The book discusses the indispensable connection between the environment and health via all possible aspects, focussing on human interactions with the environment. The multi-dimensional field of environmental and human health perspectives with emerging issues and current trends is illustrated through supporting case studies, reviews, research reports and examples. It also covers crucial areas of research such as vector control in a tropical climate, influence of climate change on human health and so forth, including proliferation of microbial diseases. Environmental, health and safety guidelines are discussed as well. Aimed at graduate students and researchers in environmental and medical sciences, health and safety, and ecology, this book Highlights interdisciplinary aspects of environmental changes and associated health risks Explains different aspects of environmental pollution and health risks Includes dedicated chapters on global epidemics and biomedical and municipal waste Contains case studies pertaining to different health and safety issues.

Multidimensional Global Change Kirill Ya Kondratyev Forty years of technological progress have had a catastrophic impact on the environment, since this progress has been based on the ruthless exploitation of natural resources: 20 percent of the fertile soil on cultivated land has been lost; 20 per cent of tropical forests have been cleared; desertification continues at a rate of 6 million hectares annually; and deforestation amounts to 11 million hectares annually. Economic estimations practically never take into account this depletion and damage to natural resources, the harmful effect on human health, the deprivation of future generations of those natural resources, and the long-term impact in the form of biospheric deformation. In this text Kirill Kondratyev emphasises the extremely complex and interdisciplinary nature of multidimensional global change, highlighting its principal aspects and many practical consequences (economic, social, etc.), as well as the relationships between environmental problems on global, continental and national scales. He demonstrates that the main limiting factor of further quantitative development of humankind is the available biosphere resources and that the basic criterion of ecological well- (or ill-) being is the level of depletion of these resources. The author highlights an acute social controversy of the modern world in that the level of biospheric resource consumption in industrially-developed countries exceeds by far that in the Third World. This disparity could be eliminated through advancements such as the 'decarbonisation' of energy production, and the development of new technologies. However, he shows that radical improvement of the situation can only be achieved by reducing the population number and establishing a new, fair economic order. He emphasises that when considering global change problems it is important to avoid exaggerations, and he strikes a balance between the most gloomy predictions and more encouraging estimations. Readership: Professional scientists, environmentalists and engineers concerned with research relating to global change and its consequences, managers and senior engineers wishing to gain an insight into the problems caused by global change, and undergraduate and postgraduate students of geography, meteorology, climatology, atmospheric physics and environmental science.