We can't find the internet
Attempting to reconnect
Something went wrong!
Hang in there while we get back on track
Sustaining Life: Human Health–Planetary Health Linkages
Summary
This chapter introduces the Planetary Health framework, which treats human and environmental health as inseparable, using examples like climate change, chemical contamination, and biodiversity loss. Microplastic pollution fits within this framework as a chemical contamination threat that simultaneously harms ecosystems and human health.
Our beautiful planet has been profoundly altered by human activities. Climate change, biodiversity loss, pollution, land use changes, and disrupted cycles of water, nitrogen, and phosphorus, to name several alterations, in turn have far-reaching impacts on human health, especially targeting the most vulnerable. Planetary Health approaches the health of people and the health of the planet as inextricably linked. This chapter introduces the Planetary Health framework by exploring four examples: climate change, chemical contamination, land use changes, and biodiversity loss. It concludes by considering innovative ways of thinking, and novel ethical considerations, raised by the current crisis of planetary degradation.
Sign in to start a discussion.
More Papers Like This
The One Health Concept
This article explains the One Health concept, which recognizes that human health, animal health, and environmental health are deeply interconnected. Environmental threats like pollution, including microplastic contamination, affect all three domains simultaneously. The framework is relevant to understanding microplastic risks because plastics move through ecosystems, accumulate in animals, and ultimately reach humans through the food chain and environment.
Aquatic one health framework: Integrating ocean ecosystems and human well-being
This paper introduces an Aquatic One Health framework that integrates ocean ecosystem health with human and animal wellbeing, discussing how marine pollutants including microplastics form interconnected threats that require coordinated environmental and public health responses.
Die Bedeutung der Konzepte One Health und Planetary Health für die Umweltmedizin im 21. Jahrhundert
This review examined how One Health and Planetary Health frameworks are essential for 21st-century environmental medicine, emphasizing the interconnected threats from chemical pollutants, microplastics, and climate change to both human and ecosystem health.
Planetary Health: Safeguarding Human Health and the Environment in the Anthropocene
This book on Planetary Health framed environmental degradation as a direct threat to human health across domains from pandemics to chronic disease to mental health, arguing that transformative changes in energy, food, housing, and transport systems are needed to simultaneously improve health outcomes and protect the natural systems on which human civilization depends.
Linked Effects: Examining How Microplastic Pollution Affects Human Health and Marine Ecosystems
This paper reviews the dual threat of microplastic pollution to both human health and marine ecosystems, examining how particles smaller than 5 mm from consumer products and environmental degradation permeate global environments. The authors link microplastic exposure to physiological harm in marine organisms and potential toxicological risks in humans through the food chain.