2018 Volume 67 Issue 3 Pages 241-254
In 2016, the World Health Organization published a report titled “Preventing disease through healthy environments, A global assessment of the burden of disease from environmental risks.” The report is a systematic review of evidence and synthesis of environmental and occupational impacts on over 100 diseases, which showed that 23% of global deaths (22% of disability-adjusted life years) and 26% of deaths of children under 5 years were attributable to the environment. The Japanese government has made tremendous efforts to establish and improve regulations on environment. Effluents from mines, industrial wastewater, contaminated fish and rice, and polluted air had caused severe health problems especially since the late 1950s. In many cases, it took a long time to take effective countermeasures because concrete scientific evidence was required. Therefore, we must continuously improve the environmental control framework, by not only revising the standards but also improving the methods for risk assessment and management communication, mainly based on a scientific risk assessment-management scheme driven by precautionary approach. Policies must consider future environmental and social impacts, and, subsequently, sustainability-related factors, given the population decline and severe financial conditions of people in local areas.
