Projects

National Childhood Asthma Prevention Campaign

Click here for A Report from the Working Group of Representatives from State Health and Environmental Agencies on Strategies to Reduce Environmental Factors that Contribute to Asthma in Children

Click here for the Toolbox of Resources for State Agencies

Click here for the ECOS Resolution on Reducing Environmental Factors that Affect Asthma in Children

Click here for a Matrix of State Programs related to asthma

The Environmental Council of the States (ECOS) is working with the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials (ASTHO) on a project related to the prevention and reduction of childhood asthma triggered or aggravated by indoor and outdoor environmental conditions. This project will build upon the work currently underway at ECOS and ASTHO, utilizing the childhood asthma information being collected through the Children's Environmental Health Profiles.

Over the course of several months, a workgroup developed a vision statement, goals and draft action agenda. The documents were proposed for discussion in a groundbreaking meeting that took place in San Diego, CA in August 2001, titled "Catching Your Breath: A conference for leaders of state environment and health agencies." Over a hundred representatives from thirty-nine States (fifty-two state environment and health departments), two federal agencies and nine other organizations participated in this meeting, the first that brought together state environment and health officials to discus children's asthma. The participants agreed on the proposed goals, vision statement and the topic areas for the action agenda, and urged for continuing collaboration among environment, health, education, housing and other relevant state departments.

At the 2001 Annual Meeting, ECOS passed a resolution endorsing the goals and vision statement. To further elaborate the action agenda, the state workgroup divided it into four workable sections with specific topics: asthma data, indoor environments, outdoor environments, and schools and child care settings. This gave the States an opportunity to discuss specific differences between health and environmental systems, something rated as highly important during the San Diego meeting. During 2002, the workgroup met five times to discuss the specific topics and then wrap-up the recommendations from each meeting into a single document.

The final Report from the Working Group of State Health and Environment Agencies - "CATCHING YOUR BREATH: Strategies to Reduce Environmental Factors that Contribute to Asthma in Children" has been released. The report contains a vision statement and action agenda developed by representatives from environmental and health agencies, and identifies steps states can take to address childhood asthma in homes, schools, childcare centers and outdoor environments. It is intended to serve as a blueprint for States and describe fruitful areas for action, and not to bind states to specific commitments. Some states may address some areas while other states emphasize others, based on distinct needs.

ECOS has sponsored five state pilots on childhood asthma in Wyoming, Wisconsin, and California (with funding from EPA Headquarters), as well as in Idaho and Oregon (with funding from EPA Region 10). To qualify for the grant awards, the applicants had to prove that the state environmental agency and the public health department would collaborate substantially toward the completion of the project. The pilots address various areas pertaining to childhood asthma, such as in-home exposures to environmental triggers of asthma, disseminating information regarding forecasts of unhealthy air quality, measuring PM outdoor air at schools and establishing associations with increased asthma exacerbations, reducing idling around schools, assembling data sets consisting of health, environmental, and housing information for use with spatial analytic tools to identify patterns or risk factors correlated with higher rates of asthma prevalence and morbidity. All pilots will be completed in 2004