HR: 0800h
AN: U51A-0007    [Abstracts]
TI: Not a Tsunami, Not a hurricane, Just an Opportunity!
AU: * Edsall, D W
EM: edsall@usna.edu
AF: U.S. Naval Academy, Physics Department 274 Chauvenet Hall, Annapolis, MD 21402 United States
AU: Bunnell, J E
EM: jbunnell@usgs.gov
AF: United States Geological Survey, 956 National Center, 12201 Sunrise Valley Drive, Reston, VA 20192 United States
AB: It has long been recognized that human health can be affected by the geologic environment through either short-term or long-term exposure to naturally occurring toxic materials. Human health can also be affected by an excess or deficiency of certain trace elements. Spatial correlations between geology and health problems are used as evidence for cause and effect relationships. For example, the Goiter Belt in the upper Midwest and Great Lakes region is a result of an iodine deficiency. The USGS and other international organizations are pursuing studies of "medical geology," the science dealing with the relationship between natural geological factors and health in man and animals, and understanding the influence of ordinary environmental factors on the spatial and temporal distribution of diseases. An ideal population study cohort for a medical geology investigation would have been born and lived solely on a relatively isolated South Pacific Ocean atoll, reef or volcanic island. Such populations would not be as mobile as those from more developed societies, would eat a more restricted diet, would live in more direct contact with the natural environment and would only be subjected to chronic contamination by geologic materials due to a lack of industry and other sources of anthropogenic pollution. We are interested in establishing relationships with similar-minded professionals from a diversity of disciplines to collect and exchange the baseline geologic and public health data necessary to initiate a medical geology investigation of a select number of South Pacific Island populations. Such research could better prepare populations at risk of future environmentally-linked public health problems for more favorable outcomes.
DE: 0499 New fields (not classifiable under other headings)
DE: 6699 General or miscellaneous
DE: 9355 Pacific Ocean
DE: 9810 New fields (not classifiable under other headings)
SC: Union [U]
MN: Fall Meeting 2005