We’ve brought together a list of statements from scientists and academics that tie together the links between environmental pollution and its affect on human health.
They are listed chronologically, but you can search by policy area in the box on the right.
| Date | Title |
|---|---|
| 12/04/2013 | European Respiratory Society - 10 principles for clean air |
| 17/05/2012 | Consensus Paper: Developmental Origins of Non-Communicable Diseases and Dysfunctions: Implications for Research and Public Health |
| 20/02/2012 | State of the Art of the Assessment of Endocrine Disruptors, Final Report |
| 04/12/2011 | Durban Declaration on Climate and Health |
| 17/10/2011 | BMJ Climate, Security and Health statement The statement (in full):- Climate change poses an immediate, growing and grave threat to the health and security of people in both developed and developing countries around the globe. Climate change leads to more frequent and extreme weather events and to conditions that favour the spread of infectious diseases. Rising sea levels, floods and droughts cause loss of habitat, water and food shortages, and threats to livelihood. These trigger conflict within and between countries. Humanitarian crises will further burden military resources through the need for rescue missions and aid. Mass migration will also increase, triggered by both environmental stress and conflict, thus leading to serious further security issues. It will often not be possible to adapt meaningfully to these changes, and the economic cost will be enormous. As in medicine, prevention is the best solution. Action to tackle climate change not only reduces the risks to our environment and global stability but also offers significant health co-benefits. Changes in power generation improve air quality. Modest life style changes – such as increasing physical activity through walking and cycling - will cut rates of heart disease and stroke, obesity, diabetes, breast cancer, dementia and depressive illness. Climate change mitigation policies would thus significantly cut rates of premature death and disability for hundreds of millions of people around the world. The health co-benefits of lower carbon use save money: reducing EU greenhouse gas emissions by 30% by 2020 (compared to 1990 levels) would save over €80 billion a year in healthcare costs and through increased productivity of a healthier workforce. We therefore call upon governments around the world to prioritise efforts to address the causes and impacts of climate change. Specifically we urge: The European Union to unconditionally agree a target to reduce greenhouse gas emissions domestically by 30% by 2020, and to prepare further targets towards 2050 which would incentivise the decarbonisation of the economy. Developed countries to adopt more ambitious greenhouse gas reduction targets, to increase their support for low carbon development and to invest in further research into the impact of climate change on health and security. Developing countries to actively identify the key ways in which climate change threatens health and democratic governance, as well as undertaking mitigation and adaptation activities, including through supported and unsupported NAMAs. All governments to enact legislative and regulatory change to stop the building of new unabated coal-fired power stations and phase out the continuing operation of existing plants prioritising lignite generation as most harmful to health. All parties at the climate change conference in Durban, South Africa, to strive to adopt an ambitious greenhouse gas emission reduction agreement consistent with the target of restricting the global temperature rise to 2°C as agreed in Copenhagen and Cancun, and in line with the pending UNFCCC review towards a 1.5°C limit above preindustrial levels. A mechanism ensuring that all people can share equitably the benefits of a safe atmosphere without penalising those with the least historical responsibility for climate change must be established. All governments to incorporate the UN Security Council Presidential statement from 20 July 2011 on the potential consequences of climate change on security into their short and long term security planning. All governments to strive to adopt climate change mitigation targets and policies that are more ambitious than their international commitments. The Statement will be published in the British Medical Journal. For more information about the meeting and to see who endorsed the statement or to endorse it yourself, please go to: http://climatechange.bmj.com/statement |
| 11/04/2011 | Paris Appeal: International Declaration on Diseases due to chemical pollution |
| 18/03/2011 | The Asturias Pledge: A new call to action on environmental and occupational cancer prevention |
| 14/12/2010 |
