Children’s environmental health indicators

Oct 14m 2010

Source: NIH

National Library of Medicine

National Center for Biotechnology Information

Photo Source: Unsplash

Children’s environmental health indicators

Previous articles on the impacts of climate change on health, and on children’s health in particular, have called for additional research to improve understanding of the relationships between climatic factors and health, quantification of the current impacts, and projections of future impacts. Such research, including surveillance and program evaluation, is essential to inform the prioritization of activities related to climate change adaptation in public health. Frameworks for prevention include incorporation of climate change actions into the 10 essential functions of public health (Frumkin et al. 2008) and the WHO’s efforts to develop internationally comparable children’s environmental health indicators (CEHIs) (WHO 2009a). CEHIs—subdivided into categories of context, exposures, health outcomes, and actions—have emerged from several international agreements as a proposed tool for tracking the state of children’s environmental health (WHO 2009a). Table 4 gives some examples of CEHIs linked to climate change impacts. Specifically, there is a need for quality and continuous environmental health indicator data that are disaggregated by age group and include children (Akachi et al. 2009). If standardized CEHIs are collected regionally, comparisons among areas have more validity and targeted interventions can be tailored to be regionally specific. The goals of such efforts involve getting a better handle on the current burden of disease, following trends, identifying hot spots, and consequently enabling better prioritization and capacity building. The argument for children’s increased vulnerability and their disproportionate burden of disease presented in this article underscores the importance of child-specific information to respond to their sensitivities and disproportionate exposures.

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