Dr Shirish Khedgikar
'World Health Day' is a global health awareness day
being celebrated every year on April 7 from 1950. The first World
Health Assembly organised by the World Health Organization' (WHO)
in 1948 decided to celebrate it by declaring a new slogan for this
day, every year. Slogan this year is ‘Our Planet,
Our Health.’ It's for global attention for keeping earth healthy and foster a movement to create healthy planet to live on.
WHO estimates that more than 12 million deaths around the
world each year are due to avoidable environmental causes. Nowadays, the climate crisis is the single biggest health threat to
human beings, as well as other animals on earth. Extreme
weather events, land degradation and water scarcity are affecting
their health. In the heating world, mosquitoes spread diseases
farther and faster. Exposure to extreme heat increases risk of
headaches, confusion, tiredness and vomiting. Heat above 40 degree Celsius
causes heat strokes resulting in organ failure and hospitalization.
Droughts and wildfires due to climate change are hazardous for
health. Wildfires cause suffocation. Inhalation of smoke and burn
injuries result in deaths. Such trauma affects mental health
and also results in loss of housing and livelihoods.
Over 90 percent of people breathe polluted air, resulting from
burning of fossil. According to fuels Paris Agreement documents,
control of air pollution will save a million lives per year worldwide
by 2050. Transportation produces around 20 percent of global
carbon emissions. Alternatives like walking and cycling stop it
and also offer major health benefits. Greenhouse gas emissions
produced during production, packing and distribution of food cause 11 Million premature deaths per year due to heart diseases and cancer. Highly processed, unhealthy food items and beverages cause obesity. Plastic found at the bottom
of oceans and on the highest mountains has made its way into our food
chain now. Floods due to extreme climate change result in
displacement of public. Shortage of food and safe drinking water
cause different infectious diseases.
Recent COVID -19 pandemic highlighted inequities in the
world. Inequitable distribution of income, health and power is
threat for health. Social protection, budgetary provisions for poor
people with good legal and fiscal strategies should be our goals for
ecological sustainability. Climate-resilient health systems can
protect the population. Financial provisions for it must be
adequate and easily available. Providing fresh air, clean water,
healthy food and good medicines to citizens is the responsibility of
Government.
(Writer is Associate Professor at Government Dental College, and
Hospital, Aurangabad.)