For the first time in history, more than half the population of the world now lives in cities. The need to shelter and sustain this population without destroying the delicate balance of the environment is a major dilemma for the coming century.- Urban Explosion Overview How you gonna' keep down on the farm after they've seen metropolis? The populations have moved to the city for the jobs and the services. It's no surprise that this is happening in a world where cities have become the economic beehives of industry and development. With prosperity and a more affluent life-style come the side effects of environmental stress and a change in the quality of life.
Author, Richard Preston on a recent Today Show on NBC was asked to comment on how serious he felt the SARS "epidemic" is and what we could expect from the coronavirus. He said that the virus could be a massive problem considering the urban population explosion. The larger number of people in a smaller area and environmental situations that compromise otherwise reasonably healthy living conditions would promote and spawn more SARS-like disorders. Not good news for countries where economic growth may be the only salvation for burgeoning populations. It all appears to be a game of give and take.
Media inundates us with the negative aspects of environmental changes and we begin to wonder if it's possible to live a healthy life amongst all of Shakespeare's "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune." Of course we have done what we will with urbanization and have attempted to provide goods and services to the most people in the smallest area of space. Anyone living in a rural area can tell you of the more pristine environment they inhabit, but at the same time refer to all of the inconveniences along with lack of goods and services characteristic of more remote regions. It seems to be difficult to provide a healthy environment and meet the needs of people at the same time.
The focus of this lesson is the affect of urban explosion on the environment and the health of its inhabitants. . We will examine different cities and their conditions, eventually focusing on the Baltimore-Washington area as a representative region of population increase and urbanization. The disease of asthma will likewise be our medical focus as we attempt to integrate the "city life" with environmental "triggers" being produced in diverse profusion as a result of urban explosion
You need definition and explanation for this urban explosion phrase. Using the following links read the information and answer the questions provided for you as you acquire the schema needed to address the problems awaiting you.A. Begin your fact-finding quest by reading: How Progress Makes Us SickB. Journey to Planet Earth-Urban Explosion
Begin your fact-finding quest at the Journey to Planet Earth-Urban Explosion Link. Read about Mexico City, and New York City. View the videos of each and then return here to answer the questions provided below on a sheet of paper.Quest Questions on Mexico City
1. Home to less then 6 million citizens and growing by 350,000 each year, living conditions are so serious that a 200-year-old celebration in praise of liberty is often marked by angry demonstrations demanding environmental action.
a. True b. False2. Surrounded by a wall of mountains, some as high as 12,000 feet, Mexico City is locked into what scientists call a closed eco-system. Unlike most other mega-cities there is little wind to cleanse the air and no ocean or major river to exchange water and sewage.
a. True b. False3. Mexico City's atmosphere is thick with smog; a toxic soup cooking airborne chemicals into ________.
a. freonb. ozone
c. carbon dioxide
d. hydrogen sulfide
4. Eight out of ten days in Mexico City are declared hazardous to human health. Just breathing is said to be the equivalent of smoking two packs of cigarettes a day. Adding to the problem are 35,000 factories spewing tons of pollutants into the air.
a. True b. False5. Mexico City sits on top of a vast aquifer and is in no danger of running dry because 70 percent of the city's drinking water is pumped from the underground reservoir.
a. True b. False6. The lesson of Mexico City is simple. Despite all its history, all its efforts, the devastating consequences of uncontrolled growth serve as an environmental warning to the rest of the world.
a. True b. FalseQuest Questions on New York City
1. By the 1930s New York's population was seven million, and it overtook London as the world's largest city.
a. True b. False2. Harlem is home to six of Manhattan's seven bus depots, and their combined diesel fuel emits very small particles that are easily breathed into your lungs, and are very hard to expel. This contributes to a virtual epidemic of asthma in Harlem.
a. True b. False3. With an incidence of asthma the same as the New York City average, the Harlem community has been called a public health paradise.
a. True b. False
Health Related Problems in the Baltimore-Washington Corridor
Now that you have examined two cities at different stages of urban explosion and their health related issues, let's begin to focus in on air quality conditions in the Baltimore-Washington corridor that would lead to respiratory disorders.