Climate and Health Council Health and fiscal co-benefits of emissions reductions: a summary for negotiators at Cancun Summary: Policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions will substantially reduce the burden of disease from heart disease, cancer, obesity, diabetes, dementia, depression, osteoporosis, road deaths and injuries, and air pollution (and thus lung disease). These benefits are associated with substantial and meaningful savings in healthcare costs which offset much of the cost of mitigation. Such information should encourage negotiators: whilst climate change threatens health, mitigation strategies can save both lives and money. Independent scientific research published in the leading international medical journal The Lancet, documents the multiple health effects of reducing fossil fuel use1. Meeting emissions targets in the transport sector will require modest substitution of car use with walking & cycling. The associated increase in physical activity would dramatically cut rates of chronic disease, with 10% to 20% less heart disease and stroke, 12% to 18% less breast cancer and 8% less dementia. Mental health would improve, with an estimated 6% less depression- and more if the impacts of neighborhood greenness and reduced community severance, fatness & noise pollution are considered. Reducing livestock production diminishes cattle related methane emissions and deforestation. Consuming less animal products lowers food prices (& reduces malnutrition) because cattle are fed on grain. Reducing the amount of animal products in the diet would reduce consumption of harmful saturated animal fats, yielding a further large fall (30%) in the incidence of chronic disease, including cardiovascular disease and cancer of the colon & rectum (the 2nd commonest cancer in men). Together, changes in diet and physical activity would reduce levels of population fatness, when current trends will lead to nine in ten adults in most developed countries will be overweight or obese by 2050. Rates of diabetes would thus fall, as will those of cerebrovascular disease. By improving diet & physical activity levels, climate change mitigation policies would dramatically cut rates of premature death and disability for hundreds of millions of people around the world. Insulating homes in high income countries prevents winter cold deaths and reduce greenhouse emissions. Fuel efficient cook stoves in low income countries cut respiratory deaths in children: 1 million children die every year from respiratory infections caused or made worse by the burning of solid fuels. De-carbonizing energy supplies would reduce air pollution from coal extraction. Such health benefits save money: moving the EU greenhouse gas emissions reduction target from 20% to 30% domestically by 2020 (compared to 1990 levels) would cost €46 billion per year in 20202 1 but save -* CONTACTS AT CANCUN: Climate and Health Council, www.climateandhealth.org Dr. Hugh Montgomery, +44 7981 654 009, h.montgomery@ucl.ac.uk; Health and Environment Alliance HEAL www.env-health.org and Health Care Without Harm HCWH www.noharm.org, Dr. Pendo Maro, +32 495 28 14 94, pendo@env-health.org. References: 1.Friel et al. 2009. Public health benefits of strategies to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions: food and agriculture. Lancet. Woodcock et al. Public health benefits of strategies to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions: urban land transport. The Lancet, 374, 1930-1943. 2.European Commission Communication, May 2010, COM (2010) 265 final. Analysis of options to move beyond 20% greenhouse gas emission reductions and assessing the risk of carbon leakage. http://ec.europa.eu/environment/cli... (accessed 14.08.2010) 3 "Acting Now for better health, A 30% reduction target for EU climate policy", HEAL and HCWHE, Brussels, September 2010 |
| 14/10/2010 |
World Medical Association Statement on Environmental Degradation and Sound Management of Chemicals |
| 17/09/2010 |
Collegium Ramazzini Call for Action : Control of Biocides in the European Union |
| 29/06/2010 |
WHO Europe Guidelines for indoor air quality: selected pollutants |
| 23/06/2010 |
Letter to EFSA from scientists and NGOs Re: Potential adverse health effects associated with BPA exposures |
| 14/06/2010 |
ChemTrust A review of the role of pesticides play in some cancers: Children, farmers and pesticides users at risk? |
| 06/05/2010 |
US President’s Cancer Panel Environmentally caused cancers are ’grossly underestimated’ and ’needlessly devastate American lives.’ |
| 14/03/2010 |
WHO Europe Parma Declaration on Environment and Health |
| 14/11/2009 |
The Lancet Series Managing the health effects of climate change |
| 14/10/2009 |
World Medical Association Declaration of Delhi on Health and Climate Change |
| 14/09/2009 |
International Society of Doctors for the Environment Position paper on Climate Change and Human Health |
| 14/07/2009 |
European Respiratory Society Position Statement, Climate change and respiratory disease |
| 29/06/2009 |
WHO Europe Guidelines for indoor air quality : dampness and mould |
| 14/06/2009 |
Prof. Dr. Andreas Kortenkamp State of the Art Report on Mixture Toxicity |
| 01/05/2009 |
