Megan Latshaw

• PhD, MHS
• Director at Johns Hopkins University

Key Takeaways Water systems can positively influence public well‐being by teaming up with health agencies. Two case studies are presented that show how this collaborative work can happen at a local level. In the United States, the Lead and Copper Rule Revisions open the way for stronger communications across the water and public health sectors.

Public transit provides relatively low-cost access to jobs, food, and healthcare, while also reducing pollution and greenhouse gas emissions by taking cars off the roads and increasing physical activity. Despite these benefits, public transit in Baltimore often fails to get people to their destinations in a reasonable amount of time. This is especi...

Environmental quality has a profound effect on health and the burden of disease. In the United States, the environment-related burden of disease is increasingly dominated by chronic diseases. At the local level, public health practitioners realize that many policy decisions affecting environmental quality and health transcend the authorities of tra...

The science is clear, the call is loud, now what? Building on the expansive body of research on climate change and human health as well as the calls to action from health leaders, this presentation will explore the potential for public health professionals to make an impact on climate change mitigation through an advocacy coalition. After reviewing...

The United States lacks a comprehensive, nationally-coordinated, state-based environmental health surveillance system. This lack of infrastructure leads to: ? varying levels of understanding of chemical exposures at the state & local levels ? often inefficient public health responses to chemical exposure emergencies (such as those that occurred in...

Written for state environmental agency leaders, this paper highlights the capabilities & capacities of public health and environmental laboratories.

The use of Environmental Public Health Tracking data has proven to be an unmatched resource when coupled with biomonitoring– the measure of environmental chemicals in people’s blood, urine and other fluids. While Tracking looks at how contaminants in the environment impact a community’s health, biomonitoring determines contaminants in human specime...

Government operated public health and environmental laboratories can significantly advance the efforts of researchers looking for additional resources. These state and local laboratories have the capabilities to conduct a wide range of environmental research, including human biomonitoring, environmental contamination evaluations, consumer product t...

In 2009, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention funded three state-based public health laboratory biomonitoring programs. These programs are the foundation for a National Biomonitoring Plan that consists of a larger network of state and local biomonitoring programs. To understand the utility of these programs and plan for the larger network...

Biomonitoring for environmental chemicals continues to gain prominence as a tool to understand exposure and guide public health activities. The Environmental Heath Profile of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey now documents US population exposures to hundreds of environmental chemicals. While NHANES is an important national resour...

Dr. Latshaw will describe what is meant by the term National Biomonitoring System. She will explain the purpose and process for creating such a system. This presentation sets the stage for the rest of the presenters.

To document the ability of public health laboratories to respond to radiological emergencies. The Association of Public Health Laboratories developed, distributed, and analyzed two separate surveys of public health laboratories representing the 50 US states and major nonstate jurisdictions. The 2009 All-Hazards Laboratory Preparedness Survey examin...

The objective of this study was to describe the distribution and predictors of blood mercury levels in an adult population. This was a cross-sectional analysis of first-visit data (2001-2002) on a random sample of 474 subjects from the Baltimore Memory Study. After adjustment for race/ethnicity, education, assets, and diabetes, persons in the highe...

Due to its cardiovascular benefits, fish consumption is widely encouraged among older Americans. However, this fast-growing population is at increased risk of cognitive impairment and may be particularly sensitive to methylmercury, a neurotoxicant found in fish. To describe associations of blood mercury levels with neurobehavioral test scores in an...