In Maryland, asthma is the most diagnosed pediatric illness, and the number one cause of pediatric emergency room visits. It is also the number one reason why kids miss school. But perhaps most significant, recent research indicates that children don't actually "outgrow" asthma as was once thought; the condition merely becomes quiescent, and very often serious symptoms can reappear later in life. Peyton Eggleston, MD, director of Hopkins' Center for Childhood Asthma in the Urban Environment, says the implications of this new understanding are important: "If we can prevent asthma in kids, then we'll end up with healthier adults." But the problem is, how? No one, at present, can say.Asthma-The Breath Taking Disease Use the following links, directives and questions to learn about a pressing envirohealth problem.Quest Questions on the Environmental Health Sciences
Environmental Health Sciences at Johns Hopkins
Center Summary
1. After examining the brief animation showing the urban grow in Baltimore over the past 200 years, how would you describe the rate of growth? Choose from below:
a. growth was rapid at first and then slowed down.b. growth has been occurring at relatively even rate.
c. growth has been erratic with most of it occurring 200 years ago.
d. growth started slowly but has been accelerating in recent years.
2. The inner-city poses particularly unique problems with the imposition of multiple environmental stress factors on special populations that may have limited access to health care.
a. True b. False3. In the modern urban environment people are exposed to a diverse array of chemical and biological agents, each of these exposures can interact with underlying individual genetic and environmental susceptibility factors that contribute to poorer health outcomes.
a. True b. False4. The problems that we confront today in understanding the role of the urban environment in chronic human health outcomes are much more complex than in the past.
a. True b. False5. The disease burden in a community will be the result of the interaction between:
a. time, destiny and money.b. exposure, susceptibility and availability.
c. condition, reactions and results.
d. None of the above
Quest Questions on Air Quality in MarylandClick this link Maryland Lung Association of Maryland, read and answer the following question:
1. After examining the data on air quality in selected Maryland counties and Baltimore city, it's apparent that some of them have received passing grades for air quality on high ozone days.
a. True b. False
Click this link OZONE, read and answer the following question:
2. Ozone is a noncorrosive, nontoxic liquid that has a chemical formula of O2.
a. True b. False
Click this link GROUND LEVEL OZONE, read and answer the following question:
3. Ground-level _____ is an air pollutant that causes _________ health problems, and damages _______ and other ________. It is a key ingredient of urban smog.
Click on Ground-level Ozone: What is it? Where does it come from? read and answer the following question:
4. Ozone is not usually emitted directly into the air, but at ground level is created by a chemical reaction between oxides of nitrogen (NOx) and volatile organic compounds (VOC) in the presence of heat and sunlight.
a. True b. False5. Though there is only one form of ozone chemically, O3, there are two different locations for the gas.
a. True b. FalseVOC + NOx + Heat + Sunlight = Ozone 7. The above equation shows the components used in the process of making ozone.a. True b. False8. Motor vehicle exhaust and industrial emissions, gasoline vapors, and chemical solvents are some of the major sources of NOx and VOC, that help to form ozone.
a. True b. False9. Sunlight and cold weather cause ground-level ozone to form in harmful concentrations in the air.
a. True b. False10. Ozone is known as a wintertime air pollutant.
a. True b. False11. Many urban areas tend to have high levels of ____________, but even rural areas are also subject to __________ ozone levels because wind carries ozone and pollutants that form it hundreds of miles away from their original sources.
Click on Chief Causes of Concern read and answer the following questions:
1. Ground-level ozone triggers a variety of health problems even at very low levelsand may cause permanent lung damage after long-term exposure.
a. True b. False2. Peak ozone levels typically occur during hot, dry, stagnant summertime conditions.
a. True b. False
The length of the ozone season varies from one area of the United States to another. Southern and Southwestern states may have an ozone season that lasts nearly the entire year.-EPA 3. After reading the above statement, when do you think Baltimore's ozone season occurs and is at its worst.
a. summerb. winter
c. fall
d. spring
Click on Health and Environmental Impacts of Ground-level Ozone , read and answer the following questions:
1. Ground-level ozone even at low levels can adversely affect everyone. It can also have detrimental effects on plants and ecosystems.
a. True b. False2. Ozone cannot irritate lung airways or cause inflammation much like a sunburn.
a. True b. False3. Other symptoms of inhaling ozone include wheezing, coughing, pain when taking a deep breath, and breathing difficulties during exercise or outdoor activities.
a. True b. False4. Repeated exposure to ozone pollution for several months may cause permanent lung damage.
a. True b. False5. Even at very low levels, __________________ triggers a variety of health problems including aggravated ________, reduced lung capacity, and increased susceptibility to ___________ illnesses like pneumonia and ____________.
EVALUATION You have completed a WebQuest explaining urban explosion, its effect on the environment and ultimately the effect on the respiratory health of urban inhabitants. Using 500 words as a unit of size summarize what you have learned in this exercise about the environmental health consequences of urban explosion.