Children’s Health Month

One of the focuses in the month of October is Children’s Health.  Growing Happy, Growing Healthy is the theme.

Your children face some unique health issues around environmental factors and the goal of this month is to raise awareness to help give children a healthy start in life.

There is a government task force set up to lead the initiative. You can go online and read about the details and get involved if you’d like.

A couple areas of focus that you and I can help with are listed below:

Pesticides

• Children often play on the floor and touch their faces and mouths.
• The use of harsh pesticides at child care centers, schools or at home can affect children whose systems are more vulnerable as they are developing. 
• You have to be careful about what you choose to use and how you store pesticides.
• Have the poison control center hotline available:  1-800-222-1222.

Plastics

• There are some plastics with chemicals that can be unhealthy and even toxic to children.
• The chemical names are phthalates, bisphenol A (BPA), polyvinyl chloride (PVC) and polystyrene.
• Watch for these products in baby bottles, sippy cups, water bottles and toys.

Private Home Health Care believes it’s important for children to get the right start in life.  Check out this website for additional information:  https://www.epa.gov/children/childrens-health-month