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Tuesday, September 23, 2008

EPA Just Kidding Around on Children's Health

Last week, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report on the Environmental Protection Agency's policies for considering children's health. GAO's title sums it up well: "EPA Efforts to Address Children's Health Issues Need Greater Focus, Direction, and Top-Level Commitment."

A Clinton-era executive order on children's health created an advisory committee that was to provide expert opinion to government decision makers. But at EPA, the committee's advice has gone unheeded, GAO found. A new article from OMB Watch's The Watcher reports:

EPA requested advice from the committee on regulations only three times, on guidance three times, and only once on developing a policy. Fourteen other times, EPA asked for advice on other issues such as developing plans and evaluating pilot programs. Yet over the period GAO reviewed, the committee sent to over 600 recommendations for action EPA should take on a wide variety of issues, ranging from mercury regulation and farm worker protections to pesticides and air pollution. GAO concluded, "EPA has largely disregarded the advisory committee's recommendations."

One example where EPA has ignored the children's health advisory committee came earlier this year when it finalized a standard for ozone, or smog, weaker than what the entire scientific community — including those experts on the committee — was recommending.

In March 2007, the committee wrote to EPA administrator Stephen Johnson and was quite clear with its scientific opinion: "[I]n order to more protective of the respiratory health of susceptible children, the committee recommends that the EPA choose a standard of 0.060 [parts per million]."

But when Johnson announced the standard in March 2008, he chose 0.075 ppm as the standard. According to the estimates of EPA's staff, choosing a standard of 0.065 ppm — not even as strict as the committee had recommended — could have prevented an additional 8,100 asthma-related emergency room visits for people 18 and younger every year.

Read more about EPA's record of protecting children from environmental hazards.