A Decade of Tribal Environmental Health Research: Results and Impacts from EPA’s Extramural Grants and Fellowship Programs
Authors
The Scientific Consulting Group, Inc.
Keywords
Chemical Substances and Toxics, Risk Assessment, Health, Subsistence, Traditional Knowledges, Tribal Lifeways, Environmental Quality, Case Studies, CBPR, Outreach, Water Resources, Fish, Shellfish, Berries, Grants
Many traditional American Indian and Alaska Native (AI or AN) populations maintain intricate and ecologically interdependent relationships with the natural environment, as they have for millennia. To restore and protect the health and knowledge base of their communities, tribal nations encourage traditional diets, religious practices, customs and language use. This emphasis on traditional, healthy lifeways for AI or AN communities requires that the unique health and environmental impacts of pollution, dietary exposure, cumulative risk and climate change be identified to reduce tribal health risks (U.S. EPA, 2012e). The relationships between tribal citizens and their environments are being affected adversely by a variety of stressors. Industrial chemical pollution, climate change, the availability of processed foods, and social and political isolation threaten the health, wellness and lifeways of AI or AN communities. Contaminated sites, pesticide drift, bioaccumulation and rights of access issues have an effect on exposures from subsistence lifestyles and diets (U.S. EPA, 2012e). The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and its tribal partners recognized that AI or AN populations have distinct research needs as a result of their unique relationship with the natural environment. To address these needs, the Agency directed the Office of Research and Development’s (ORD) National Center for Environmental Research (NCER) to establish its Tribal Environmental Health Research Program. In 2010, the EPA Administrator made strengthening tribal partnerships one of the Agency’s seven priorities, demonstrating EPA’s commitment to support and, when possible, bolster tribal capacity (U.S. EPA, 2010a). To underscore this commitment, the FY 2011–2015 EPA Strategic Plan includes strengthening of tribal partnerships as a cross-cutting fundamental strategy for EPA (U.S. EPA,
2010b).
