Environmental Health: A Complex and Fundamental Issue

According to the WHO, environmental health encompasses aspects of human health, including quality of life, that are determined by the physical, chemical, biological, social, psychosocial, and aesthetic factors of our environment. It also concerns policies and practices for managing, mitigating, controlling, and preventing environmental factors that may affect the health of current and future generations. The WHO has shown that in Europe, environmental factors that could be prevented or eliminated cause 1.4 million deaths per year, accounting for at least 15% of all deaths.

Furthermore, the recent SARS-CoV-2 pandemic illustrates how, in the context of climate change, the interaction between infectious agents, hosts, and the environment lies at the heart of infectious disease outbreaks. Environmental health is a fundamental concern for our century.

Environment and health are thus closely intertwined, with numerous interactions. The field of environmental health is all the more vast because it takes into account environmental factors such as climate change or air pollution, as well as exposure to substances in the environments that surround and constitute people’s living conditions (rural or urban housing, housing quality), consumption habits (diet, everyday products, and common consumer goods), or the population’s work environment.

For many environmental hazards, it remains difficult even today to establish precise knowledge of their impacts on public health. In this context, the data generated for surveillance must inform hypotheses that are further explored through environmental health research.

Thus, environmental health is a priority area of Santé publique France’s work program.