European environment and health policy attaches great importance to the human biomonitoring (HBM) tool for the determination of the environmental burden on the population. However previous or ongoing HBM studies in several European countries deal with different issues.
The German Environment Agency supports the cooperation on human biomonitoring between the Federal Ministry for the Environment and the German chemical industrial association (VCI). The cooperation is significant for the development of new analytical methods to enable the detection of chemicals in urine or blood samples to which the population may have increased exposure or are of special relevance
FAQ of the Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR) and the Federal Environment Agency (UBA)
The Human Biomonitoring Commission has published opinions on many substances in various specialist journals (only in German language).
Human biomonitoring (HBM) is a tool of health-related environmental monitoring with which populations are examined for their exposure to pollutants from the environment. The results are also intended to provide information as to whether (further) pollutant reduction measures are needed and on the effects of existing measures.
Environmental influences can cause illness: For example, noise increases the risk of heart attack and particulate matter may trigger lung cancer. The Federal Environment Agency uses the "environmental burden of disease” concept to investigate which environmental impacts are associated with particularly large numbers of diseases and what benefits environmental protection can have for our health.
The environmental medicine discipline aims to prevent the occurrence of environmental complaints and diseases in people. The cause of suffering is not always the same. Diagnosis and treatment often require cross-disciplinary cooperation and experience.
