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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMINUTES - 06271989 - IO.4 I.O. 4 TO: Board of Supervisors FROM: INTERNAL OPERATIONS COMMITTEE DATE: June 19, 1989 odsT -- •c3' 4 COUt� SUBJECT: STATUS REPORT ON THE PROSPECTIVE STUDY OF THE INCIDENCE OF CANCER IN CONTRA COSTA COUNTY Specific Request(s) or Recommendations(s) & Background & Justification RECOMMENDATIONS: 1. Direct the Public Health Director to present our Committee on December 11, 1989 with an outline on how a prospective study of the incidence of cancer in Contra Costa County should be conducted. 2. Direct the Public Health Director to ask the Bay Area Cancer Coalition to make a report on the concept of a prospective study of the incidence of cancer in Contra Costa County to the San Francisco Bay Area Air Quality Management District's Advisory Committee and thereafter to the Air Quality Management District's Board of Directors, requesting their respective endorsements for the need for such a prospective study of the incidence of cancer in Contra Costa County. 3. Direct the Public Health Director to write to each county and city in the geographical area served by the San Francisco Bay Area Air Quality Management District, explaining the concept of a prospective study of the incidence of cancer in Contra Costa County and requesting their endorsement of such a study, with any and all such endorsements to be forwarded to the San Francisco Bay Area Air Quality Management District's Board of Directors. Continued on attachment: YES Signature: Recom nenda ' on ty Administrator _� Recommendation of Board Committee Appr Ot Signature(s): 6M POW(Oi� SUNNE WRIGHT MC PEA Action of Board on: June 27, 1989 Approved as Recommended x Other Vote of Supervisors I HEREBY CERTIFY THAT THIS IS A TRUE AND CORRECT COPY OF AN ACTION TAKEN x Unanimous (Absent iii ) AND ENTERED ON THE MINUTES OF THE Ayes: Noes: BOARD OF SUPERVISORS ON DATE SHOWN.. Absent: Abstain: Attested a7 /989 cc: County Administrator Phil Bat elor, Clerk of the Board Health Services Director of Supervisors and County Administrator Public Health Director - By � ,Deputy Clerk CLVM:eh(io-4bo) BACKGROUND: On December 6, 1988 the Board of Supervisors referred to our Committee oversight of the outline of a prospective study of the incidence of cancer in Contra Costa County. The Health Services Director and Public Health Director were asked to identify the individuals who were most likely to be influential in funding such a study. On June 19, 1989 our Committee received and reviewed the attached report which outlines possible funding sources which are being pursued by the Health Services Department. While we appreciate these possibilities,we are concerned that we have not yet seen the actual outline of how such a study would be conducted. This information is essential in order to actively seek funding for such a study and we have been asking for this information for some time. We are, therefore, specifically requesting that this information be provided to us in six months and that endorsements for such a study be sought from jurisdictions in the Bay Area and the BAAQMD's Advisory Committee and Board of Directors in order to move the possible funding of such a study ahead as quickly as possible. - 2 - S� L Health Services Department Public Health Division 'i OFFICE OF THE DIRECTOR - Administrative Offices O' .')Illl�lla -� •,� 20 Allen Street Martinez,California 94553 O (415)646-4416 COUK' June 14, 1989 To: Supervisor Sunne McPeak Supervisor Tom Powers Internal Operations Comm From: Wendel Brunner, M.D. Director of Public Health Re: Potential Funding Sources For Prospective Cancer Study and Cancer Prevention Interventions We were asked to report to the I.O. Committee on potential funding sources for a prospective cancer study. We have identified a number of such sources, and have begun to discuss the kinds of prospective cancer proposals that might be funded in Contra Costa County with potential funding contacts . At the same time we have been looking for funding sources for cancer prevention interventions, including occupational and environmentally induced cancers as well as life style cancer causes, which could be implemented through the auspices of Bay Area Cancer Coalition. In addition to the National Cancer Institute, we have identified several other significant sources of potential funding. Those include the Centers for Disease Control Chronic Disease Surveillance Section, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) , the Agency for Toxics Substances and Disease Registries, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, and private industry. The CDC Chronic Disease Surveillance Section is interested in developing cancer and other chronic disease surveillance mechanisms and may be interested in following cancer rates prospectively in various parts of the Bay Area. That section has an existing cooperative agreement with the State Department of