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Measurement of Exposure and Dose
Published in Samuel C. Morris, Cancer Risk Assessment, 2020
Air pollution monitoring began in the 1930s and routine monitoring was firmly established in the United States in the 1960s. Most air sampling is done at fixed locations selected for convenience, as representative of an area, or appropriate for monitoring the impact of a particular point-source emission. Focus is on criteria pollutants established under the Clean Air Act. The Environmental Protection Agency establishes guidelines and criteria for monitoring site selection and sampling equipment design. During the 1970s, this type of data was the basis of exposure assessment. To obtain finer grain exposure estimates for epidemiological studies, fixed monitors were established in local communities being studied. Study designs might, for example, require that the monitor be within half a mile of the residence of each study participant. Not until the late 1970s was there common recognition that exposures might vary significantly depending on personal activities such as commuting to work on crowded streets or the percentage of time spent indoors or outdoors. This introduced two new air sampling designs: personal exposure monitoring and microenviron-ment monitoring.
An Introduction to Risk Assessment with a Nod to History
Published in Ted W. Simon, Environmental Risk Assessment, 2019
In 1970, the US Congress passed the Clean Air Act (CAA) regulating emissions from both mobile and stationary sources of air pollution. EPA was authorized to establish National Ambient Air Quality Standards to protect public health and welfare. Before 1990, risk assessment was used to establish standards for six common classes of pollutants—sulfur oxides, particulate matter, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, hydrocarbons, and photochemical oxidants such as ozone and formaldehyde. The 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments authorized EPA to regulate the emissions of 189 toxic chemicals that were considered carcinogenic, mutagenic, or toxic to reproduction or development. Section 112 of the CAA required EPA to set emission standards for hazardous air pollutants to protect public health with “an ample margin of safety.” The regulatory standards were not based on risk, but rather the maximum achievable control technology (MACT).47 Hence, EPA interpreted Section 112 to place technology-based regulation in a primary role and health-based risk assessment in a secondary role.
Continuing Education in Public Health in the United States
Published in Ira Nurmala, Yashwant V. Pathak, Advancing Professional Development through CPE in Public Health, 2019
Ira Nurmala, Yashwant V. Pathak
The 1960s brought major progress for the civil rights movement and for President Lyndon B. Johnson's War on Poverty which included the Office of Equal Opportunity (OEO). The OEO helped create 100 neighborhood health centers and the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (DHEW) supported another 50. A strong environmental movement developed following the publication of Rachel Carson's Silent Spring in 1962. In 1970 Earth Day attracted 20 million Americans in demonstrations against assaults on nature; by 1990 Earth Day brought out 200 million participants in 140 countries (McNeil, 2000). The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was established and the first Clean Air Act was passed in 1970. Also created during this period were the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH).
Temporal Trends over a Decade in Serious Vision Impairment in a Large, Nationally Representative Population-based Sample of Older Americans: Gender, Cohort and Racial/Ethnic Differences
Published in Ophthalmic Epidemiology, 2022
ZhiDi Deng, Esme Fuller-Thomson
In the United States, the establishment of the Clean Air Act in 1970 has gradually led to markedly improved air quality,40 and this may have a positive effect on ocular health. Several studies have associated air pollution with ocular physiology. Saxena et al.41 showed that individuals who frequently travel through highly polluted areas display changes in their ocular surfaces. Novaes and colleagues42 reported that air pollution induces structural changes in the conjunctival epithelium that lines the inside of eyelids. Another study found a positive correlation between air pollution and the rates of medical visits for non-specific conjunctivitis.43 With improved air quality, each successive generation may experience fewer ocular physiologic changes and thus fewer related vision problems.
Evolution of Federalism in Environmental Health: Federal, State, and Local Government Control
Published in Journal of Legal Medicine, 2020
Jennifer R. Black, Matthew Penn, Laurel Berman
Congress created the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 1970 to protect the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the land that grows our food.44 EPA was then responsible for regulating interstate environmental issues, such as water and air pollution concerns, because these natural resources easily travel between states.45 Some of the most influential pieces of modern regulation passed by EPA within its first decade were the Clean Air Act (1970),46 the Clean Water Act (1972),47 and the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (1976).48 The federal government also developed some of the first major federal environmental laws,49 water and air quality standards, food and drug safety statutes, and tobacco advertising regulations during the 1970s.50
Ethical Dilemmas in Protecting Susceptible Subpopulations From Environmental Health Risks: Liberty, Utility, Fairness, and Accountability for Reasonableness
Published in The American Journal of Bioethics, 2018
David B. Resnik, D. Robert MacDougall, Elise M. Smith
Several U.S. laws provide additional protections for susceptible subpopulations. For example, the Clean Air Act (1990) requires the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to provide additional protections for susceptible subpopulations, including children, asthmatics, and the elderly, when establishing ambient air quality standards (Marchant 2008). The EPA follows this law by establishing ambient air quality standards for ozone, particulate matter, nitrogen dioxide, sulfur dioxide, and carbon monoxide that incorporate protections for susceptible subpopulations (Environmental Protection Agency 2016b). The Food Quality Protection Act (1996) includes a 10-fold safety factor for acceptable pesticide residues on foods to provide additional protections for children (Resnik 2012). An amendment to the Toxic Substances Control Act (1976), the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act (2016), includes additional safety protections for subpopulations that are susceptible to exposures to toxic chemicals, including children and pregnant women (Schmidt 2016). Aside from these legal mandates, the EPA has affirmed its commitment, as a matter of public policy, to drafting environmental regulations and guidelines with an eye toward protecting susceptible subpopulations (Environmental Protection Agency 2016a).