Why does the environment affect health

A reduction in mortality from starvation or disease can lead to overpopulation, which stresses the environment in many different ways—increasing use of fossil fuels, clearing of land, generating pollution and waste, and so on. Relationships between human health and the environment raise many ethical, social, and legal dilemmas by forcing people to choose among competing values. These considerations can be grouped into the following categories.

Managing benefits and risks. Many of the issues at the intersection of health and the environment have to do with managing benefits and risks. For example, pesticides play an important role in increasing crop yields, but they can also pose hazards to human health and the environment. Alternatives to pesticide use create trade-offs in health. The extreme action of stopping all pesticide uses could significantly reduce agricultural productivity, leading to food shortages and increased food prices, which would, in turn, increase starvation in some parts of the world.

Public health authorities have opted to regulate the use of pesticides to enhance food production while minimizing damage to the environment and human health. Energy production and use helps sustain human life, but it can also pose hazards to human health and the environment, such as air and water pollution, oil spills, and destruction of habitats.

No issue demands greater care in balancing benefits and risks than global warming. A significant percentage of global climate change is due to the human production of greenhouse gases. Climate change is likely to cause tremendous harm to the environment and human health, but taking steps to drastically reduce greenhouse gases could have adverse consequences for global, national, and local economies, which would result in a general decline in human health and health care.

For example, greatly increasing taxes on fossil fuels would encourage greater fuel efficiency and lower carbon dioxide emissions, but it would also increase the price of transportation, which would lead to widespread inflation and reduced consumer spending power. For many years some politicians and scholars argued that we should wait for more evidence of global warming before taking action, since the steps needed to prevent or minimize it could have disastrous economic consequences.

Others have argued that society cannot afford to wait for complete evidence because the consequences of global climate change could be catastrophic and irreversible. This difference of opinion raises fundamental questions about the ethics of risk management: what is the role of scientific evidence in decision-making? Most regulatory agencies in the U. Agencies often refrain from making regulatory decisions until they have complete scientific evidence. Many commentators and organizations have endorsed an alternative approach called the precautionary principle.

The idea is that society should take reasonable steps to prevent or minimize irreversible and significant harm, even when scientific evidence is incomplete, and that regulatory decisions to avoid harm need not await the accumulation of complete scientific evidence. Although the precautionary principle has gained many adherents, especially in Europe and California, it remains controversial.

Social justice. Managing benefits and risks raises social justice concerns. In general, people with lower socioeconomic status have greater exposure to certain detrimental environmental conditions in their homes or at work, such as lead, mercury, pesticides, toxic chemicals, or air and water pollution.

Communities and nations should minimize such injustices when making decisions such as choosing a site for a factory, a power plant, or waste dump, or regulating safety in the workplace. The decision-making process should be fair, open, and democratic, so that people who will be affected by environmental risks have a voice in these deliberations and can make their concerns known. When drafting and implementing environmental health regulations, it is important to consider vulnerable subpopulations.

A vulnerable subpopulation is a group with an increased susceptibility to the adverse effects of an environmental risk factor, due to their age, genetics, health status, or some other condition. The properties of certain hazardous chemicals cause them to persist in the environment and bioaccumulate in the food chain, which means there will be a considerable time lag before reductions in emissions translate into reduced exposure.

In addition, the volume and range of chemicals in use today and the ongoing growth in chemical production suggests that human and environmental exposure will continue to increase. This raises concerns about the health effects of exposure to mixtures of chemicals over our lifetime, in particular during vulnerable life stages, such as early childhood, pregnancy and old age.

The impacts of climate change also pose immediate threats to health, in terms of heat waves and shifts in the patterns of infectious diseases and allergens. In general, bathing water quality is of a high standard across the EU, with the quality of bathing waters consistently improving over time as a result of investment in the sewerage system, better waste water treatment and the reduction of pollution from farms.

A growing body of evidence suggests that environmental risks are not evenly distributed across society , but rather disproportionally affect socially disadvantaged and vulnerable population groups. Socially disadvantaged people may be more sensitive to the impacts of environmental stressors due to pre-existing health conditions, poor nutritional status and specific behaviours, such as smoking or inactivity.

They may also face constraints in adapting to and avoiding environmental risks. Recognising the intrinsic link between the state of the environment and quality of life, priority objective 3 of the Seventh Environment Action Programme 7th EAP aims 'to safeguard the Union's citizens from environment-related pressures and risks to health and well-being' EU, The profound dependency of human society on supporting ecosystems lies at the very core of the 7th EAP vision that 'in we live well, within the planet's ecological limits'.

A broad range of policies are in place at EU level to address environmental impacts on health. Some examples from the main environmental policy areas include:. The European Environment and Health Process, led by WHO Europe, aims to bring together the environment and health sectors, and promote joint solutions, in particular to address the environment-related health goals and targets of the Sustinable Development Agenda.

