Recognition that the environment is a determinant of health is deeply rooted in the heritage of nursing. Environmental hazards and their effects on health rarely have simple solutions that can be managed by one discipline alone. Environmental health issues are complex in nature and the science is developing rapidly. Primary prevention strategies often involve the participation of professionals ...

The World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) was held in Johannesburg in 2002 to review progress since the Rio conference in 1992, and to agree a new global deal on sustainable development. Unlike its predecessor, it was primarily concerned with implementation rather than with new treaties and targets, although a number of new targets were agreed, for example one on sanitation. Failure to...

38 Kreisberg—Medical Practice Management Healthcare in the United States continues to face numerous challenges, including inaccessibility of services, rising costs, and medical pollution, as well as an increase in environmentally related illness.1,2 In fact, the World Health Organization’s Millennium Ecosystem Assessment 2005 found that 25% of the world’s burden of disease comes from poor envir...

In recent years, environmental health science has broadened the scope of its inquiries, expanding its investigations beyond the effects of single pollutants on individuals to incorporate the entire panorama of external factors that may affect people's health. Consideration of the health impacts of the built environment-the human-modified places where we live, work, play, shop, and more-has been...

Physicians form a vital front in recognizing unusual clinical presentations that could herald a health threat. In the Flint water crisis, physicians can be credited with playing critical roles in both uncovering the crisis and providing leadership when government failed to respond effectively. Yet most physicians in Flint were not formally trained in advocacy or leadership and might have recogn...

In October 1990 East and West Germany were reunited. Economic pressures, civil unrest, and the decision of the leadership of the USSR not to back further repression brought down the East German government. With Soviet consent reunification became possible. This seemed the best of all worlds for stability in central Europe and freedom and prosperity for the East Germans. However, the path to suc...