National Children's Center for Rural and Agricultural Health and Safety Celebrating 25 Years

Thursday, August 25th, 2022 -- 10:00 AM

The National Children’s Center for Rural and Agricultural Health and Safety, part of the National Farm Medicine Center, is celebrating 25 years of preventing injuries associated with the agricultural worksite, one of the nation’s most hazardous worksites and the only one where children of any age may be present.

The center was established in 1997 with funding from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It is one of 11 NIOSH-funded Agricultural Centers, and the only center dedicated to childhood agricultural injury prevention.

Barbara Lee, Ph.D., director of the National Children’s Center since its inception, recalls that before the National Children’s Center, “there were relatively few resources and virtually no guidance on strategies to safeguard working and non-working children on farms.”

The national approach to childhood agricultural injury prevention has paid off. Among early Children’s Center interventions was the development of guidelines for parents to match chores with their child’s developmental and physical capabilities.

Follow-up data demonstrated a 56 percent decline in youth farm injury rates from 1998 to 2009, which ranked among Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report’s Ten Great Public Health Achievements 2001-2010.

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