Planning and Childhood Health

From article by Marissa Ramirez on Sustainable Cities Collective:

"It is now well understood that environmental factors such as poor air quality and food deserts, for example, contribute to a familiar list of ailments, including asthma and obesity. But developing research indicates that our environment can also affect our gene expression."

"In an article on poverty and illness published last month in The New Yorker, Paul Tough reported that neurobiologists have found that adversity in early childhood, such as living in unsafe conditions, economic hardship, violence or neglect from families, causes acute and chronic stress responses at the molecular level. This modifies the chemistry of DNA in the brain in such a way as to have an adverse effect on adulthood."

"While planners may not be performing genetic analysis in the near future, we should account for environmental damages from health issues at the molecular level. Finally, we need additional collaboration among the disciplines of medicine, environment and urban planning to inform the best community development and design."