The purpose of this course is to introduce students to the interconnections between the health and wellbeing of individuals, communities and the environment; this is the foundation of an evidence-based approach to environmental health and sustainability. The course will cover concepts linking health and wellbeing across scales from individuals to ecosystems, as well as methods to assess and prevent or respond to environmental health challenges. The course learnings will be illustrated and reinforced by diverse case studies, including notably issues related to land use, infectious diseases, chemical pollution, nature connectedness, and a robust module on the process of zoonotic spillover from reservoir host ecology, environmental change, pathogen dynamics, human behavior, to factors that determine human compatibility and susceptibility to certain pathogens, to early outbreak dynamics.

Over the semester, students will analyze several case studies, and explore an environmental health project, from the identification of the problem or opportunity, to health assessment design, and communication aimed at engaging communities and/or institutions in solution-finding.

The goal of this course is to develop an understanding of planetary health and skills to analyze planetary health problems and solutions. Students will gain an understanding of the importance of the complexity of planetary health challenges, the urgency of addressing health and environmental problems, and the importance of evidence to design effective solutions. The course will introduce the dimensions of environmental change that are causing environmental degradation, such as habitat destruction, biodiversity loss, and climate change, and the connections to population health, including related to food systems, infectious disease, chronic disease and mental health. Students will also build skills analyzing planetary health cases by both presenting cases and participating in discussions. In addition, we will review win-win solutions to environment-health issues for their evidence quality, feasibility, and acceptability, and we will examine different stakeholder perspectives on these issues.

Public health and community leaders seek to identify policy or program alternatives that will help to better address a need or gap, as a step towards building health equity and justice. More and more, the role of–and human interactions with–built and natural environments are considered when seeking innovations to improve human and ecosystem health. Health impact assessments can be a useful tool, “a means of assessing the health impacts of policies, plans and projects in diverse economic sectors using quantitative, qualitative and participatory techniques” (World Health Organization). The course will introduce students to the 4+2 steps that are used to consider and conduct a health impact assessment, and will work to consider fit and feasibility of this approach, develop organizational capacity to implement the approach, and practice implementation with a real world/real-world-like project.

Issues related to health equity, sustainability, social and environmental justice are considered complex or wicked problems. To understand and begin to address these, a strategic leadership toolkit is needed. Week-by-week, this seminar will help build that toolkit. This course will review what wicked problems are, how change happens, and the roles that public health leaders play; it will revisit methods used to rapidly assess and evaluate the current state, and compare that to the ideal (future) state. Students will practice compiling an evidence base for use to inform actions, and practice professional writing (white papers) and oral pitches. Students will define a project scope, develop a work plan, conduct a literature review, draft a project report outline, identify and access relevant data, review data to inform action, and develop a project report that could or will be submitted to a ‘client’. Generating a significant document through this course serves as an Integrated Learning Experience for students in the Environment, Climate, and Health Track.