{"id":7662,"date":"2018-04-12T10:20:56","date_gmt":"2018-04-12T15:20:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/?p=7662"},"modified":"2018-04-12T10:20:56","modified_gmt":"2018-04-12T15:20:56","slug":"monitoring-our-chemical-exposures-five-lessons-learned-and-whats-on-the-horizon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/2018\/04\/12\/monitoring-our-chemical-exposures-five-lessons-learned-and-whats-on-the-horizon\/","title":{"rendered":"Monitoring our chemical exposures: Five lessons learned and what\u2019s on the horizon"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lindsay McCormick,<\/em><\/a>\u00a0<\/em>is a\u00a0Project Manager.<\/p>\n

Last October, a groundbreaking report<\/a> concluded that diseases caused by pollution were responsible for 1 in 6 premature deaths in 2015 worldwide.\u00a0 That\u2019s 9 million deaths caused by environmental pollution \u2013 three times more than AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria combined<\/em>.<\/p>\n

That may seem startling at first, but health outcomes are largely defined by a person\u2019s genes and<\/em> their environment.\u00a0 In fact, environmental factors \u2013 like ambient and household air pollution, industrial chemicals, and common consumer products \u2013 are implicated in health impacts ranging from cancer and asthma to infertility.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, our ability to track an individual\u2019s chemical exposures \u2013 also called the \u201cchemical exposome\u201d \u2013 lags way behind what we can measure genetically.\u00a0 And without this information, it is virtually impossible to develop sound policies and evidence-based interventions to reduce harmful exposures and protect health.<\/p>\n

But what if everyone could monitor hazardous chemical exposures? What if school children, soldiers, pregnant women, flight attendants, nail salon workers, gas attendants, and those living within just a few miles of industrial sites \u2013 or just about anyone \u2013 could understand chemical exposures in their personal environment?<\/p>\n

This is where EDF comes in. EDF is exploring ways to catalyze development and scaling of breakthrough technologies capable of detecting an individual\u2019s exposure to a broad spectrum of chemicals\u2014making the invisible, visible.<\/p>\n

Our efforts began three years ago, with a series of pilot projects<\/a> in which people wore a simple silicone wristband capable of detecting over 1,400 chemicals in the environment. Today, we\u2019re collaborating with diverse stakeholders to identify needs and opportunities for accelerating broad uptake of chemical exposure monitoring technologies. Below are five important lessons to jump-start this opportunity.<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0 There\u2019s huge demand for chemical exposure data.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Interest in understanding personal chemical exposures comes from a variety of sources, from military personnel and private sector companies to healthcare providers and consumers \u2013 each with their unique technology, performance, and cost preferences.\u00a0 To drive innovation, there is a need to translate this demand into increased investment in and uptake of novel technologies.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n

2.\u00a0 Funding is not well-designed for the innovation needed.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Traditional public research funding for environmental health studies often does not explicitly support the development of exposure monitoring tools. Moreover, when such funding is made available, it is generally targeted towards the development of tools that address a narrow research question focused on a small subset of chemicals \u2013 creating little incentive for the development of technologies designed to measure a wider spectrum of chemical substances.<\/p>\n

Diverse funding sources \u2013 such as crowd-funding, pre-buying agreements, lending libraries, challenge programs, and venture capital \u2013 are needed to spur technology development and uptake.<\/p>\n

3.\u00a0 It\u2019s a long game \u2013 that will require incremental progress and taking risks.<\/strong><\/p>\n

A single technology that fulfills the demands of all users does not currently exist (and may never). Seeking incremental advancements is likely to be more successful than attempting to develop the perfect device from the get go.\u00a0 At the same time, intelligence programs like IARPA<\/a> \u2013 which invests in high risk\/high payoff research programs \u2013 teach us the importance of investors tolerating a high failure rate in technology development in order to achieve success.<\/p>\n

To that end, identifying and funding a specific use-case of a near-market ready technology, and showing movement towards solving an important problem in 6-24 months, may be the best balance between feasibility and risk-taking.<\/p>\n

4.\u00a0 Validation is critical and will support uptake.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Studies designed to validate \u2013 or prove the efficacy of \u2013 new exposure monitoring technologies are critical to build confidence in these tools among the research community. Unfortunately, the pace of such studies has been slow, largely due to lack of funding.\u00a0 This dynamic can present a catch-22 \u2013 as low uptake of technologies due to performance concerns can stymie further development and improvement of promising new technologies.<\/p>\n

One way to accelerate the market is through \u201ctest beds\u201d \u2013 or a standardized set of performance tests \u2013 to allow users to compare results across different technologies.\u00a0 A recent technology challenge organized by NIST, the NFL, GE and Under Armour<\/a> to create a football helmet to mitigate concussions provides an example of such an approach. NIST led the development of the \u201ctest bed\u201d to evaluate and compare prototype helmet submission.<\/p>\n

5.\u00a0 Communicating chemical exposure results is crucial.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Effective exposure monitoring tools must be coupled with meaningful communication of exposure information so that it is accessible.\u00a0 Without this step, individuals may become overwhelmed by the information and fail to take meaningful action \u2013 such as personal behavior change or advocacy efforts \u2013 to reduce exposure to hazardous chemicals. \u00a0EDF is exploring new opportunities to ensure that chemical information is meaningful and useful to individuals.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

We believe that with the right incentives, public health researchers, technology developers, and investors can work together to catalyze innovation \u2013 in technologies, processes, and business models \u2013 to unlock breakthrough solutions and reach the vision of a world where we can readily track our exposure to hazardous chemicals.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lindsay McCormick,\u00a0is a\u00a0Project Manager. Last October, a groundbreaking report concluded that diseases caused by pollution were responsible for 1 in 6 premature deaths in 2015 worldwide.\u00a0 That\u2019s 9 million deaths caused by environmental pollution \u2013 three times more than AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria combined. That may seem startling at first, but health outcomes are largely …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":50533,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[114079,56100,56094],"tags":[91614],"coauthors":[114097],"class_list":["post-7662","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chemical-exposure","category-emerging-science","category-new-testing-methods","tag-chemical-exposure"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7662","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/50533"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7662"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7662\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7662"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7662"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7662"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/health\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=7662"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}