How is a good environment good for health?

Although it cannot be seen with the naked eye, it is the living environment that is affecting your health every second of every day. Where you live, what you eat, and how you interact with the world around you are all important factors in good health.

People often think that they can take initiative to protect their health, like exercising diligently or sticking to a vaccination schedule. However, many external factors can affect your health, such as causes of stress and quality of life.
Many people think that a healthy environment consists of clean air and water, but there are actually other ways the world around us can affect our physical and mental well-being. Physical, chemical, and biological factors that you cannot control directly can affect your health. For example, if you live in a neighborhood with unsafely constructed sidewalks or polluted air, it may be difficult for you to go outside for walks and exercise. Likewise, your home's building materials, the insects that live around, and the food you have access to can all affect the health of your family.
According to statistics, more than 12 million people around the world die every year because of living or working in an unhealthy environment. Environmental pollutants can cause many health problems, such as respiratory disease, heart disease, and certain types of cancer. Low-income people often live in polluted areas with unsafe drinking water. Children and pregnant women are at higher risk of pollution-related health problems.
For example, air pollution causes more than 6 million deaths every year. At heart and respiratory diseases. Air pollution has also been shown to exacerbate COVID-19 deaths.
Every day 4,000 children die from diseases caused by contaminated water and inadequate sanitation. Toxins found in plants and animals can accumulate in the human body if ingested. Fresh water, sea and land resources are devastated by pollution from urban, industrial and agricultural waste; wastewater; power production; heavy industry and automotive. Harm to natural resources then adversely affects public health.
Humans use more than 100,000 different elements and chemical compounds - including lead, mercury, cadmium and persistent organic pollutants. If not managed properly, chemicals can cause serious harm to health, causing acute poisoning, cancer, birth defects, neurological disorders, hormone disorders and other diseases.

2.1. Air Quality Humans need air to survive, but you don't always pay attention to keeping the environment clean. It is this that can significantly affect your health.
Poor air quality has been linked to a wide range of health problems, including sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), lung cancer, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Air pollution has also been linked to low birth weight babies. A study published in 2005 found that babies whose mothers were exposed to high levels of ozone during the second and third trimesters were more likely to be born with low birth weight. The effects were similar to those seen in infants born to mothers who smoked during pregnancy.
2.2. Clean water and personal hygiene According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), an estimated 780 million people worldwide do not have access to safe drinking water, and 2.5 billion (or nearly 1/3 of the Earth's population) lacks adequate sanitation services (like clean bathrooms). The impact of this causes about 2,200 children worldwide to die every day from diarrheal diseases related to improper water and sanitation.
Upgrading water purification and disinfection systems has greatly reduced common diseases, such as typhoid in the United States. By one estimate, for every $1 invested in clean water technology, the country will receive back $23 in savings in related health and social costs. Clean water contributes largely to the reduction of child mortality in the country.
2.3. Toxic substances and hazardous wastes Many materials needed for the development of industries and technologies, such as heavy metals or some plastics, can also injure the human body and even lead to serious health conditions. serious medical condition.
One of the most recent examples is the water crisis in Flint (Michigan state, USA). In 2015, news that the drinking water contained high levels of lead caused widespread outrage and fear in families. If children ingest or ingest lead it can lead to long-term health complications, including brain damage. Economically disadvantaged children will be most affected. As can be seen, environmental health problems will hurt people who already have high-risk health conditions.
2.4. Housing and public places You spend most of your time at home, work or school. Therefore, it is important that these places be safe with minimal risks as well as conducive to a healthy lifestyle. For example, when living in a violent neighborhood, families may not get outside to exercise. When roads are not properly maintained, more traffic accidents can result.
Many remote areas do not have adequate grocery stores, people often have to rely on a few stores nearby to shop. Not only does this cost them more, but most importantly, there are fewer quality fresh fruit and vegetable options - a key ingredient in a healthy diet. For families in these areas, experts urge residents to grow and harvest their own fresh produce, improving transport access to grocery stores and full farmers' markets.

Over the coming decades, health professionals are bracing for a warmer, wetter climate that is likely to pose or exacerbate threats to public health globally.
For example, as temperatures rise, disease-carrying mosquitoes can live in areas that were previously too cold for them, increasing the number of people affected by diseases such as dengue and malaria. As sea levels rise, coastal cities and island nations are at risk of flooding, forcing millions of people to relocate to crowded areas where disease can spread rapidly.
As extreme weather events become more frequent, successive storms and floods destroy homes, allow disease to spread, and leave millions of families without power.
Protecting the health of the planet is crucial to improving and maintaining the health of all populations around the globe. Although health outcomes have improved dramatically over the past century – especially in affluent nations like the United States – environmental hazards and infectious diseases remain potential risks. Nowadays, people travel farther and more often, which is also easy to spread disease. War conflicts cause millions of people to flee their homes. An increase in cross-border and transcontinental migration will affect epidemic prevention efforts and overload existing infrastructure.

Unlike diet and exercise, many environmental health factors cannot be managed on an individual level. To combat the health risks posed by habitats, laws, policies, and programs often must be applied at the local, federal, and international levels.
For example, people cannot check the level of metals in their daily water. There is therefore a need for a comprehensive and coordinated effort within a broad system to protect the health and safety of communities nationally and globally.
Even so, there is much you can do to protect the environmental health and safety of the communities in which you live and around the planet. For example, improve air quality by cycling, taking public transport, or switching to working from home instead of driving to and from work.
You can check your home yourself for paint or lead or toxic gas lines to avoid exposure to hazardous substances. Besides, you can also talk to local authorities and businesses about investing in health activities, ensuring people have access to a clean and safe environment to live and work. and playing.

References: webmd.com, unep.org, health.gov, who.int