Environmental health: an appraisal

Having taken note of the disturbing trend in the management of environmental issues, I considered it appropriate to make an appraisal of the situation in terms of human health. The World Health Organisation (WHO) has observed that over 70 per cent of all human ailments are influenced by environmental deterioration. The industries are the sources of hazardous emissions and effluents. The use of chemical insecticides and pesticides in agro management also leaves dangerous residues. Transport, whether land borne, water borne or airborne, does contaminate the environment. Public health infrastructure — sewage, garbage, drainage — has a detrimental impact on the environment. The food we eat, the water we drink and the house we live in are not free from contaminants, affecting our health, and causing a spectrum of ailments.

What is at stake is the way the environmental issues are handled. For over three decades, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has been deliberating on the environmental issues through a spectrum of expert groups and bodies from which "Sustainable Development" concept has emerged as a viable approach, in achieving an equitable complementarity in environment and development, by way of evolving mechanisms for checks and balances, in both ecology and economy, with total regard for stable livelihood opportunities and betterment of health.

I do believe that people's participation is inevitable in the successful conduct of both development and environment. But the tendency of people's groups and individuals is to highlight the environmental hazards leading to confusion, disinformation and panic of a tragedy facing the community. In fact, a totally scientific issue with achievable solutions is converted into a social issue or even a political issue. The net result is the cessation of the development process, or even closure of highly profitable establishments, disturbing the livelihood of the people.

In almost all agitational methods as instruments in highlighting an environmental issue, emotions of the community are triggered without any rationale, and without taking into account the degree of disruption to developmental activity and the means of livelihood of the people. It is therefore imperative that an agenda of sustainable development deserved to be put in place, powered by science and technology as the tools for bringing about complementarity in environment and development. In such a scheme, issues raised by the people may be addressed suitably through appropriate alternatives like detoxification of toxic effluent resources, quality certification of products and measures to reduce risks and betterment of safety systems.

In order to achieve the above desirable level of management, there is need to evolve policies, laws and other statutory measures, supported also by credible institutional expertise providing scientific inputs. In order to coordinate, manage and control the successful implementation of sustainable development alternative as a viable solution to environmental issues, a statutory body namely "Environmental Monitoring and Management Authority" be constituted with provision for accommodating people drawn from Academia, Technology, Management, and Government together with people's representatives.