2nd International Conference of Environmental Medicine

The Italian Society of Environmental Medicine (SIMA) and the University "Gabriele d'Annunzio" of Chieti-Pescara are glad to present the Second International Conference of Environmental Medicine "Environmental Exposures and Epigenetics: Protecting Children's Health", taking place on November 20^th and 21^st 2025 in Chieti (Auditorium "Gabriele d'Annunzio") during the annual celebration of the International Children's Right Day.

The event is organized in collaboration with the Environmental Health Research Organization (EHRO), the Spanish Society of Environmental Medicine an Changes (SESMA), and the Laureate Science Alliance (LSA).

Fostering the application of precautionary principle, our aim is to promote a new vision of Medicine and Epidemiology focused on Primary Prevention of the most common diseases or conditions where the role of environmental exposures has been already investigated in medical literature.

Specific preventive actions must be adopted based on risk factors which characterize populations at the local level, also taking into account social determinants of health, as fighting against social inequalities can contribute to prevent diseases and cancers. Public policies should be focused on keeping people healthy, starting from children and adolescents, as well as young women and men.

Therefore, we ask our colleagues worldwide to come together and address the challenge of this new vision of Medicine able to change the world. To accomplish this goal, epidemiological observations (which represent the “true facts”) should guide the development of consistent etiological theories for cancer, as well as for all the other conditions which are also dramatically increasing even in paediatric and younger ages, such as malformations, autoimmune and metabolic diseases (including type 1 diabetes) or neurodegenerative and neurodevelopmental disorders (i.e., autism), taking into account the interactions between epigenome, lifestyle and environment. The adoption of this new perspective in Medicine and Epidemiology will ultimately turn into unexpected opportunities both for pharmacological and non-pharmacological primary prevention, in order to reduce the burden of the new epidemics of the XXI century which affect children and young people as well as adults of any age.

The choice of University of Chieti as conference venue is not a case, as it is internationally recognized in the field of epigenetics.

We are waiting for you in Italy to start changing the world by starting to change the way we look at Medicine.