MPH 530 Module 8 Environmental Justice Example

Who Bears the Burden? Environmental Justice as the Heart of Environmental Health

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Master of Public Health Program, Aspen University

MPH 530: Environmental Issues in Public Health

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Month Day, Year

Who Bears the Burden? Environmental Justice as the Heart of Environmental Health

Environmental hazards are not spread evenly. Across the course, the same pattern has appeared: polluted air near highways and freight corridors, lead in the water of a majority-Black city, heat in neighborhoods without trees. Environmental justice asks why these burdens fall hardest on low-income communities and communities of color, and what fairness requires. This paper examines environmental justice as the capstone of environmental health practice.

Origins of the Movement

The environmental justice movement grew from protests in 1982 in Warren County, North Carolina, a majority-Black county chosen as the site for a landfill for soil contaminated with PCBs. Subsequent studies found that hazardous waste facilities were disproportionately located in communities of color. A review of the field describes how environmental justice research and activism have documented unequal exposure to hazards and unequal access to environmental benefits, and have pressed for community participation in decisions (Mohai et al., 2009).

Three Dimensions of Justice

Environmental justice is often described in three dimensions, summarized in the table.

Unequal Air Pollution

Exposure to fine particulate matter is higher among people of color in the United States. When researchers traced exposure back to each type of polluter, the gap by race appeared for almost every category, from trucks to construction to industry, and it persisted in every state, in cities and countryside, and at every income level (Tessum et al., 2021). The finding suggests that disparities are systemic, embedded in where roads, industry and housing were placed.

Unequal Health Effects

Unequal exposure is compounded by unequal vulnerability. Among Medicare enrollees nationwide, the added death risk from PM2.5 was higher for Black beneficiaries and people eligible for Medicaid than for others (Di et al., 2017). Communities facing more pollution often also face more chronic disease, less access to care and more stress, so the same exposure produces more harm.

Flint as Environmental Injustice

The Flint water crisis illustrates all three dimensions. The decision to switch water sources was made by a state-appointed emergency manager rather than elected local officials. Residents' complaints were dismissed for months. And the damage was heaviest in the poorest neighborhoods, where the jump in lead-poisoned young children was steepest (Hanna-Attisha et al., 2016).

Cumulative Impacts

Traditional regulation evaluates one pollutant or one facility at a time. Communities, however, experience many exposures together: air pollution, contaminated sites, noise, heat and social stressors. Cumulative impact assessment considers these combined burdens, and some states now require it before permitting new polluting facilities in overburdened communities.

Genetic, Physiological and Psychosocial Factors

Environmental justice connects to the course's attention to individual factors. Chronic stress from discrimination and poverty can increase susceptibility to pollutants. Poor nutrition increases lead absorption. Existing disease raises vulnerability to heat and air pollution. These factors are themselves shaped by social conditions, which is why justice requires addressing both exposures and the conditions that heighten their effects.

A Composite County Plan

A composite county adopted an environmental justice plan with five parts: mapping overburdened census tracts using pollution, health and social data; requiring cumulative impact review and community meetings before new permits in those tracts; prioritizing lead service line replacement, tree planting and cooling resources there; funding community air monitoring run by residents; and creating a standing advisory council with members from affected neighborhoods.

Meaningful Participation

Participation means more than a public hearing after decisions are made. It requires notice in residents' languages, meetings at accessible times and places, technical assistance so residents can review data and a genuine chance to change outcomes. Community science, such as resident-led monitoring, can also produce data that agencies lack. Stipends and child care for community members serving on advisory bodies make participation possible for people who cannot volunteer unpaid time.

The Role of Public Health

Public health agencies can document disparities, include equity in environmental health assessments, speak for health in land use and permitting decisions and partner with community organizations. Health departments that report environmental burdens by neighborhood make inequities visible and give communities evidence for advocacy.

Health Impact Assessment

Health impact assessment is a tool for bringing health and equity into decisions outside the health sector, such as highway expansions or zoning changes. It predicts how a proposal would affect health and which groups would bear the effects, and it recommends changes. Environmental justice advocates have used it to challenge projects that would add burdens to overburdened communities.

Benefits as Well as Burdens

Environmental justice concerns benefits too: parks, tree canopy, clean transit and healthy food. Neighborhoods shaped by past discriminatory housing policies often have less green space and more heat. Investments in green infrastructure can reduce these gaps, though they should be designed to avoid displacing existing residents through rising rents.

Federal and State Policy

Federal policy has directed agencies to consider environmental justice in their decisions, and several states have passed laws requiring cumulative impact review or directing investment to disadvantaged communities. Policies change with administrations, so durable protection depends on state laws and local practice as well as federal action.

Measuring Progress

Progress can be tracked through exposure gaps between neighborhoods, the number of permits reviewed with cumulative impact assessment, investments in overburdened areas and health outcomes such as childhood asthma and blood lead levels by neighborhood. Publishing these measures holds agencies accountable.

Tribal Nations

Tribal nations face distinct environmental justice issues, including contamination from uranium mining on the Navajo Nation, lack of safe drinking water in many tribal homes and threats to traditional foods. Tribal sovereignty means that tribes must be partners in decisions, not simply consulted.

Conclusion

Environmental justice brings together the course's themes: air, water, food, soil, weather and chemicals affect health, but not equally. Evidence shows that people of color and low-income communities face more exposure and greater harm, as in unequal PM2.5 exposure, higher mortality risk and the Flint crisis. Addressing distributive, procedural and recognition justice, cumulative impacts and meaningful participation is central to protecting public health.

References

Di, Q., Wang, Y., Zanobetti, A., Wang, Y., Koutrakis, P., Choirat, C., Dominici, F., & Schwartz, J. D. (2017). Air pollution and mortality in the Medicare population. New England Journal of Medicine, 376(26), 2513-2522. https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMoa1702747

Hanna-Attisha, M., LaChance, J., Sadler, R. C., & Champney Schnepp, A. (2016). Elevated blood lead levels in children associated with the Flint drinking water crisis: A spatial analysis of risk and public health response. American Journal of Public Health, 106(2), 283-290. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2015.303003

Mohai, P., Pellow, D., & Roberts, J. T. (2009). Environmental justice. Annual Review of Environment and Resources, 34, 405-430. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-environ-082508-094348

Tessum, C. W., Paolella, D. A., Chambliss, S. E., Apte, J. S., Hill, J. D., & Marshall, J. D. (2021). PM2.5 polluters disproportionately and systemically affect people of color in the United States. Science Advances, 7(18), Article eabf4491. https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abf4491