CORE COMPETENCIES PAPER Dissertation Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

CORE COMPETENCIES PAPER - Dissertation Example (Holmes) Public health is "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, communities and individuals" (Winslow, 1920). It focuses on improving health of communities, groups of people and preventing from diseases. It may include curing from diseases, finding ways to prevent from them, making people aware of the diseases and taking measures to contribute to healthy lifestyles. There can be many reasons for different diseases. Some are sexually transmitted diseases like HIV AIDS, many are infectious like small pox, and few are caused due to lack of providing medicines at early stage of life like polio, whereas some are caused by environmental hazards. Environmental Health Hazards At every interaction with the environment, we are in contact with numerous health hazards that are caused by different pollutants and harmful substances. What we feed to our enviro nment is given back to us in the form of diseases and other health hazards. Environmental hazards are caused by chemical waste from industries, harmful substances used in these industries, land degeneration, ozone depletion, nuclear issues, over population, harmful substance used at our homes, poor sanitation, and emission of harmful gases such as carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide. Domestic and hazardous waste cause serious diseases. These wastes are divided into two categories: municipal waste by domestic activities & industrial waste by industrial activities. Municipal waste causes problem for ordinary human being if it is not disposed off in the right way. Industrial waste can cause damage to the workers in the industry as well as common man. Water contamination again causes water-borne diseases that might lead to morbidity and mortality. Clean drinking water is rare in the world. Most people do not enjoy clean water and have to quench their thirst with contaminated and polluted water. This is a very increasing concern of environmental health in entire world. Another way of causing environment related health problems is the air toxicants. Huge amounts of carbon Dioxide, carbon monoxide, and sulfur dioxide in our air are harmful for our health. A large part of air pollutants is caused by the emissions from automobiles. Besides these, in our everyday life we see consumer products full of harmful substances. Lead is one example. Lead is present in many consumer products especially paint. The manufacturers of these products put such harmful substances without realizing the high level of human interaction with these products. (Nweke & William, 2009) Children come into direct contact with environmental toxicants such as lead, methyl mercury, tobacco and other pollutants. These pollutants enter children’s bodies via placental transfer during fetal growth, inhalation of dust, breast milk and other dietary sources during early childhood. (Landrigan et al, 19 98) One of the threats from these environmental hazards is asthma in children. It is more common in children because they have smaller airways. Asthma Asthma causes the airways