By Dave Lucas
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Albany, NY – New York is one of three states awarded federal grant money to study long-term exposure to chemicals in the environment. Capital District Bureau Chief Dave Lucas reports.
In 2009, CDC awarded a total of $5 million to New York, California and Washington) for state-based laboratory biomonitoring programs. The funding is intended to increase the capability and capacity of these states to conduct biomonitoring - the direct measurement of environmental chemicals in people's blood, urine, or other body tissues. Biomonitoring improves health officials' ability to make timely and appropriate health decisions by providing better information on human exposure.
"The fact that we have, and can measure, some of these chemicals in people does not necessarily mean that they cause disease, and we're very careful to mention that," said Dr. Kenneth Aldous, Director of the Division of Environmental Health Sciences at the state Department of Health's Wadsworth Center laboratories. "However, the fact that they are in our bodies and that they may be increasing - which is something biomonitoring can tell us - may be important down the road measuring their correlation with disease."
Claudia Hutton, the Director of Public Affairs for the New York State Health Department, says New York's study will continue over the next few years - researchers will report to the Federal government regularly, although no timetable has been disclosed. Thirty-three states applied for funding, either individually or in a partnership with other states. Of the three states approved to be funded, the New York State Department of Health received $1,000,000.