The environment and human health: an agenda for research
Environment and Human Health gives a comprehensive review of the related literature in order to aid understanding of the (missing) link between the environment and health. Given the exhaustive literature on the subject the paper focuses on the water‐related and land‐related diseases namely in the fast growing and poor countries. By assessing the terrain of research on the subject, the paper aims to look beyond the causal linkage between environment and health and instead emphasis the underlying question about how environmental factors, along with man‐made changes, influence human health. Specifically, the review examines the ability of the literature to define the incidence of environmentally‐related diseases as well as their distribution across social and geographical scales, understands the role of diverse factors influencing these diseases and the adaptive capacity of societies in managing these illnesses or disorders. The paper draws on a wide range of sources from a variety of disciplines to unpack the linkage between the environment and health, and identifies issues, themes and questions raised by the literature.