Healthcare and Public Health Sector

Welcome to another insightful week of Chem-Sect. This week, I will be discussing the Healthcare and Public Health Sector, its impact, the hazard types, and how it affects our environment.

Overview of this Sector
Did you know that this sector operates in all U.S. states, territories, and tribal areas? Yes. The Healthcare and Public Health Sector plays a significant role in response and recovery across all other sectors in the event of a natural or manmade disaster. It protects all sectors of the economy from hazards such as terrorism, infectious disease outbreaks, and natural disasters.

Fig. 1.

This Healthcare and Public Health Sector is highly interconnected with industrial activities that emit much of the nation’s pollution to air, water, and soils. Estimated emissions are directly and indirectly attributable to the health care sector and to the potential harmful effects on public health. Negative environmental and public health outcomes were estimated through economic input-output life cycle assessment (EIOLCA) modeling using National Health Expenditures (NHE) for the decade 2003–2013 and compared to national totals.

In 2013, the health care sector was also responsible for significant fractions of national air pollution emissions and impacts, including acid rain (12%), greenhouse gas emissions (10%), smog formation (10%), criteria air pollutants (9%), stratospheric ozone depletion (1%), and carcinogenic and non-carcinogenic air toxics (1–2%). See Figure 1.

Environmental and Health Impacts
If the U.S. healthcare system was a country, it would be rank 13th in the world for greenhouse gas emissions according to Dr. Jodi Sherman of Yale University School of Medicine and Dr. Matthew Eckelman of Northeastern University. The U.S. healthcare system, the most expensive in the world, uses vast amounts of energy in the form of heating, electricity, and energy-intensive goods and services. It has been estimated that the healthcare sector contributes 8% of the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions. Yet emissions of other pollutants from the healthcare sector, and their impact on the public health, have not been reported.

T

Courtesy of Northeastern University

hese results sounded an alarm. Over the past 10 years, the sector’s greenhouse gas emissions grew by more than 30%, accounting for nearly 10% of the national total in 2013. Damages to health that year from the pollutants rang in at 405,000 “disability adjusted life years (DALYs),” a measure of years lost due to ill health, disability, or early death.

Environmental Hazard Types

As humans, we stumble across numerous environmental hazards every single day. To better understand environmental health, let’s classify environmental hazards into four categories:

1. Biological Hazards
Biological hazards emanate from environmental relations between organisms. Some examples of biological hazards include bacteria, viruses, fungi, spores, pathogenic micro-organisms, tuberculosis, malaria and so on. When these diseases and pathogens are transmitted between two or more organisms, we call it infectious disease. The real reason humans suffer from these pathogens and diseases is that they are being infested by other organisms, which is a natural process, but at the same time hazardous.

2. Physical Hazards
These are physical processes which happen naturally in the environment, for example, natural disasters like volcanoes, earthquakes, droughts, landslides, blizzards, and tornadoes. Physical hazards are considered secret events, but not all are, for instance, a few like UV radiations are openly happening each day. Ultraviolet radiation is categorized as hazardous since too much exposure to it destroys the DNA and triggers health complications in humans such as cataracts and skin cancer.

3. Chemical Hazards


Courtesy of Huff Insurance

They occur in ecological systems in two ways; human-made or natural.  Examples of naturally occurring chemical hazards include mercury and lead, which are considered heavy metals. Human-made chemical hazards encompass lots of synthetic chemicals human produce such as pesticides, plastics, and disinfectants. A few organisms even generate natural chemicals, which are hazardous to the environment, for instance, elements contained in peanuts and dairy that trigger allergic reactions to humans.

4. Cultural Hazards
They are sometimes referred to as social hazards. They originate from your locality, behavioral choices, occupation, and social-economic status. Examples of cultural hazards include cigarette smoking, which is detrimental to human health. Cigarette smoking is considered a behavior choice. If you reside in a neighborhood full of criminal activities, it is classified as a hazard based on your locality. In equal measure, your diet choice, workout habits, and main means of transportation all impact your overall health and the health of the ecological system around you.
 
Here’s an interesting video on Health Sector Resilience posted by the CDC:

Do you have any questions or comments you would like to add? Feel free to respond below. Thank you for visiting!!!

References:

1. CDC. (2016). Health Sector Resilience. Retrieved from YouTube: https://youtu.be/zW5xCzs0spA
2. DHS. (2010). Healthcare and Public Health Sector-Specific Plan. Washington, D.C.: Department of Health & Human Services.
3. DHS. (2017). Healthcare and Public Health Sector. Retrieved from Department of Homeland Security: https://www.dhs.gov/healthcare-public-health-sector
4. Kashef, Z. (2016). Environmental and Health Impacts of U.S. Healthcare System. Retrieved from Yale News: https://news.yale.edu/2016/06/09/environmental-and-health-impacts-us-healthcare-system
5. Kukreja, R. (2017). What is Environmental Health and Critical Issues Related to it? Retrieved from Conserve Energy Future: http://www.conserve-energy-future.com/environmental-health-and-its-issues.php
6. Sherman, J. (2016). Environmental Impacts of the U.S. Health Care System and Effects on Public Health. Retrieved from PLOS One: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0157014#pone-0157014-g001
7. Singer, T. (2016). Researchers Reveal the Hidden Environmental and Public Health Impacts of the US Healthcare Sector. Retrieved from News at Northeastern: http://news.northeastern.edu/2016/06/researchers-reveal-the-hidden-environmental-and-public-health-impacts-of-the-u-s-health-care-sector/