Professor Richard Sharpe Male Reproductive Health Disorders and the Potential Role of Exposure to Environmental Chemicals |
| 02/02/2009 |
Endocrine Society Endocrine-Disrupting Chemicals: An Endocrine Society Scientific Statement 2 February, 2009. Evanthia Diamanti-Kandarakis, Jean-Pierre Bourguignon, Linda C. Giudice, Russ Hauser, Gail S. Prins, Ana M. Soto, R. Thomas Zoeller, and Andrea C. Gore Key Points • An endocrine-disrupting substance is a compound, either natural or synthetic, which through environmental or inappropriate developmental exposures alters the hormonal and homeostatic systems that enable the organism to communicate with and respond to its environment. • Issues key to understanding the mechanisms of action and consequences of exposure to endocrine disrupting chemicals include age at exposure, latency from exposure, the mixture of chemicals, dose-response dynamics, and long-term latent effects. • Because of the shared properties of the chemicals and the similarities of the receptors and enzymes involved in the synthesis, release, and degradation of hormones, no endocrine system is immune to endocrine disrupting chemicals. • Effects of endocrine disrupting chemicals may be transmitted to further generations through germline epigenetic modifications or from continued exposure of offspring to the environmental insult. • The evidence for adverse reproductive outcomes (infertility, cancers, malformations) from exposure to endocrine disrupting chemicals is strong, and there is mounting evidence for effects on other endocrine systems, including thyroid, neuroendocrine, obesity and metabolism, and insulin and glucose homeostasis. • The Precautionary Principle is key to enhancing endocrine and reproductive health, and should be used to inform decisions about exposure to, and risk from, potential endocrine disruptors. • Scientific societies such as The Endocrine Society should partner with other organizations with the scientific and medical expertise to evaluate effects of endocrine disrupting chemicals in humans. Download here |
| 06/11/2008 |
Canadian Cancer Society Environment, Cancer and You |
| 14/10/2008 |
Collaborative on Health and the Environment Agriculture and Cancer: A need for action |
| 29/06/2008 |
Collaborative on Health and the Environment Learning and Developmental Disabilities Initiative Scientific and Policy Consensus Statements on Environmental Factors |
| 23/06/2008 |
Professor Andreas Kortenkamp Breast cancer and exposure to hormonally active chemicals: An appraisal of the scientific evidence |
| 14/06/2008 |
World Federation of Public Health Associations (WFPHA) Resolution on “Safer Chemical Policies” |
| 10/02/2008 |
Collaborative on Health and the Environment Consensus Statement on Cancer and the Environment |
| 01/11/2007 |
California Medication Association Resolution on Chemicals Policy for California |
| 30/07/2007 |
The Faroes Statement Human Health Effects of Developmental Exposure to Chemicals in Our Environment |
| 14/06/2007 |
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Climate Change 2007 synthesis report. Summary for policy makers |
| 14/06/2007 |
Chapel Hill BPA Expert Panel Consensus Statement Integration of Mechanisms, Effects in Animals and Potential to Impact Human Health |
| 19/01/2007 |
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report |
| 10/11/2006 | Helsinki Statement: Is endocrine disruption within REACH? |
| 14/06/2006 | Our Stolen Future |
| 04/06/2006 |
Collaborative on Health and the Environment Consensus Statement on Breast Cancer and the Environment |
| 04/05/2006 |
Andreas Kortenkamp The Prague Declaration on Endocrine Disruption 4 May 2006. Published as a part of the Mini-Monograph: Endocrine Disruptors— Exposure Assessment, Novel End Points, and Low-Dose and Mixture Effects; Environmental Health Perspectives Volume 115, Number S-1, December 2007. The Prague Declaration on Endocrine Disruption |
| 14/02/2006 |
International POPs Elimination Network (IPEN) Declaration for a Toxics-Free Future |
| 14/10/2005 |
Collaborative on Health and the Environment Vallombrosa Consensus Statement on Environmental contaminants and human fertility compromise |
| 29/06/2005 |
WHO Air quality guidelines - global update 2005 |
| 14/06/2005 |
Standing Committee of European Doctors Health and environment (REACH) |
| 07/03/2005 |
Various scientists Prague Declaration on endocrine disruptors |
| 14/06/2004 |
Paris Appeal International Declaration on diseases due to chemical pollution |
| 24/04/2004 |
Ontario College of Family Physicians Systematic review of Pesticide Human Health Effects |
| 14/04/2003 |
European Respiratory Society European Lung White Book |
| 14/06/2002 |
WHO Europe & European Environment Agency Children Health and Environment: A Review of Evidence |
| 14/05/2001 |
International Society of Doctors for the Environment Declaration on Children, their health and their environment |
| 06/05/1997 |
Environment Leaders’ Summit of the Eight Declaration of the Environment Leaders of the Eight on Children’s Environmental Health |