Health Services (DOHS) which is administered by Dr. George Kaplan of DOHS, who is a member of our Public and Environmental Health Advisory Board. We are working with Dr. Kaplan as he prepares for a renewal of his cooperative agreement to see if the CDC would be interested in some A372 (4188) aspects of the prospective cancer study in Contra Costa County. We are also proposing Bay Area wide cancer surveillance activities which the Bay Area Cancer Coalition could use to analyze cancer trends on a regional basis. The Chronic Surveillance Branch at CDC is interested in developing specific surveillance with worker groups or industrial cohorts, which would be particularly applicable to the prospective cancer study. The National Cancer Institute put out two small RFP's earlier this year for cancer identification and interventions in the industrial work force. Those programs would consider both occupational cancers and life style induced cancers . We have reason to believe that the NCI will come out with further, more extensive, RFP's along those same lines . We have been working with Dr. Don Austin of the DOHS Cancer Epidemiology program and Dr. Anna Osario of the DOHS Occupational Health program to outline joint Contra Costa County-State DOHS responses to these anticipated RFP's . In addition, Dr. Osario is investigating NIOSH, which has been promoting small business initiatives around work place carcinogens. NIOSH has recently suffered about 40% reductions in funding, however, so the prospects from that source are unclear. An intriguing funding source, particularly for Contra Costa County, is the Agency for Toxics Substances and Disease Registries, which is maintained in conjunction with the federal Superfund hazardous waste site program. That agency is interested in funding intervention programs targeted to industry and communities which use coalitions involving voluntary health agencies, industry, local health departments, and community groups . Such an approach is particularly suited to the methods of the Contra Costa County Health Services Department and the Bay Area Cancer Coalition. Working with private industry to further the implementation of a prospective cancer study has also proceeded. Don Austin, before he left the Tumor Registry, developed a collaborative program with Dow Chemical to link their employee cohort with the Tumor Registry to study the cancer rates among their employees . Dr. Eva Glazer, currently working with the Tumor Registry, has continued that approach, and has been meeting with representatives of Shell, Unocal, and Chevron to see if a similar program could be implemented 'in those sites in Contra Costa County. Our Health Services Department has been supportive of those efforts. Identification of federal funds. for our local public health projects generally depends on a close collaborative relationship between the local and state health services departments. That collaboration with our county and other counties in the Bay Area and the State DOHS has been facilitated by the location of key State DOHS programs here in the Bay Area. Those programs include the Tumor Registry which has been of such assistance both to our Health Services Department and to the Bay Area Cancer Coalition, Epidemiological Studies and Assessment, Toxic Hazard Evaluation, 2 ♦ p Occupational Health, Air Pollution, Human Population Laboratory, and Birth Defects Registries . The location of those programs in the Bay Area has facilitated also the collaboration with the Bay Area academic institutions, including the University of California at Berkeley School of Public Health, the University of California School of Medicine at San Francisco, and Stanford University Medical School and Health Promotion Research Center. This collaboration between the Bay Area local health departments, the State Department of Health Services programs, and the academic institutions provides the opportunity to create and implement some of the most innovative and advanced public health programs in the country. It is that collaboration which makes possible activities such as the Bay Area Cancer Coalition, and it makes conceivable projects like the prospective cancer study. The State Health Services Department is planning, apparently for administrative reasons, to consolidate these programs in Sacramento. As a first step, they have announced their intention to move the Tumor Registry and staff out of the Bay Area. Such a move will be extremely disruptive to both the Bay Area Cancer Coalition and to our efforts to implement 'a prospective cancer study. Not only will the convenient access be eliminated, including the participation of key State DOHS personnel on our advisory boards, but the move will entail a major turnover in staffing, as Bay Area professionals working for DOHS seek other employment. I am concerned about the impact of these moves on the quality of public health activities in the Bay Area region. WB:rm cc: Mark Finucane, Health Services Director 3