Rebuilding the Unity of Health and the Environment: A New Vision of Environmental Health for the 21st Century (The compass series)

This is a summary of the workshop Rebuilding the Unity of Health and the Environment: A New Vision of Environmental Health for the 21st Century. The goal of this workshop was to emphasize the connection between human health and the natural, built, and social environments. This workshop integrated talks from many fields and created a dialogue among various environmental health stakeholders. The language presented in this respect should not be viewed as an endorsement by the Environmental Health Sciences Roundtable or the Institute of Medicine of what action is needed for the future, but rather as an effort to synthesize the various perspectives presented. Introduction -- Keynote address: Environment and health: a connection to the current debate -- Human health and the natural environment : The importance of contact with nature Biodiversity and human health Ensuring the food source while addressing environmental health -- Human health and the "built" environment : Designing a better future Smart growth Coherence in the built environment Embracing natural capitalism -- Human health and the social environment : Sustainable development, environment, and health Health and the urban environment: the forgotten ecosystem Socioeconomic status and health Nutrition, physical activity, and health A more communal approach to health Changing the educational environment -- Toward an integrative approach to environmental health.