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Nature Appropriation and Associations with Population Health in Canada’s Largest Cities

Earth is a finite system with a limited supply of resources. As the human population grows, so does the appropriation of Earth’s natural capital, thereby exacerbating environmental concerns such as biodiversity loss, increased pollution, deforestation and global warming. Such concerns will negativel...

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Autores principales: Rainham, Daniel, Cantwell, Rory, Jason, Timothy
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2013
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3709316/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23531492
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph10041268
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author Rainham, Daniel
Cantwell, Rory
Jason, Timothy
author_facet Rainham, Daniel
Cantwell, Rory
Jason, Timothy
author_sort Rainham, Daniel
collection PubMed
description Earth is a finite system with a limited supply of resources. As the human population grows, so does the appropriation of Earth’s natural capital, thereby exacerbating environmental concerns such as biodiversity loss, increased pollution, deforestation and global warming. Such concerns will negatively impact human health although it is widely believed that improving socio-economic circumstances will help to ameliorate environmental impacts and improve health outcomes. However, this belief does not explicitly acknowledge the fact that improvements in socio-economic position are reliant on increased inputs from nature. Gains in population health, particularly through economic means, are disconnected from the appropriation of nature to create wealth so that health gains become unsustainable. The current study investigated the sustainability of human population health in Canada with regard to resource consumption or “ecological footprints” (i.e., the resources required to sustain a given population). Ecological footprints of the 20 largest Canadian cities, along with several important determinants of health such as income and education, were statistically compared with corresponding indicators of human population health outcomes. A significant positive relationship was found between ecological footprints and life expectancy, as well as a significant negative relationship between ecological footprints and the prevalence of high blood pressure. Results suggest that increased appropriation of nature is linked to improved health outcomes. To prevent environmental degradation from excessive appropriation of natural resources will require the development of health promotion strategies that are de-coupled from ever-increasing and unsustainable resource use. Efforts to promote population health should focus on health benefits achieved from a lifestyle based on significantly reduced consumption of natural resources.
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spelling pubmed-37093162013-07-12 Nature Appropriation and Associations with Population Health in Canada’s Largest Cities Rainham, Daniel Cantwell, Rory Jason, Timothy Int J Environ Res Public Health Article Earth is a finite system with a limited supply of resources. As the human population grows, so does the appropriation of Earth’s natural capital, thereby exacerbating environmental concerns such as biodiversity loss, increased pollution, deforestation and global warming. Such concerns will negatively impact human health although it is widely believed that improving socio-economic circumstances will help to ameliorate environmental impacts and improve health outcomes. However, this belief does not explicitly acknowledge the fact that improvements in socio-economic position are reliant on increased inputs from nature. Gains in population health, particularly through economic means, are disconnected from the appropriation of nature to create wealth so that health gains become unsustainable. The current study investigated the sustainability of human population health in Canada with regard to resource consumption or “ecological footprints” (i.e., the resources required to sustain a given population). Ecological footprints of the 20 largest Canadian cities, along with several important determinants of health such as income and education, were statistically compared with corresponding indicators of human population health outcomes. A significant positive relationship was found between ecological footprints and life expectancy, as well as a significant negative relationship between ecological footprints and the prevalence of high blood pressure. Results suggest that increased appropriation of nature is linked to improved health outcomes. To prevent environmental degradation from excessive appropriation of natural resources will require the development of health promotion strategies that are de-coupled from ever-increasing and unsustainable resource use. Efforts to promote population health should focus on health benefits achieved from a lifestyle based on significantly reduced consumption of natural resources. MDPI 2013-03-26 2013-04 /pmc/articles/PMC3709316/ /pubmed/23531492 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph10041268 Text en © 2013 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Rainham, Daniel
Cantwell, Rory
Jason, Timothy
Nature Appropriation and Associations with Population Health in Canada’s Largest Cities
title Nature Appropriation and Associations with Population Health in Canada’s Largest Cities
title_full Nature Appropriation and Associations with Population Health in Canada’s Largest Cities
title_fullStr Nature Appropriation and Associations with Population Health in Canada’s Largest Cities
title_full_unstemmed Nature Appropriation and Associations with Population Health in Canada’s Largest Cities
title_short Nature Appropriation and Associations with Population Health in Canada’s Largest Cities
title_sort nature appropriation and associations with population health in canada’s largest cities
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3709316/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23531492
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph10041268
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