The report, entitled Preventing Child Exposures to Environmental Hazards, calls for the development of environmental policies based on health standards that address the special needs of children. American environmental health policies, the report says, should focus on preventing harmful environmental exposures to children rather than establishing permissible levels of exposures. Policy makers need to put children at the center of environmental policy. One step in that direction is to learn a lot more about the exposures and effects of environmental hazards to children. Physicians and public health clinicians can play an important role in diagnosing environment-related illness and educating families and communities regarding environmental risks to children, according to the report.
Children are physically different from adults.
The rate of absorption, tissue distribution, and ability to transform and eliminate chemicals contribute to a child's biological sensitivity. In utero and in the early months of life, a child's brain lacks a blood membrane. Children have narrower airways and breathe more rapidly than adults. A child's risk for exposure and radverse effects from toxins changes at each stage of development. Lead in a mother's bones which may be harmless to her will be transferred to her fetus, while newborns can be exposed to PCBs through breast milk.