Publication year: 2011
Source: Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability, Available online 28 October 2011

Ulisses EC Confalonieri, Corinne J Schuster-Wallace

Highlights

► We review concepts for integrating water quality and health data. ► There is a trend for understanding water–health nexus in the context of Social–Ecological Systems. ► New information technologies will facilitate the integration of global water/health datasets.

Publication year: 2011
Source: Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability, Available online 1 November 2011

Susan J Elliott

The water-health nexus represents the intersection at which issues of water, sanitation, and human health collide. This collision is of crisis proportions at present. This paper will briefly outline the crisis, discuss some theoretical lenses through which we might view the crisis with an aim to action, review the importance of the knowledge journey with respect to linking evidence with action, and conclude with some reflections and next steps. In essence, if we do not adopt a contextualized theoretical lens through which to address the transdisciplinary nature of the problems requiring action at the water-health nexus, we will never succeed — from a scientific or moral imperative — of meeting global human needs.

Highlights

â–º Problems at the water-health nexus are at crisis proportions. â–º These problems require action, but before we can move forward they must be contextualized within a comprehensive theoretical framework. â–º A conceptual framework is proposed to guide this transdisciplinary knowledge journey.

Publication year: 2011
Source: Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability, Available online 1 November 2011

Germán Poveda, Óscar A Estrada-Restrepo, Julián E Morales, Ólver O Hernández, Armando Galeano, ...

Malaria is a complex multi-factorial disease whose outcomes are affected by climate and environmental variability. In particular, malaria is endemic in the year-round hot and humid lowlands of Colombia, whose hydro-climatology exhibits clear-cut variability at interannual timescales, mostly driven by both phases of El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO): El Niño (warm phase) and La Niña (cold phase). Here we show highly significant statistical correlations between malaria outbreaks in Colombia during historical El Niño events of 1959–2009. Analyses are performed at national, regional, and municipal spatial scales, and at annual, quarterly, and monthly timescales. Annual malaria incidence in Colombia exhibits a combination of long-term trends (which might be explained by historical increasing trends in average air temperatures throughout Colombia, in turn owing to global warming and deforestation), as well as strong malaria outbreaks during El Niño, as a consequence of the concomitant increases in air temperature. Also, we show that satellite imagery of vegetation activity can be used as an environmental indicator for malaria in Colombia. We discuss how these research results and diverse knowledge-based tools, including mathematical explanatory models and geographical information systems, are being used by the Colombian health authorities as an end-to-end program and early warning system (EWS) for malaria prevention and surveillance countrywide.

Highlights

► We show strong statistical linkages between El Niño and malaria outbreaks in Colombia. ► Evidenced national, regional, and municipal levels. ► Climatic/environmental indices are being used to set up malaria early warning systems (EWS). ► Knowledge-based systems (dynamical models and GIS) are also used as EWS. ► End-to-end program linking research with public health policy decision-making.

Publication year: 2011
Source: Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability, Available online 9 November 2011

Pierre Horwitz, Lucilla Spini, Kathryn Campbell, RJ Thomas, Jo Mulongoy

For five Multilateral Environmental Agreements (MEAs), we have examined the way the relationship between water, health and global environmental change is expressed and how it has evolved recently. We recognize a distinction between an emphasis on water and reservoirs of water for health (for drinking water supplies, sanitation and hygiene), and a focus on places of water, where wetland ecosystems provide a service for human well-being which encompasses health. We also recognize a trend over time for the MEAs to increasingly address water, health and global change issues as a reaction to emerging infectious diseases and global pandemics. For both observations we note an increasing reliance on collaborative efforts across the MEAs, and beyond to involve international food, agriculture, trade and health sectors, and the emergent theme on ecosystem approaches to human health.

Highlights

â–º We examine the relationship between water, health and global change. â–º We note water for sanitation and hygiene, and ecosystem approaches to human health. â–º We note a trend over time for Conventions to respond to emerging infectious diseases. â–º For both we note an increasing reliance on collaborative efforts across Conventions.