The National Children’s Study is a project authorized by Congress and which is conducted by several federal agencies like the National Institutes for Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, The U.S Environmental Protection Agency.

Basically, the National Children’s Study aims at observing the life of children from before birth to the age of 21, hoping that this research will help solve adult diseases that have their roots in childhood. The finds in this study will help people suffering from diseases such as autism, asthma, learning disabilities, diabetes and obesity.

The National Children’s Study has been in planning from the year 2000, when methods of attracting volunteers where thought of. This is the largest study of this kind conducted in the U.S and the founders of the project hope that the results, besides helping crucial issues in the fight with childhood-rooted diseases, will also help lowering health care costs. This way the $3.2 billion, the project needs in order to function, will pay off even in the conditions of only lowering health care costs with 1%. On the long run, this might be a major breakthrough in medicine and in solving some of the problems with which world deals todasy.

The team that will manage the project can only be described as a “dream team”, the best of the best being trusted with the care and the research of the project. The research will be conducted in 27 centers and after the program becomes fully operational, researchers hope that they will be able to conduct their work in 40 centers, all around the nation.

The study will need as volunteers women before they give birth or even before conceiving in order for the research to be truly precise. Even if all this is pretty hard to swallow, think of the importance of this study and that time will certainly prove its value.