A British scientist, who was awarded the “Nobel prize in the environment”, warned that research has long ignored the impact of water pollution on human health.
Sir Andy Haines, who was unveiled Wednesday as the Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement Winner, said in an interview, that recent studies showing the severity of chemical pollution in rivers all over the globe are a wakeup call.
Sir Andy believes that river cleaning has been neglected in environmental health research. He supports the Telegraphs Clean Rivers campaign. This campaign calls for action to prevent water companies, urban agriculture, and other waste from polluting Britain’s beauty places.
He also said that a paper published earlier in the month, in which the UK’s rivers were ranked the worst for chemical pollution due to prescription drugs, showed how widespread and unanticipated this problem is.
Sir Andy said that pharmaceuticals can pollute water in high income countries, as well as in low income countries. Some cases of high levels of pharmaceuticals could be affecting ecosystems. This is a worrying trend.
He added that he thinks that’s just one example of an unexpected source of water pollution.
We also have other problems, like the overflowing of freshwater or marine ecosystems with agricultural runoff. For example, fertilisers can cause eutrophication. Ecosystems can collapse and become low in oxygen. River pollution is an important issue that needs to be highlighted more.
“Potentially disastrous” for your health
Sir Andy was awarded Tyler Prize after more than 30 years of research into the link between climate change, health, and the environment.
Although he began his career as a GP for North London, Sir Andy moved into research in 1991 and became one the first physicians to warn about the potentially disastrous effects of global warming. A piece in the British Medical Journal.
Later, he was a professor of Environmental Change and Public Health and was the director of London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine between 2001 and 2010.
Sir Andy was the one who told it. The TelegraphAlthough the health ramifications of climate change are better understood than 30 years ago, it is still a neglected topic in climate-change conversations.
COP26 showed that the health community was more represented than at previous COPs. However, it was mostly during side events so I still believe that health was marginalised in relative terms. It was not a major focus of preparations for COP nor was it a central focus of negotiations.
According to him, policy makers lack the urgency they should have.
Many decision-makers are unaware of the potential effects of climate change on human health. There are the obvious ones, such as extreme heat, and others that are less obvious. Through the spread and spread of vector-borne disease vectors like dengue, malaria, and wildfires.
Sir Andy’s recent work has been on identifying the health benefits of low carbon policies, including better insulation, a plant based diet, and reducing dependence on cars, as well as the positive environmental effects.
It was a moment of clarity for me when I realized that it wasn’t enough to simply say that climate change was going very badly for human health.
Climate change is a major threat, so it’s not surprising. [we need to stress]There are huge benefits. These benefits are not only long-term, but also have immediate benefits for human health. It’s all tragic because you can’t make people change their destiny by scaring them.
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