Collaboration between centres of the World Health Organization : Italy supports a Mexican university

BACKGROUND: Mexico is the third most populous country in America. A sizeable percentage of Mexicans live under unfavorable conditions such as malnutrition, marginalization and overcrowding. Environmental injustice includes: indigenous exposed to wood smoke, families living in mining zones, children working and living in garbage dumps and brick factories. Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, pesticides, electronic waste and heavy metals exposure represent a health risk. These pollutants can induce biochemical lesions as DNA damage and epigenetic changes which could modif the gene expression profile of each individual. OBJECTIVES: The aim of this work is to create an Italy-Mexico collaboration (within the context of WHO collaborating centres) between the Center of Molecular and Genetic Epidemiology, University of Milan and the University of San Luis Potosi, will allow molecular approaches to develop early indicators of susceptibility to adult disease and cancer.