CDC Launches New Environmental Public Health Tracking Network

July 7, 2009 - The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention now offers an on-line network the public can use to track environmental exposures and chronic health conditions. On Tuesday the CDC announced the Environmental Public Health Tracking Network, a public health surveillance tool that scientists, health professionals, and members of the public can use.

“The ability to examine many data sets together for the first time has already resulted in faster responses to environmental health issues. We believe the Tracking Network holds the potential to shed new light on some of our biggest environmental health questions,” said Howard Frumkin, M.D., M.P.H., DrPh., director, of CDC’s National Center for Environmental Health.

The web-based tool unites vital environmental information from across the country, including air and water pollutants and information for some chronic conditions, including asthma, cancer, childhood lead poisoning and heart disease into one resource.

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PA Cancer Cluster Study Approved

March 12, 2009

Congress has approved $5.5 million in funding to study a cancer cluster in the Luzerne-Carbon-Schuylkill tri-county region, U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter announced on Wednesday. “I am pleased that Congress has approved this funding to study the higher than usual incidence of the blood disease in this area. The community is very concerned about the problem, and they’re entitled to the best answers science can give them,” Specter said in a press release.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will receive $5 million to conduct assessments of Polycythemia Vera trends and associated risk factors – including environmental risk factors – in the cancer cluster areas or in areas where potential environmental risks might exist.

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