In the Ostrava Declaration of , ministers and representatives of countries in the WHO European Region set out an intersectoral and inclusive approach towards improving environmental health. The EEA is working with partners at national and international level to build the knowledge base on the linkages between the environment, health and well-being.

This includes work to explore how the environment contributes to human well-being, as well as work on exposure to and the health impacts of specific environmental stressors including air pollution, noise, chemicals and climate change. Ultimately, health outcomes result from the combination of exposures to environmental stressors over time, implying that assessments of environmental health should take an integrated approach.

The EEA is also developing a new line of work to explore how social and demographic factors influence the relationship between the environment and health. Well-known environmental stressors that affect human health are subject to regulatory control in Europe, with efforts underway to reduce exposure. However, there are also emerging issues for which environmental pathways and effects on health remain poorly understood.

These include issues such as anti-microbial resistance, or changes in human exposure to chemicals in products as we shift towards a circular economy and increase recycling. In terms of thematic work, the EEA delivers a range of assessments and indicators on air pollution, noise, chemicals and climate change adaption. The main aim of the initiative is to coordinate and advance human biomonitoring in Europe. Autism, for example, has been associated with an immune response in mothers that scientists hope someday could help identify the condition before a baby is even born.

Very early intervention could help children with autism — but only if their families have access to quality health care. People who are socially and economically disadvantaged carry a heavier burden of disease. Below is an infographic that explains how structural racism and health disparities have played out around the COVID pandemic in the United States.

Systematic assessments of the resilience of water supply and sanitation systems to climate change and inclusion of its impacts in water safety plans are needed Under the 6th EAP, the Thematic Strategy on the urban environment 73 highlights the consequences for human health of the environmental challenges facing cities, the quality of life of urban citizens and the performance of cities.

It aims to improve the urban environment, to make it more attractive and healthier to live, work and invest in, while trying to reduce the adverse environmental impacts on the wider environment. The quality of life and health of urban dwellers depends strongly on the quality of the urban environment, functioning in a complex system of interactions with social, economic, and cultural factors Green urban areas play an important role in this context.

Amultifunctional network of green urban areas is capable of delivering many environmental, social, and economic benefits: jobs, habitat maintenance; improved local air quality and recreation, to name a few. Health is generally perceived to be better by people living in more natural environments, with agricultural land, forests, grasslands or urban green spaces near the place of residence 76 Furthermore, the perceived availability of green urban areas has been shown to reduce annoyance due to noise Much progress has been achieved through dedicated approaches to improving the quality of the environment and reducing particular burdens on human health — but many threats remain.

The predominant drive for material well-being has played a major role in the biological and ecological disturbances witnessed today. Preserving and extending the benefits provided by the environment for human health and well-being will require continuous effort to improve the quality of the environment. Furthermore, these efforts need to be complemented by other measures, including significant changes in lifestyle and human behaviour, as well as consumption patterns.

Meanwhile, new challenges are emerging with a wide range of potential, highly uncertain, ecological and human health implications. In this context, technological advancements may provide new benefits — however, history also offers many examples of adverse health impacts from new technologies Nanotechnology, for example, may allow the development of new products and services which are capable of enhancing human health, conserving natural resources or protecting the environment.

However, the unique features of nanomaterials also raise concerns about potential environmental, health, occupational and general safety hazards. The understanding of nanotoxicity is in its infancy, as are methods for assessing and managing the risks inherent in the use of some materials.

The European Commission has, for example, consulted experts and the public regarding the benefits, risks, concerns and awareness of nanotechnologies to support the preparation of a new action plan for to The increasing awareness of multi-causality, complexity, and uncertainties also means that the EU Treaty principles of precaution and prevention are even more relevant than before.

More recognition of the limits of what we can know, in time to prevent harm, is called for, as is the need to act on sufficient, rather than overwhelming, evidence of the potential harms to health, given the pros and cons of action versus inaction. Note: Not all ecosystem changes are included. Some changes can have positive effects food production, for example. Source: Millennium Ecosystem Assessment l.

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Forgot your password? You are here: The European environment — state and The European environment — state and Synthesis The European environment — state and Chapter 5: environment, Note: new versions of the publication are available! This website has limited functionality with javascript off. Please make sure javascript is enabled in your browser. The European environment — state and outlook Menu The European environment — state and outlook knowledge for transition to a sustainable Europe SOER — The European environment — state and outlook The European environment — state and outlook All key facts Synthesis Translations The European environment — state and outlook Synthesis Legal notice Authors and acknowledgements SOER table of contents Key messages Chapter 1: the state of the environment in Europe Chapter 2: climate change Chapter 3: nature and biodiversity Chapter 4: natural resources and waste Chapter 5: environment, health and quality of life Chapter 6: links between environmental challenges List all.

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