Environmental Health: Air Quality, Coursework Example

The current problem of air pollution and air quality is precisely an issue since poor air quality has been linked to both “short- and long-term effects on human health.” (Tiwary & Coles, 2010, p. xix) It is thus a crucial concern of environmental health policy. Yet regulating air pollution and air quality remains a challenge insofar as the inexorable march of technological progress combined with the increasing pressure on countries to expand industry in order to either become or remain relevant within the global political arena prevents a direct challenge to consensus global resolution. For example, a prime example of such a case is India: with the country’s attempts to transcend its third world status, a policy of high industrialization has become the norm, however, not without adversely affecting public health. According to the World Health Organization, “it is estimated that in Indian alone about 500,000 premature deaths are caused each year by indoor air pollution, mainly affecting mothers and their children under 5 years of age.” (Tiwary & Coles, 2010, p. xix) Moreover, the competitive nature of the free market and the imperative for private companies to maintain a germane position within their industry can lead to such firms’ general antipathy towards public health issues, to the extent that health is placed on the backburner in favor of various management strategies with the primary intent of profit. For example, Chevron in El Segundo, California have refrained from using pollution control equipment, which has the following harrowing consequences: “when loading oil tankers, toxic gases are forced out of the tanker and into the air, exposing workers and nearby residents to toxic vapors, including benzene, a known human carcinogen.” (Toshiyuki Drury et al., 1999, p. 252) In this case, the question of attempting to resolve air pollution is a radically ethical question, which speaks to the very foundational normativities of society, and, as such, directly confronts prevailing contemporary political and economic ideology.

Certainly, these explicit instances of poor air quality does not mean that regulations and various other programs have not been installed at various global, local, and national levels in order to respond to the problem. For example, as far back as 1951, “modern air-pollution regulation began in the USSR…when standards were fixed for ten air pollutants including sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides.” (Sokolov & Jager, 2001, p. 142) However, such policies are obviously not foolproof. Moreover, because of the ever-increasing globalized world, policies on a national or local level are not sufficient: “Controlling global air pollution is a unique policy challenge, because solutions must be developed not only through domestic initiatives but also through international treaties and programs.” (Callan & Thomas, 2007, p. 238)

Accordingly, the severity of the environmental health challenge can be traced back to the complex demands of a globalized and competitive world economy, dominated by a capitalist world-view: any prospective resolution, as Callan & Thomas note above, suggests a complicated synthesis of global and domestic initiatives. This is not to say, however, that purely localized initiatives, such as community health approaches cannot aid in ameliorating the problem. Rather because of this very complexity, perhaps it is most important to raise the issue on a community level in order to create awareness in the public imagination: the attempt to take certain grassroots approach can potentially reset ethical perspectives on fundamental level. For example, the establishment of environmental activist groups on neighborhood levels can alert the local population of possible health hazards, while also endeavoring to directly communicate with local industry, making it clear that the community has concerns with their business practice. The expression of direct concern in this case is a relevant means of protest, since, for example, such local industries acquire the labor power necessary for their industries from these same communities. This local level initiative demonstrates the community’s concern for its health: such activism demands individual health rights on the most basic possible level, encouraging industry to adhere to environmental health policy, while also working with them to potentially take a new ethical world-view in their business practice. While this nevertheless remains a purely local strategy, this should not minimize the significance of such an intervention, since these health concerns are most painfully experienced on precisely individual, familial and community levels.

References

Callan, S.J. and Thomas, J.M. (2007). Environmental Economics & Management: Theory, Policy, and Applications. Mason, OH: Cengage Learning.

Drury Toshiyuki, R., Believeau, M.E., Kuhn, J.S. and Bansal, S. (1999) Pollution Trading and Environmental Injustice: Los Angeles’ Failed Experiment in Air Quality Policy. Duke Environmental Law & Policy Forum. Vol. 9, 23. 233-289.

Sokolov, V. and Jager, J. (2001). Turning Points: The Management of Global Environmental Risks in the Former Soviet Union. In: W.C. Clark (ed.) Learning to Manage Global Environmental Risks: A Comparative History of Social Responses to Climate Change, Ozone Depletion, and Acid Rain. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. 139-166.

Tiwary, A. and Colls, J. (2010). Air Pollution. (3^rd edition). New York: Routledge.