With the spread of droughts, flooding and agricultural decline, one can easily understand why fears of reduced access to drinking water, cereal crops and the threat of infectious diseases affect our sense of well-being. One might also predict a dramatic rise in the incidence of stress-related psychiatric disorders and depression, as well as physical manifestations of stress such as asthma and hypertension, as living conditions deteriorate.

The health consequences of a changing environment are numerous and can have both direct and indirect consequences. For example, the direct physical health effects of floods include: mortality (injuries, infectious diseases, poisoning and diseases related to physical and emotional stress).

Indirect effects result from the events affecting other systems in ways that cause human injury and disease. Examples of indirect effects are: reduced nutritional status (especially among children), increases in respiratory and diarrhoeal diseases (including cholera) because of the crowding of survivors, mental health problems (often protracted), and, for floods, increases in water-related diseases from disruption of water supply or sewage systems and exposure to hazardous chemicals or pathogens released from storage sites and waste disposal. Ultimately, environmental problems are reflections of human insecurities that have significant impacts on human health and well-being and it is in addressing these insecurities that contributes to part of the solution to environmental challenges.