Environmental Health Division
Highlights
Environmental Health Division
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April is National Healthy Homes Month
During National Healthy Homes Month, make your home safer and healthier. The theme for April 2025 is Better Housing, Stronger America. This theme emphasizes the many benefits of creating and providing safe, healthy, affordable, and resilient housing for everyday Americans, including but not limited to improvements in individual health, cost savings, job creation, increases in home value, better educational outcomes, reduced spending, reduction in energy use, and, ultimately, stronger communities. A healthy home is key to everyone’s health and well-being. The MDH Healthy Homes Minnesota site has resources on how to find and safely fix residential hazards such as, lead-based paint (LBP), asbestos, and radon hazards, ensuring our air and home is clean and water is safe to drink.
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Health officials update fish consumption guidance in some waterbodies due to PFAS
The Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) has updated its fish consumption guidance due to per-and polyfluoralkyl substances (PFAS) found in fish from some waterbodies in 10 Minnesota counties. In the Twin Cities metro area, some waterbodies in Anoka, Carver, Dakota, Hennepin, Ramsey and Washington counties are impacted. In Greater Minnesota, some waterbodies in Douglas, Martin, McLeod and St. Louis counties are impacted. More information can be found on the April 17, 2025 news release.
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Test to be sure all’s well with your water well
More than 4 million Minnesotans rely on groundwater for their drinking water, and 1.1 million of them get that groundwater from a private well.
Wells can be a source of high-quality drinking water, but they require regular maintenance. If groundwater becomes contaminated, it can affect the health of those who drink it. More information can be found at Water Quality and Testing.
The Minnesota Department of Health and Tap-In Collaborative are offering free water test kits for private well households in eight southeast Minnesota counties in response to requests from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The eight counties eligible for these test kits are: Dodge, Fillmore, Goodhue, Houston, Mower, Olmsted, Wabasha, or Winona counties. Test kits will include analysis for five common contaminants in well water including: coliform bacteria, nitrate, arsenic, lead, and manganese. Funding for the test kits is provided by the Clean Water Fund.
MDH is currently providing free well water testing kits and possibly bottled water to homes in eight southeast Minnesota counties who have nitrate concentrations high than 10 parts per million and a pregnant person or baby under 1 year of age in the home. More information can be found at Response to Nitrate in Southeast Minnesota.
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Working Carbon Monoxide Alarms
MDH reminds people to make sure you have working CO alarms within 10 feet of every room used for sleeping. According to the Consumer Product Safety Commission’s February 2024 Report (PDF), non-fire CO deaths are most associated with furnaces, portable heaters, and portable generators. So, we recommend that you get your furnace inspected annually. Also, having a CO alarm with a digital read out is a good idea. If the reading is anything but 0 ppm, then it is a good idea to find out the cause of the CO problem. More information can be found at Carbon Monoxide (CO) Poisoning in Your Home.
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Lead in drinking water in early care and education facilities map
Child care centers, public and charter schools are required to report lead in drinking water results and remediation actions. Results by facility or address can viewed on the interactive map tool located on the Results and Metrics webpage.
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PFAS and products
Per- and polyfluoroalkyls (PFAS) are a family of human-made chemicals that have been widely used since the 1950s in consumer products and are a public and environmental health concern. There is a risk of PFAS exposure and pollution whenever a product containing PFAS is made, used, or disposed of. To find out more about PFAS and products, how to reduce your exposure, and what Minnesota is doing to help, visit the PFAS and Products page.
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Licensing System
Minnesota Department of Health Licensing System is available for Certified Food Protection Manager (CFPM), Registered Environmental Health Specialists/Registered Sanitarians (REHS/RS), Lead and Asbestos.
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New District Office locations
The Rochester District Office and the St. Cloud District Office moved to new locations.
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EH topics
The Environmental Health Division (EH) works on multiple topics to support the health of all Minnesotans. You can search these topics on the Topic Index webpage.
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Minnesota Office of Accessibility
State of Minnesota’s free e-Learning program on how to create accessible documents.
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