IT’S NOT SURPRISING that the novel coronavirus originating in Wuhan City, China has gone global. We now live in a highly globalized environment where you have porous transport of goods, people, services, ideas, and viruses across the world.
Yes, the world is wealthier than before, but it is not necessarily healthier. Whatever is happening to the world’s physical environment has an impact on health outcomes. Take climate change, for example. The obvious effects of the increase in surface temperature are extreme heat and drought which affects our food production and nutrition, and the melting of the icebergs (as exhibited on various multimedia platforms) which affects us through unpredictable and frequent disasters such as floods and intense storms.
There are also environmental risk factors such as air pollution and climate change which have resulted in more than 3.5 million deaths globally every year.
Changes in the environment have affected not only humans but also the behavior of insects. For example, the Aedes aegypti mosquito — a vector for dengue that is now seen in cities of temperate zones when this used to be confined to the tropics. Also, they have become year-round and not only manifest during the rainy season.
Apart from environmental issues, other health problems should also be looked into like the increasing intake of processed foods, prevalence of non-communicable diseases, alcohol and smoking, mental health, teenage pregnancies, and the spread of viruses including HIV. There is also the problem on decreasing rates of immunization, which is supposed to protect children from vaccine-preventable diseases like measles and polio.
Yes, a lot of these threats come from a highly globalized environment. There is porous transport of goods, people, services, ideas, and viruses across the world. Given these global health risks and threats, the challenge lies in determining how to keep the population healthy.
How? Prioritize universal health care, maximize the role of local government units, use information technology, strengthen health regulations and epidemiology, and enhance strategic communication and health promotion among Filipinos.
Furthermore, the health sector should work with other sectors such as education, energy, housing, agriculture, trade, transport, and the arts to create a health-promoting environment. It is about creating healthier environments and settings — places where people live, learn, work, and play. It is about people having more skills and knowing what they should and should not eat, getting them to move around more, not to smoke and not to drink. In short, having a healthy lifestyle.
