Inégalités environnementales

Analyzing the relationship between environment and health has become a major issue for public health as focused in French national plans for health and environment. To respond to this priority, it appears as a necessity to develop tools able to link and analyze environmental quality data and health indicator. The objective of this work is to develop a GIS (Geographic Information System)-based platform combining environment and population information to map environmental disparities and detect vulnerable populations. To achieve this objective, combining exposure assessment and spatial data is a fundamental prerequisite that first implies to overcome different scientific limitations such as the linkage of the several databases to describe the global source-effect chain at a fine scale. A stochastic multimedia exposure model allows the assessment of the transfer of contaminants from the environment (via air, soil, water, food chain) to population. In this article, we performed a risk assessment of metals exposure (lead and chromium), with a resolution of 1 km, in two regions of France. Exposure pathways considered include ingestion of soil, vegetation, meat, egg, milk, fish and drinking water. Exposure scenarios were defined for different reference groups (age groups, dietary properties, fraction of food produced locally). The final aim of this project is an integrated tool where the sources of contaminants, environmental media, risk assessments, and health data will be linked by a GIS platform offering a set of statistical tools to analyze relationships between geography, environment and human health.Les inégalités environnementales se fondent sur le constat de disparités très fortes marquant des territoires et des individus face aux dégradations de l’environnement. Dans ces zones, les populations apparaissent davantage exposées aux effets directs et indirects (via la chaîne alimentaire) des pollutions de l’air, du sol ou de l’eau. Les actions pouvant contribuer à l’identification de ces points noirs puis à l’évaluation et à la réduction des expositions afin de protéger la santé des populations concernées constituent un axe prioritaire du second Plan national santé environnement et du Contrat d’objectifs 2011- 2015 de l’INERIS. Dans ce contexte, les Systèmes d’information géographique (SIG) sont communément utilisés pour appréhender l’exposition, en couplant des données de différents types