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Environmental Safety Issues

Environmental safety is a subject that affects everyone. It deals with a wide range of issues ranging from chemical exposure to infectious disease to risk management, but the ultimate goal of any branch of environmental safety is to keep communities (and society at large) safe from environmental harm. Environmental safety deals with both sudden outbreak of crisis and long-term, year-to-year problems.

  1. Genetically Modified Organisms

    • Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO) represents the cutting edge of technology. However, the risks it carries make it controversial. GMO food is at the center of the debate. Agricultural producers who make money from GMO promote it as a means of making food production more efficient and advanced, but others have cautioned that GMO may be harmful to people and the environment. Separate studies have indicated that GMO processes can introduce allergens into food for human consumption, inadvertently reduce certain species of insects it's not intended to harm, or produce food that causes stomach problems when consumed. Those in the environmental safety community will continue to debate the pros and cons of GMO.

    Chemicals

    • The Center for Disease Control tracks exposure to chemicals. In several studies, the agency has detected over 200 industrial chemicals in humans. The widespread use of synthetic chemicals, many of which have not been tested for their long-term effects on humans, have proliferated in the environment and, by extension, in humans. In this case, the environment can be considered not only the natural environment but the man-made environment of homes, schools, and workplaces in which humans spend a great deal of their time.

    Disease

    • Disease represents another environmental health concern. Even in an age of advanced medical technology, disease threatens both human and environmental health. Diseases also threaten livestock populations. Disease can be organic in nature (as with outbreaks of flu or other contagious illness) or caused by exposure to harmful man-made substances, such as asbestos.

    Risk Management

    • Risk management is an important subject within the field of environmental safety. It seeks to develop preventive measures and solutions to potential and ongoing environmental problems. Environmental safety risk management involves six fields: workers' compensation, driving safety, travel safety, insurance and public education.

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