Environmental Change, Climate and Health: Issues and Research Methods

Planning for the protection of human health from the potential impacts of global environmental changes, such as climate change, requires a greatly improved understanding of the disease inducing mechanisms involved, possible synergetic effects, and the vulnerability of populations. An important aspect is the development of theoretical and conceptual methods for the assessment of the health impact of global environmental changes. This book addresses the concepts and methods needed to analyse and understand this complex issue, and will be of great value to researchers and graduate students.

PIM MARTENS holds degrees in Biological and Environmental Health Sciences from Maastricht University, The Netherlands. He worked within the project 'Global Dynamics and Sustainable Development', launched in 1992 by the Dutch National institute of Public Health and the Environment (RIVM). After obtaining his PhD from the Department of Mathematics, Maastricht University, he worked as assistant professor at the same Department. Since 1998, Pim Martens has been a senior researcher at the University's International Centre for Integrative Studies, where he directs the Global Assessment Centre. In 2001 he became an Honorary Senior Lecturer, Department of Epidemiology and Population Health, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, UK. He is editor-in-chief of the international journal Global Change and Human Health and editor of a book series on Resurgent and Emerging Infectious Diseases. Furthermore, he is a member of the Assessment Study Climate, Ecosystems, Infectious Disease, and Human Health (USNational Research Council/National Academy of Sciences), and lead-author of several climate change and human health assessment reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), and the World Health Organization (WHO).

TONY MCMICHAEL is a medical graduate from Adelaide, South Australia. He is currently Professor of Epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, UK. His research interests, over 30 years, have encompassed the social aetiology of mental health problems, the causes of occupational diseases, studies of diet and cancer, and environmental epidemiology. During the 1990s he developed a strong interest in the assessment of population health risks from global environmental change. His current research activities include studies of heatwave impacts on urban mortality patterns, of solar ultraviolet radiation and immune disorders, of dietary factors in breast cancer, and the mathematical modelling of future climate change impacts on malaria transmissibility. Between 1994 and 1998 he convened the review by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Second Assessment Report) of potential health impacts of climate change. He is doing likewise for the IPCC's Third Assessment Report (1999-2001). He is a member of WHO's newly established Advisory Committee on Globalisation and Health, and a Council member of the newly-formed World Health Policy Forum (focusing on food and health policy).