SCI 301: Water: Science, Policy, and Health Day 1: Environmental Health 101

 Students will be able to define “toxicology and its basic terms”.  Students will have responded to the assumptions and overview of the course.

 Water challenges  Drinking water quality: mercury, arsenic, lead  Dysfunctional or absent sewage treatment  Use of poison in fishing  Depleted aquifers  Car washing  Salination  Photo by Suzanne Fournier

Let’s talk about Mr. Geoffrey’s bias.

 Environment: Circumstances, objects, or conditions by which one is surrounded.  Natural environment  Built environment  Social environment

 Health: condition of being sound in body, mind, or spirit  Disease: a condition that impairs the performance of a vital function

 The study of the effects of chemicals on organisms.  The study of what agents do to the body and what the body does to agents.  "All things are poison and nothing is without poison; only the dose makes a thing not a poison.“ - von Hohenheim  Objective science is needed to inform policy.

 Agent: a chemical, biological, physical factor that can affect human health  Exposure: An agent comes into contact with a human  Risk: the possibility of loss or injury  Safe: free from risk

 Bacteria  Virus  Radiation  Chemical

BacteriaViruses  Alive  Examples: Streptoccoculus, Cholera, some food poisoning  May be killed by antibiotics (e.g. Cipro)  Alive?  Examples: Causes of the common cold, HIV, Ebola, some causes of cervical cancer  Antibiotics have no effect.  Can be prevented by vaccinations.

 Bacteria  Virus  Radiation  Chemical

 Depleted uranium from shells, looted nuclear material  Increase in cancers and birth defects(?)  Photo by relaxedpolitics.com

 Bacteria  Virus  Radiation  Chemical

 Over 70,000  Their effects are not well documented.  Why not?  Agents are released by a source into the environment.  Examples: Benzene, Arsenic, Lead, Mercury

 We can manage risk.  Risk Management is the selection of the best alternatives, considering the risks and other social, economic, and political concerns.  This is policy. This is life.

 Individual characteristics  Latency  Multi-factorial etiology  Mixed exposure scenarios  Disease non-specificity  Socio-economic status (SES)

 Humans impact the environment and the environment impacts humans.  E.G.: Methlymercury in seafood causes developmental delays in children of exposed mothers.  Apply new terminology to the above situation.

 Environment  Health  Disease  Agent  Exposure  Risk  Safe

 Do citizens of these countries all use the same amount of water?  USA  China  India  Mozambique  Mexico  Peru

Population Affluence x Technology Impact

 For everyone to use water like water is used in the West, we would need 3.5 earths.  So, we should all be like Mozambique?  How can we control the factors in the Impact equation?

Population Affluence x Technology Impact

SCI 301: Water: Science, Policy, and Health Day 1: Overview of course

The only things that exist are matter and energy.

Students will be able to use scientific research and policy to improve water quality and human health in Iraq and the KRG.

 Environmental problems are human problems.  Science improves policy.  Policy can improve human health.

 This class is exactly that.  We are a mix of business, policy, politics, IT, and engineering people.  But each one of us is also a mix of those fields.  Business people sell technology.  Politicians use research to make arguments.  This course will not make you a toxicologist or a policy-maker.  This course will help you to use research to reach your goals.  Which hopefully include cleaner water and healthier people.

 The Interesting Stuff  Housekeeping  Questions

 Master’s degree in Public Health from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, with a focus on Environmental Health and Policy. After earning his degree, he worked for six months at the Washington D. C. offices of the NGO Environmental Defense Fund.

Who are you?

 Engineering?  Business Majors?  IT?  IS?  Who took SCI 208 with Dr. CJ Geraci?

What is your bias?

 This is a 300-level Science course.  This course is not an “Easy A”.  You will need to take notes, do the readings, and revise your memo several times in order to get a good grade.

Quiz!!

 What is it?  Our actions will have results we cannot predict.  Example: DDT to prevent Malaria  This is why precaution and alternatives are important.  Cell phones

 What is it?  Is it a problem here?  Please go to the WHO website, Cholera Factsheet.  Use Cholera example to review these concepts.

 Environment  Health  Disease  Agent  Exposure  Risk  Safe