Principal, EcoHealth Consulting

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Five Principles Of Ecosystem Health
David J. Rapport, Ph.d, FLS (London)

• Principal, EcoHealth Consulting
• And
• Professor, Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry,
• The University of Western Ontario
• London, Ontario

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A Pause for Thought!

• Ten years ago we didnt know about environment,
  but now its all around us.
• - John Crosby, Former Canadian Minister of
  Fisheries
• -

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Principle 1 Health a property of ecosystems

• Key Indicators Vigor (Productivity),
  Organization, and Resilience
• Key Dimensions
• Ecological (Bio-physical)
• Economic (no jobs for a dead planet)
• Cultural
• Governance
• Human Health

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Principle 2 Deterioration in EH is due to
Chronic Exposure to Anthropogenic Stress

• Physical Restructuring(dams, roads, utility
  corridors, etc)
• Waste Residuals (discharges of contaminants to
  air, land, water).
• Over-Harvesting (forests, fisheries, wildlife)
• Exotic Species (introduced intentionally or
  accidentally)
• Extreme Natural Events (hurricanes, ice
  storms,sea temperature rise)

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Principle 3 Highly degraded ecosystems may not
bounce back

• Not even when stress loads are lessened (e.g.
  Ponderosa Pine Forests Desert Grasslands)
• More generally ecosystems undergo transformation
  to less organized states e.g. Grasslands to
  Deserts (SW USA)

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The Ecosystem Distress Syndrome (EDS)

• Decreased biodiversity
• Increased disease prevalence
• Loss of nutrients (nutrient leaching)
• Abnormal primary and secondary productivity
• Increased dominance by exotics, small life forms,
  rapidly reproducing species

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Principle 4Loss of EH places human futures at
risk.

• Examples
• Economic Loss of Commercial Fisheries,
  Recreation, Commercial Forestry
• Cultural Loss Indigenous Peoples, World wide
• Increased Human Health Burdens e.g.,
  Vector-borne Diseases, Asthma, food security
• Vicious Cycle Degraded human conditions result
  in further degradation of ecosystems

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Principle 5Barriers to EH Less a matter of
Science than of Politics and Values

• Decisive gap between what we know and what we do
• In short term, tradeoff between development and
  environment
• Human behaviors destructive of environment arise
  from societal values perverse economic incentives

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Challenges to Human Health
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Health Effects of Ecological Disruption

• Physical Restructuring
• (Dams/Irrigation) Malaria, Dengue, Schisto
• Eutrophication Cholera, Cryptosporidiosis
• Loss of Water Resources, Malnutrition, Diarrhea,
  
• Food Supply Toxicity (Red Tides)
• Environmental Refugees Overcrowding, Infectious
  diseases

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Principles In a Nutshell

• EH is more than an analogy it is a property of
  all living systems
• Anthropogenic stress can overpower the resilience
  of ecosystems and result in ecosystem breakdown.
• Highly degraded ecosystems do not necessarily
  bounce back
• Loss of EH increases human health vulnerability
• Barriers to achieving EH are largely in the realm
  of politics and human values