Published In

BioScience

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

3-1-1999

Subjects

Environmental policy, Global environmental change -- Social aspects, Health and environmental sciences

Abstract

The last half-century has seen momentous and accelerating changes in humankind's economic activities, political relations, and social and demographic profile. A prominent feature of this change is the increasing scale of human impact on Earth's natural biophysical systems: the climate system, stratospheric ozone, biodiversity, terrestrial and marine food-producing ecosystems, and the great cycles of water, nitrogen, and sulfur (Meyer 1996, Vitousek et al. 1997). These systems sustain the conditions on which life depends, and their weakening may therefore have profound long-term implications for human population health (McMichael 1993, Last 1997).

Description

Article is made available in accordance with the publisher's policy and may be subject to US copyright law. Please refer to the publisher's site for terms of use.

DOI

10.2307/1313510

Persistent Identifier

http://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/9061

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