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Over the past 30 years, urbanisation has been a prominent phenomenon and various drivers have been proposed to explain it. Very few have suggested that the degradation of the rural environment was one of them. This paper explores the human–environment interface by focusing on the portrayal of these concepts within scholarly literature. A systematic literature review was conducted and 147 articles were examined to determine the direction of the link between the environment and human mobility, and if urbanisation was featured. The results demonstrate that equal attention is paid to both directions of the environment–mobility link. Of the articles reviewed, 40 per cent focus on urbanisation, but 93 per cent of those portray urbanisation as a forcing on the environment, rather than an impact of environmental degradation. The lack of support for environmentally influenced urbanisation can be explained by coupled system complexity, disciplinary research and the silence of those most likely to endure environmental change. Understanding these relationships is paramount to the promotion of adaptation without eroding resilience or further degrading environments.

The authors describe 169 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention epidemic-assistance investigations involving American Indians and Alaska Natives that occurred during 1946-2005. The unique relation between the US federal government and American Indian and Alaska Native tribes is described in the context of transfer in the 1950s of responsibility for Indian health to the US Public Health Service, which at the time included the Communicable Disease Center, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's precursor. The vast majority of epidemic-assistance investigations were for infectious disease outbreaks (86%), with a relatively limited number, since 1980 only, involving environmental exposures and chronic disease. Although outbreaks investigated were often widespread geographically, the majority were limited in scope, typically involving fewer than 100 patients. Epidemic-assistance investigations for hepatitis A, gastrointestinal and foodborne infectious diseases, vaccine-preventable diseases, zoonotic and vectorborne diseases, acute respiratory tract infections, environmental exposures, and chronic diseases are described chronologically in more detail.

Here I explore how the experience of place at a First Nations reserve in Ontario, located in the middle of Canada's "Chemical Valley," is disrupted by the extraordinary levels of pollution found there. In so doing, I give special attention to air pollution and residents' responses to associated odors - that is, to the sense of smell. Focusing on a unique feature of smell - that it operates primarily through indexicality - I draw on C. S. Peirce's semiotic framework to highlight ways in which perception of odors entails embodiment of the perceived substance, thus connecting self and surroundings in profound and transformative ways. Ultimately, I argue that the local smellscape, while having reinforced a sense of positive emplacement on the reserve in the past, is now, because of the constant presence of toxic fumes, instilling in residents a profound sense of alienation from the ancestral landscape - a condition I call "dysplacement."

Modern environmental- and occupational-related morbidities and mortality are determined by the power relations inherent in our existing capitalist systems of production and consumption. These systems thwart human public health rights because of the priority to maximize profit for the systems' owners rather than to establish ecologically sound and socially just development for all. The international public health community must return to its primary prevention roots and take action to eliminate the potential for population morbidities that result from hazardous substance exposures in work and community environments. The 1988 Adelaide Recommendations on Healthy Public Policy provide us with guidelines that incorporate a human rights approach and build on several decades of international public health declarations and charters. To succeed, public health must work with the labor movement. A human rights approach to environmental public health can help us make a transition to sustainable modes of production and consumption. The environmental justice movement's strategy for an economic greening that sets as a priority "pathways out of poverty" can help to advance environmental public health rights.

In Japan, a number of serious public health crises involving environmental pollution, food-borne diseases, and health hazards due to pharmaceuticals (i.e., "Yakugai") have occurred in the past 50 years. Based on the literature, we summarize the initial investigations and the subsequent measures. Some common points emerge: (1) prolonged cause identification, (2) lack of countermeasures after the cause was identified, and (3) discrimination against victims and they contributed to spreading the damage. We identify lack of corporate ethics and ill-timed disclosure of information as the principal problems in Japan's crisis-management systems. Defects in information gathering were common to all of the cases, thus we suggest necessary corrective measures, such as the establishment of a new reporting system for health hazard-related information.

This paper explores the manner in which historians have dealt with the issue of industrial pollution in the United States. It reviews the existing literature, suggesting reasons for the subject's neglect in the past. It also raises a series of questions for historians of pollution to focus upon. These questions include the need to understand societal values and knowledge that determined how society reacted to past pollution that threatened its health and the quality of its environment; the need to identify major turning points in the understanding and regulation of these wastes; the need to clarify how different professional groups have related to the issue of industrial pollution; the need to explore the development of indicators for measuring and regulating industrial pollution; and, the importance of clarifying what past responsible parties understood about the risks of industrial pollutants and how they had grained this knowledge. These issues are important not only to clarify the historical record but also to inform public policy.

Outdoor air pollution has been recognized as a relevant factor for health. Studies on exposure of both workers and normal population due to accidental contaminations of environment have been performed. Energy production, winter heating, vehicle exhausts and industrial activities can act acutely or chronically. Epidemiological studies should be corrected for disturbing factors, so that the result are useful to suggest new rules about total good quality of environment (outdoor and indoor).