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Environmental Health: In 1968 the Public Health Service was reorganized into three separate health agencies: the Health Services and Mental Health Administration, the National Institutes of Health, and the Consumer Protection and Environmental Health -Service, including the Food and Drug Administration, one of the agencies originally transferred into the Federal Security Agency in 1939. These three health agencies are directed by the assistant secretary for health and scientific affairs, who is aided by the surgeon general of the Public Health Service.
A U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare task force on environmental health issued a report entitled "A Strategy for a Livable Environment," which stated in conclusion:
Danger to environmental quality, particularly in the broad context, is among the most important domestic problems facing the nation today. It affects all Americans where they live, where they work, and where they play. The environment can materially damage their children and generations yet unborn.
The task force considered the following areas of environmental health as ones of immediate concern: air pollution; water quality; waste disposal; urban contamination; population problems; toxic materials, metals, and chemicals; consumer protection; radiation hazards; occupational illness; and other related problems. The recommendations of this task force set the stage for long-term programs of environmental improvement in the U.S. (See Year in Review: ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES.) |
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