Current Environmental Health Concerns

CDC Partners with New Mexico to Address Environmental Health New Website Links Environmental Contaminants to Health Effects

Santa Fe) -- Today Health Secretary Alfredo Vigil announced the launch of the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Environmental Public Health Tracking Network, which paves the way for New Mexicans to learn more about how environmental contaminants in a community might affect health.

The Tracking Network is a dynamic website that, for the first time, provides health and environmental data in one easy-to-find location. The network makes environmental health resources available to the public, allowing scientists, health professionals, and the public to track environmental exposures and some non-infectious health conditions. For example, the Tracking Network lets people know of the health risks possible from contaminants such as air pollution and the relationship to asthma.

“By connecting environmental information and health condition information statewide and nationally, this network provides essential information into one easily accessible resource,” said Heidi Krapfl, chief of the Environmental Health Epidemiology Bureau of the state Health Department.

New Mexico is one of 16 states along with New York City initially participating in the national network. The Department of Health’s Environmental Health Epidemiology Bureau, working closely with the CDC, has collected and analyzed information contributing to this web-based network.

As part of the national program, the state Health Department is developing a New Mexico-specific Environmental Public Health Tracking Network which complements the national website. The Department expects this resource will be available to the public in the fall. The site features information on health conditions such as cancer, heart attacks, asthma, reproductive outcomes, and birth defects and environmental information about water and air.

Environmental conditions and hazards in New Mexico could have substantial impacts on health. Although the exact burden of environmentally related disease, disability, and death are unknown, recent studies have shown how significantly environmental exposures contribute to chronic disease such as lead poisoning, childhood asthma, cardiovascular disease, childhood cancer, and neurobehavioral disorders in children.

“The Tracking Network is the foundation we need to protect our health from environmental hazards, make faster research progress and help prevent chronic illnesses, such as asthma, heart disease, lead poisoning and cancer,” said Michael McGeehin, PhD, director of CDC’s Division of Environmental Hazard and Health Effects at the National Center for Environmental Health.

This resource is a launching pad for further research because for the first time it connects a body of environmental and health information from multiple states and national sources. Now with information they need available at their fingertips, scientists and the public can better understand connections between environmental exposures and chronic health conditions.

Visit CDC’s Tracking Network at www.cdc.gov/ephtracking. For more information on other environmental public health issues, visit www.cdc.gov/nceh.