Our Mission & Vision
The Collaborative for Health and Environment (CHE) is an action-oriented learning community that amplifies the latest scientific evidence and shares knowledge and resources to protect individual and collective health.
We envision a world where all people live free from environmental risks that harm human health, and we strongly believe in the following values:
Evidence-based science- Prevention-oriented behaviors and policies
- The power of education
- Civility in discourse
- Diversity of engagement
- The power of community
- Excellence in execution
- Hope for what’s possible
- Cutting edge innovation
- Transparent information and governance
The CHE consensus statement reflects our mission, vision and values, and identifies the facts and principles upon which signatories agree. Signatories to CHE's consensus statement include more than 5000 individuals and organizations in 87 countries and all 50 US states, including scientists, health professionals, health-affected groups, nongovernmental organizations, and other concerned citizens.
CHE's History & Impact
In 2022, we celebrated CHE's 20th anniversary with a series of activities and publications, including an in-person gathering with presentations from many of CHE's founders. You'll find a summary of these events and resources here.
Since its founding in 2002, CHE has fostered numerous interdisciplinary collaborations that have advanced disease prevention and health promotion in significant way. Key accomplishments include:
- Establishing the first major academic program in the US on reproductive health and the environment (housed at the University of California, San Francisco – UCSF);
- Creating an award-winning eBook on multiple contributors to specific health concerns with continuing education credits for health professionals available from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention;
- Engaging the President’s Cancer Panel in the first major review of the scientific literature on links between toxic exposures and cancer;
- Educating national learning and developmental disabilities organizations about the emerging science and empowering them to become influential voices in reducing exposures to toxic chemicals through chemical policy reform initiatives and market campaigns;
- Producing over 60 publications, for researchers, health professionals and lay constituencies to better understand new research and how it can be applied in “real world” ways;
- Developing scientific consensus statements that have advanced research on environmental links to a wide range of diseases and disabilities
Read more about CHE's history here
Past Conferences & Meetings
Over the years CHE has organized major conferences to bring emerging environmental health science to a wide range of audiences and leverage strategic initiatives to reduce environmental contributors to diseases and disabilities.
All of our meetings, including our inaugural conference in 2002, have featured leading researchers who study the links between environmental exposures and various health endpoints. Some events have focused on educating specific audiences, like those in the learning and developmental disabilities sector or health professionals. Others have been solely for scientists to develop consensus statements about links between toxic exposures and particular health concerns, such as infertility and Parkinson's disease.
We've also organized meetings for those interested in children's health, and others that include discussions of multiple, interacting environmental factors that can impact health across the lifespan. We've also offered trainings for smaller groups targeting an integral concern, such as environmental justice.
Find descriptions and outcomes of key gatherings here.
The Collaborative for Health and Environment is a program of Commonweal, a 501(c)(3) non-profit.