TAILIEUCHUNG - Air and Water Pollution: Burden and Strategies for Control

The Clean Air Act of 1970 and its amendments (in 1977 and 1990) are crucial milestones in air pollution control history. They are a political response to the increasing concern of society about the environmental impact of fossil fuel utilization. Ironically, it is precisely this fossil fuel utilization that has provided society – and especially the industrialized nations – with the technical and economic means to achieve air pollution control. (Who was it that said, “Thou shalt bear the seeds of thy own destruction”?) It is important to emphasize that technological solutions are available today for reducing pollutant emissions from most sources to environmentally acceptable levels. Unfortunately, what. | Chapter 43 Air and Water Pollution Burden and Strategies for Control Tord Kjellstrom Madhumita Lodh Tony McMichael Geetha Ranmuthugala Rupendra Shrestha and Sally Kingsland Environmental pollution has many facets and the resultant health risks include diseases in almost all organ systems. Thus a chapter on air and water pollution control links with chapters on for instance diarrheal diseases chapter 19 respiratory diseases in children and adults chapters 25 and 35 cancers chapter 29 neurological disorders chapter 32 and cardiovascular disease chapter 33 as well as with a number of chapters dealing with health care issues. NATURE CAUSES AND BURDEN OF AIR AND WATER POLLUTION Each pollutant has its own health risk profile which makes summarizing all relevant information into a short chapter difficult. Nevertheless public health practitioners and decision makers in developing countries need to be aware of the potential health risks caused by air and water pollution and to know where to find the more detailed information required to handle a specific situation. This chapter will not repeat the discussion about indoor air pollution caused by biomass burning chapter 42 and water pollution caused by poor sanitation at the household level chapter 41 but it will focus on the problems caused by air and water pollution at the community country and global levels. Estimates indicate that the proportion of the global burden of disease associated with environmental pollution hazards ranges from 23 percent WHO 1997 to 30 percent Smith Corvalan and Kjellstrom 1999 . These estimates include infectious diseases related to drinking water sanitation and food hygiene respiratory diseases related to severe indoor air pollution from biomass burning and vectorborne diseases with a major environmental component such as malaria. These three types of diseases each contribute approximately 6 percent to the updated estimate of the global burden of disease WHO 2002 . As the World Health .

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