3.2 Vulnerable Populations

After reading the readings and watching the videos, it was clear that there is still so much work that needs to be done to help protect the vulnerable populations from toxic chemical exposures. Children are at the forefront of this protection, as they are more susceptible to many environmental pollutants than adults and majority of their exposures can be prevented. Asthma is 30% preventable for children and is associated with mold, tobacco smoke, chemical cleaners, and air pollutants. Cancer is 15% preventable for children and is associated with radiation exposures, pesticides, solvents, and in-utero chemical exposures. Neurobehavioral disorders are 10% preventable for children and is associated with lead, PCBs, PBDEs, pesticides, and air pollutants. Sadly, many healthcare professionals only fix the problem they see instead of digging into why these children have such issues. In the reading, Costs of Environmental Health Conditions in California Children, it was stated that only 3% of the US’s $2.5 trillion dollars in health goes toward public health initiatives and disease prevention. The other 97% goes directly towards healthcare costs and medical service expenses.

The video that really caught my eye was the Tedtalk by Rishi Manchanda, that represents that some doctors see this backwards way of medicine and is trying to get in control of it. He talks about his work as a clinician and how he examines health where it begins. After examining the client’s symptoms, he asks basic questions to get an idea of the kind of exposures could be causing their symptoms. He asks his client about where they work, where they live, and where they spend majority of their lives. They call themselves the “upstream-ists”, where they implement a process that changes the way of medicine. They not only try to fix the problem at hand (the client’s symptoms), but they try to fix it from never happening again by mobilizing outside resources (like community advocates or even lawyers).  

Until our government and chemical companies come to terms that toxic chemical exposures are dangerous even at very low levels (which might never happen). I think by pushing doctors and other healthcare professionals to continue on the path of finding out why such disease are happening, we can dramatically decrease the effects of preventable diseases, especially among children. The more aware everyone is of the risks toxic chemicals can have, the better off our community will be in the long run.