Closing Plenary. The closing plenary session opened with a talk by Mr. Robert Dwyer of the International Copper Association (ICA) in which he described the organization’s activities, which include providing risk assessment trainings to ICA members, participating in copper exposure studies, working on lifecycle issues of copper use (including promoting recyclability) and advertising copper’s anti-microbial properties. Professor John P. Holdren of the Woods Hole Research Center and Harvard University gave a talk which examined what science has been discovering about the intersection of environment, health, and sustainable well-being, with particular attention to quantifiable measures of impact and to the implications of emerging science for the policy choices that society faces. Dr. Genandrialine Peralta of the University of the Philippines spoke on emerging environmental problems in Asia, their relationship to adverse health effects, and some of the initiatives being designed to address them. Emerging issues include electronic waste; old and new persistent organic pollutants (POPs); pharmaceuticals in wastewater and water resources; naturally occurring fluoride (and also fluoride in fluoridated drinking water); contaminated air, soil and groundwater from volatile organic contaminants (VOCs); hazardous waste from industries; disinfection by-products in water supply; cyanobacteria or blue green algae in rivers, lakes and beaches; and effects of climate change. Dr. Peralta cited the need to increase regional cooperation and information sharing. Mr. Harpreet Singh Giani, a barrister in India, gave a thought-provoking talk about the hard choices that must be made in order to balance the needs of unborn generations with the needs of those who live in the world today in terms of laws addressing environmental issues. Dr. Jenny Pronzuk of the World Health Organization (WHO) focused on children’s environmental health. Children, who are uniquely vulnerable to environmental hazards, are now exposed to "old" poisons, such as lead and pesticides (that remain as environmental toxicants in affluent countries) and also to an increasing number of "new chemicals" found in household products, agricultural products, cosmetics and toys. In developing areas, the impact of adverse environments is higher and children may lose more healthy life years per capita than children in developed countries. Dr. Pronczuk presented strategies to address some of the challenges identified, such as education and outreach; training health care providers; promoting collaborative research; implementing successful prevention and education 'models'; and building partnerships for action. Dr. William Suk of the National Institute of Environmental Heath Sciences delivered a presentation which focused on the growing recognition of the relationship between environmental exposures, genetics and disease. Dr. Suk emphasized the need to collect higher quality and more coordinated local and global data on environmental exposures and to relate these exposures to disease outcomes. He proposed developing a global, strategic, network to understand the relationship between environmental exposure and ill health. Multi-disciplinary research programs need to be developed and implemented with a focus on better understanding the relationships between environment, genes and disease and designing interventions that will improve the health of all populations.