Childhood Cancer & the Environment: Prevention Opportunities
April 24, 2025 @ 10:00am (AKDT)
Research in the last 25 years has greatly expanded our understanding of environmental risk factors for childhood cancer, including exposure to pesticides, traffic-related air pollution, tobacco, and solvents. More is also known about protective factors.
In this CHE-Alaska webinar, Dr. Mark Miller, pediatrician and director of the Childhood Cancer & the Environment project, will discuss trends in childhood leukemia incidence and survivorship, and how our knowledge about childhood cancer and environmental exposures has improved considerably in recent years. Dr. Catherine Metayer, an epidemiologist and childhood cancer researcher from UC Berkeley, will review the state of the scientific literature on environmental risk factors for childhood cancer and leukemia.
The speakers will also address successful strategies of outreach to communities to help reduce risk, as well as to pediatricians and pediatric oncologists so they can provide adequate risk reduction guidance to families. The discussion will explore challenges and opportunities in childhood cancer prevention, including the urgency of addressing prenatal and early childhood exposure to chemicals that increase cancer risk.
CHE-Alaska is part of CHE’s broader network, which is an international partnership of almost 5,000 individuals and organizations in 87 countries and all 50 US states that are committed to addressing environmental impacts on human health across the lifespan.
We encourage you to become a CHE partner so you can receive their monthly email newsletters, announcements about upcoming webinars, and other updates on a range of environmental health topics. Visit www.healthandenvironment.org to learn more.
Featured speakers
Dr. Catherine Metayer is an Adjunct Professor of Epidemiology and Epidemiology/Biostatistics at the UC Berkeley School of Public Health. Her work currently focuses on genetic and environmental risk factors of leukemia and other cancers in children, adolescents, and young adults. Prior to joining UC Berkeley, she was a Scientist at the U.S. National Cancer Institute. Her research portfolio focuses on the associations between genetic factors, environmental exposures, birth characteristics, medical conditions, and vitamin supplementation and the risk of childhood leukemia. She is the Principal Investigator of the California Childhood Leukemia Study and the Director of the Center for Integrative Research on Childhood Leukemia and the Environment (CIRCLE). She is also the immediate past Chair of the Childhood Leukemia International Consortium Studies (CLIC) and leads pooled analyses with several case-control studies worldwide.
Dr. Mark Miller is an Associate Clinical Professor in the Division of Occupational and Environmental Medicine at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF). He is also the Director Emeritus of the Western States Pediatric Environmental Health Specialty Unit (WSPEHSU) at UCSF and the past director of the Children’s Environmental Health Center at California’s Environmental Protection Agency. He received his medical degree and completed a Pediatric residency at Michigan State University. He received his Masters in Public Health in Environmental Health Sciences from UC Berkeley and completed a residency with the California Department of Health Services in Preventive Medicine.