The nexus of water and human health in the context of global changes

摘要

The notion of global changes, particularly climate change, has received increasing attention in the public discourse and by the media. The impacts of these changes - which also include responses to the global economic crises, global biodiversity loss, land degradation and global water crisis - on human health remain more obscure and not well understood. As a consequence of these global changes especially those related to water, there are direct health impacts through changes in the boundaries of vector-borne and water-borne diseases. Further, there are numerous indirect health impacts related to increased food insecurity, loss of livelihood, environmental migration and exposure to increasing number of catastrophic climate events.