundations of lifelong health.
  • EPA Region 9 Children’s Environmental Health: EPA’s Pacific Southwest Office has a number of programs to address children’s environmental health issues including pesticides, asthma triggers, lead, and mercury. The site contains contact information for EPA Regional Coordinators on children’s environmental health and specific exposures of concern.
  • Chemical-Specific Databases: The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry publishes Toxicological Profiles on chemical substances that summarize the relevant literature on health effects. The National Library of Medicine maintains TOXNET, a searchable database of chemicals and other environmental hazards.
Government Resources
  • Envirofacts contains data from five EPA systems that are used to assist the Agency in monitoring and overseeing compliance with federal regulations. The general public can use this source to obtain information about facilities in their community. The five systems represented are: 1) Aerometric Information Retrieval System Facility Subsystem (which contains air pollution data for about 150,000 regulated facilities), 2) Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Information System (Superfund data on hazardous waste sites), 3) Permit Compliance System (water discharge permit information for over 75,000 facilities), 4) Resource Conservation and Recovery Information System (data used to track handler permit or closure status for over 450,000 facilities and transporters), and 5) Toxic Release Inventory System (data on releases of over 600 toxic chemicals by over 33,000 reporting facilities). Online queries and mapping tools are also available through this site.
  • Minnesota Department of Health has created a web site to improve access to information about children’s environmental health.
  • National Center for Environmental Health is part of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Their site has information and education resources on a broad range of topics, including asthma, birth defects, radiation, sanitation, and lead in blood.
  • National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) has a site for information of public interest concerning human productive health. Included is access to scientific assessments of reproductive health risks associated with human exposures to naturally occurring and man-made chemicals.
  • Superfund Basic Research Program (SBRP) which offers funding support for research on hazardous waste sites and their health effects as well as networking opportunities for researchers and partnering organizations. The NIEHS and the U.S. EPA website for the programs posts research summaries and grant opportunities. You can join a listserve to learn about current research by sending your e-mail address to inhof@niehs.nih.gov.  Research Briefs can be found here.
  • Risk Screening Environmental Indicators is a computer-based (Windows) model that is also available through the EPA to help interpret the information that you find. The model permits screening-level analysis of risk-related impacts of toxic chemical releases and transfers in the U.S.
Lead Resources
Non-Profit Organizations
  • American Lung Association Topics of air quality, chemical hazards in school and workplace settings, and tobacco control are covered in depth on their website with recent statistics available. Materials available (several also offered in Spanish) include: Indoor Air Quality Tools for Schools Action Kit, Protecting Yourself from Air Pollution, Working Safely With Chemicals, How to Read a Material Safety Data Sheet, as well as tobacco material targeted to youth and adults.
  • Bio-Integral Resource (BIRC) offers over 25 years of insight experience, and leadership in the development and communication of least-toxic, environmentally sound, integrated pest management(IPM) methods and policies of urban and agricultural applications.
  • Children’s Environmental Health Network is a national project dedicated to pediatric environmental health. The Network’s mission is to promote a healthy environment and to protect the fetus and the child from environmental hazards.
  • Greater Boston Physicians for Social Responsibility (GBPSR) is a regional affiliate of PSR that focuses on environment and public health issues, specifically in the areas of reproductive and developmental health and the environment. The 140-page GBPSR report In Harm’s Way: Toxic Threats to Child Development can be downloaded free via the GBPSR website, in addition to information on Health Care Without Harm, Generations at Risk, and No Room to Breathe publications, resources, and campaigns.
  • Health Care Without Harm is an international coalition with 425 member organizations in 52 countries representing hospitals, health care professionals, environmental advocates, organizations of health- impacted individuals, religious organizations, student groups, and labor unions. It focuses on encouraging health care institutions to stop using products made with PVC plastic and mercury that release dioxin, mercury and other toxic substances into the environment when they are burned as waste.
  • Healthy Schools Network (HSN) is a nationally recognized, state-based advocate for the protection of children’s environmental health in schools.
  • National Environmental Education Foundation works to promote daily actions for helping people protect and enjoy the environment. In their section on Health and the Environment they have several tools for pediatricians including a tool for taking an environmental history.
  • Organization of Teratology and Information Services maintains pregnancy and environmental hot lines throughout the country to answer questions regarding prenatal exposures. Centers and hot lines can be found on their website.
  • Pediatric Environmental Health History Forms are designed for the primary health care provider to capture most of the common environmental exposures to children. Developed by the National Environmental Education Foundation.
Pesticides
  • Columbia Center for Children’s Environmental Health: The Center has developed downloadable health education materials (available in English and Spanish) that cover topics such as pesticides, indoor air, stress, and BPA.
  • Migrant Clinicians Network: Resources for clinicians including patient education materials, clinical guidelines, research guidelines, and other tools that address a variety of primary care issues. Bilingual patient information is also available on pesticide safety practices.
  • National Pesticide Information Center: The National Pesticide Information Center is affiliated with the EPA and Oregon State University to provide information on pesticide-related topics including environmental fate, regulations, and health effects. They operate a bilingual telephone hotline and develop publications and websites with pesticide risk information.
  • Pesticide Action Network of North America (PANNA) advocates the adoption of ecologically sound practices as an alternative to pesticide use. With other groups, it promotes sustainable agriculture, food security, and social justice. In addition to action alerts, connections to other organizations, fact sheets, and reports, the PESTIS database is available to search online for information on specific pesticides and alternatives.
Prenatal and Reproductive Health
  • Information on Environmental Chemicals and Pregnancy: The UCSF Program Reproductive Health and the Environment was founded in 2007 by Dr. Linda C. Giudice, chair of OB/GYN at UCSF, in order to meet the need for continued environmental reproductive health research and for the translation of science into preventive policy action, enhanced health care and heightened public awareness.
Professional Organizations
  • American Academy of Pediatrics provides networks and resources in children’s environmental health, including the handbook Pediatric Environmental Health – 2nd Edition.
  • Association of Occupational and Environmental Clinics (AEOC) includes 55 clinics across the United States and Canada that specialize in occupational and environmental health issues. Provides referrals to clinics for medical advice and care, conducts educational activities, and maintains a lending library.
Publications
Schools and Early Care and Education