Technical Notes
"US-Mexico Border" Neighborhood Added to NLM's® Tox Town
[Editor's Note: This Technical Note is a reprint of an announcement published on NLM-Tox-Enviro-Health-L, an e-mail announcement list available from the NLM Division of Specialized Information Services. To subscribe to this list, please see //sis.nlm.nih.gov/enviro/envirolistserv.html.]
A "US-Mexico Border" neighborhood has been added to Tox Town. Users can now explore a border community to learn about air pollution, drinking water quality, workplace hazards, pesticides, rats and snakes, lead poisoning, backyard trash burning, and many other environmental concerns that may affect one's health. New locations to explore in the border scene are an auto shop, tienda (corner store), maquiladora (factory), crop fields, stormwater and sewage systems, illegal dumps and tire piles, and a colonia. Colonias are border communities that lack paved roads, running water, and waste disposal, and are home to over 400,000 people in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California.
The U.S.-Mexico border region shares many of the same environmental health concerns that can be found anywhere in the U.S., but also has unique concerns and issues because of its geography, economic development, and lack of municipal services in some locations. The United States, Mexico, state, local, and tribal governments are working together to promote better environmental health in the region through programs such as the U.S.-Mexico Border Environmental Program: Border 2012, //www.epa.gov/usmexicoborder/.
