 Take Action:
Tell the Senate to Stop Putting Children at Risk!
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) Healthy Homes and Lead Poisoning Prevention Program has been eliminated by the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee in the proposed Fiscal Year 2012 spending bill for Labor, Health and Human Services and Education.
The elimination of the program would end all grants to states and annihilate the branch's key central functions like surveillance/ epidemiology, blood laboratory proficiency, technical assistance, convening, expert public health leadership, and more. The cuts would make it difficult for CDC to identify new sources of lead, new risk factors, or options for treating lead poisoning in a timely way. It also means far fewer homes being inspected and cited for lead-paint hazards.
Communities of color and low-income families will suffer the most from these cuts. The impact from the elimination of this program would fall squarely on the backs of low-income families and communities of color who are disproportionately impacted by environmental health hazards.
Take Action Today! Click here to find the contact information for your U.S. Senator. Call, write or email and tell them:
- Our children need CDC's Healthy Homes and Lead Poisoning Prevention Program
- Urge your Senator to fight to ensure that the CDC Healthy Homes and Lead Prevention Program is fully funded to protect our nation's children from the risk of injuries, lead poisoning, asthma, and other environmental public health threats.
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Victory! Semi-Trucks Banned from Community
On October 17, EHC and our Mexican affiliate the Chilpancingo Collective for Environmental Justice marked an important victory in the bi-national campaign to restrict maquiladora truck traffic from Colonia Chilpancingo, where diesel emissions from the trucks have caused respiratory problems for school children.
Signage was posted in August banning the trucks from the streets where the schools are located. EHC, alongside members of the Collective and its Youth group, conducted a campaign for more than two years seeking to restrict semi-truck traffic driving past the three public schools in the neighborhood.
Semi-trucks serving the maquiladora assembly plants take shortcuts through the neighborhood. As a consequence, 2,000 school children and everyone who lives and works in the area are exposed to high levels of diesel emissions. Diesel emissions are associated with serious health risks, including asthma, cancer and heart disease. More than 1,000 supporters signed the petition circulated by EHC, the Collective and Youth group demanding a halt to the invasion of semi-trucks from the adjacent industrial park, the largest in Tijuana.
Media Coverage
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