12. CONCLUSIONS

Results of the Environmental Health Monitoring System for 2003 are a standard comprehensive data series that has been obtained in the tenth year of monitoring activities. They provide important background information for both the national authorities involved in health risk management and the general public interested in active health protection. These comprehensive data indicative of environmental pollution levels and population health status in the Czech Republic are also an information source for other countries worldwide taking part in commercial and cultural contacts.

The most relevant findings of the Monitoring System are as follows:

From estimation of oral exposure (exposure from food and drinking water) to chemicals, it follows that in monitoring network the exposure standards are derived by an average person in limited measure. Evaluation of inhalation exposure is complicated by high variability in contaminant concentrations depending on locality (city vs. countryside), environment (outdoor vs. indoor environment), profession, lifestyle etc. Evaluation of potential population exposure to mean concentration levels of pollutants in outdoor air in monitored cities shows that a part of urban population are exposed on a permanent basis to high levels of hazardous pollutants exceeding the exposure standards.

It is not possible to determine any safe concentration or exposure standard for mutagenic and carcinogenic substances in view of their no-threshold effects; only socially allowable health risks can be established. Therefore, it is necessary to reduce the population exposure to these chemicals or keep it as low level as is reasonably possible.

To apply such a strategy where it is most needed, systematic monitoring of hazardous pollutants in the environment and their health effects and monitoring-based health risk estimates are necessary. Monitoring of the environment and population health will be helpful in progressive improvement of pollutant exposure levels and health parameters which should become comparable with those reported in the EU countries, and compatible with sustainability of life.

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