Priority 6
Strategy A: Increase awareness of the connection between environmental carcinogens and cancer risk.
Action Steps:
- Educate the public, health care providers, public health officials, schools, property owners, property managers, and policymakers about the link between environmental carcinogens of concern in Iowa and negative health impacts, specifically polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS); arsenic; and nitrates.
- Develop an awareness campaign about the sources of and routes of exposure to carcinogens in the environment and how reducing exposure can prevent disease.
- Develop an awareness campaign about environmental carcinogens.
Strategy B: Reduce occupational exposures to known carcinogens.
Action Steps:
- Tailor outreach and awareness efforts for occupational exposure to carcinogens (e.g. educate firefighters on their increased risk for digestive, oral, respiratory [mesothelioma], and urinary cancers).
- Raise awareness on and educate agricultural workers on the link between certain agricultural practices and pesticide use, and cancer.
- Educate employers and workers on the importance of personal exposure monitoring and appropriate use of personal protective equipment, to reduce occupational exposure to asbestos and other known carcinogens.
Strategy C: Reduce exposure to known and probable environmental carcinogens and investigate not yet identified sources of exposure.
Action Steps:
- Educate public health officials and health care providers about provider practice interventions and health systems support related to known, suspected, and emerging environmental carcinogens.
- Support continued education on the importance of the proper management of wastewater, solid and hazardous waste, and control of toxic substances to prevent public exposure to carcinogens.
- Work with the Zoning sector to ensure safe siting of homes, schools, parks, and community centers in or around industry or where industry used to be to limit environmental exposure risks (i.e. brownfield sites, contaminated sites), especially those environments created by both social and environmental injustices that lead to health disparities, including red lining and zoning policy.
- Advocate for additional state funding for water testing that does not compete with existing funds for testing, remediation, and closing of private wells.
- Support initiatives to reduce chemicals/pollutants and known and/or probable carcinogens in drinking water, recreational water, air, and wastewater.
- Work with partners including the Iowa Department of Transportation and local public health agencies to reduce the incidence and prevalence of lung cancer and respiratory diseases associated with exposure to fine particulate matter air pollution, ozone, pollen/allergens, molds and indoor moisture levels, by improving (indoor and outdoor) air quality across Iowa.
Strategy D: Address and mitigate exposures among specific groups put at a higher risk such as children, expectant and birthing individuals, low socioeconomic status populations, communities of color, immigrants, occupational workers including farm workers, cancer survivors in remission, and others.
Action Steps:
- Advocate for the reduction, restriction, and elimination of the use of known carcinogens in and around public spaces, prioritizing locations that prevent early-life exposure.
- Collaborate with public health officials and health care providers to provide educational materials to expectant and birthing individuals, parents, or caregivers on mitigating risk to environmental carcinogens.
- Require cumulative environment impact assessments before permitting additional polluting industries in environmentally overburdened communities.
Strategy E: Support research that further identifies chemicals and other environmental factors involved in cancer development and primary prevention strategies to reduce exposure.
Action Steps:
- Compile an inventory of known, probable, and suspected carcinogens in Iowa (source), including potential routes of exposure and susceptible/at-risk population groups.
- Support environmental monitoring for chemicals/pollutants and known and/or probable carcinogens in drinking water, recreational water, air, and wastewater.
- Support a research and innovation agenda for development of safe and sustainable alternatives to hazardous chemicals.
- Support interdisciplinary spatial life course epidemiological initiatives and research focused on evidence-based epidemiologic and environmental monitoring of carcinogen exposure, including multigenerational exposures.
Strategy F: Identify high priority environmental hazards and preventive actions families and communities can take.
Action Steps:
- Support and advocate for renewable energy to reduce hazardous air pollution linked to lung and other cancers.
- Prevent potential exposures to toxic chemicals and raw sewage that may result from more frequent heavy rain/flooding events.
- Identify and address decreased water quality resulting from elevated water temperatures and already high nutrient levels (i.e., harmful algae blooms).
- Advocate for Polluter Pays laws relating to both clean up, monitoring, and treatment costs.
- Develop partnerships with community organizations working on environmental health issues in Iowa to address the overlap of environment and cancer, such as the Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement, Des Moines Waterworks, Iowa Environmental Council, Iowa Environmental Health Association, Iowa Public Health Association, Iowa agricultural organizations, One Thousand Friends of Iowa, Iowa Department of Natural Resources, State Hygienic Lab, allied health professions associations in Iowa, Iowa Occupational Safety and Health Administration, Proteus Inc., Iowa Farmers Union, Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship, Iowa Chapter of Physicians for Social Responsibility.
Resources:
- How to test your private well: IDNR, Private well testing FAQ; Information on free private well testing: Grants to Counties
- Iowa Environmental Tracking Portal
- Ways to identify harmful chemicals and carcinogens in household, cleaning, and personal care products:
- Silent Spring Institute: Detox Me app
- Clearya app and browser extension
- Environmental Working Group’s Skin Deep Database and App
- Paths to Prevention: California Breast Cancer Primary Prevention Plan – Breast Cancer Prevention Partners (BCPP)
- Breast Cancer Action: The Climate Crisis and Breast Cancer
- American Lung Association State of the Air report: https://www.lung.org/research/sota/city-rankings/states/iowa
- EPA’s Tri Toxics Tracker
- Iowa Department of Natural Resources’ Greenhouse Gas Emission Inventory Report
- Farming For Public Health https://farmingforpublichealth.org
- Good Neighbor Iowa https://goodneighboriowa.org