PUBH 7373 - Planetary and Environmental Epidemiology

Credit Hours: 3

Description Except for the sunlight, humans get everything from planet Earth’s materials and processes. Global climate change impacts all systems of our Earth, including the geosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, cryosphere, and biosphere. Earth processes and systems influence our surrounding environments’ pollution and contamination that influence human health. Anthropogenic activities, unsustainable dependency, and resource extraction from nature disrupt planet Earth’s health and subsequently human health. This course will help students to look at environmental pollution and human health through the lens of disruption in interconnected earth systems. Planetary and environmental variables are often exposures to disease development and progression, but also can modify the relationship between other exposures and health outcomes. Students will also learn to use epidemiological tools to explore how planetary exposures and systems influence, modify and mediate the relationship between disease exposure and health outcomes.