What is the Children’s Centers program?
Because they are still developing, children can be especially vulnerable to the effects of environmental exposures. To better understand the effects of children’s exposures and to explore ways to reduce their risks from substances in the environment, the Centers for Children’s Environmental Health and Disease Prevention Research (Children’s Centers) were first funded in 1998 by EPA and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS). The Centers are investigating the effects of environmental exposures including pesticides, lead, mercury and PCBs and their role in childhood disorders such as asthma, autism and learning disabilities. The Centers apply community-based participatory research (CBPR) principles with the goal of understanding and ultimately preventing children’s exposure to environmental hazards and health disparities. The Children’s Centers employ integrated multidisciplinary approaches to understand the complex risk factors that impact children’s health from
