Global environmental change could have devastating effects on human health unless professionals, from nutritionists to business leaders, respond promptly, warns a Cornell University public health expert.

Global warming, air and water pollution, acid rain, ozone depletion and tropical deforestation threaten the physical and mental health of human beings worldwide, Eunice Rodriguez writes in a recent issue of Health Promotion International (Vol. 10, No. 3, 1995), a journal affiliated with the World Health Organization.

Health professionals must take a stand and educate communities in an ecological preventive lifestyle while businesses can follow the lead of numerous companies that have proven they can make money from sustainable development policies that do not compromise the welfare of future generations, she argues.

"If we do not cherish and protect our plants, our animals, our water and air, in a not-so-distant future there may be no habitat left for any us. Simultaneously, if we do not strive to produce a healthy and joyous human society, there will be nothing to look for; efforts to sustain human settlements will become meaningless," says Rodriguez, a social epidemiologist affiliated with Program Evaluation and Planning in the Department of Human Service Studies in Cornell's College of Human Ecology.

Rodriguez cites scores of alarming studies that together paint a grim future for the planet. Climate change, such as global warming, could increase heat-related deaths and droughts, while ozone depletion will push up the rates of melanoma deaths and cataract cases, she says. "Increases in air pollution are estimated to be responsible for an excess in mortality rates ranging from 3 to 6 percent; rain shortages are linked to lower life expectancies and to jumps in death rates from diarrhea and other infectious diseases," she writes.

Global warming and deforestation, she adds, can spread infectious diseases and give rise to new viral mutations as well as new habitats for malaria-carrying mosquitoes. Deforestation has produced new habitats for anopheles darling mosquitoes, for example, and has caused malaria epidemics in South America. "With climatic warming, malaria, St. Louis viral encephalitis and other diseases typical to warm climates could spread to higher latitudes," she warns.

And as water scarcity and contamination spreads, she predicts that in the future Middle Eastern conflicts, for example, could concern water supplies rather than oil.

Among other specific facts and predictions she has collected:

• Acid rain affects forests worldwide; in the United States, it causes more than $5 billion a year in crop damage.
• With 1.1 million of the 1.7 million annual deaths in the United States already sensitive to extreme weather, global changes could boost this number even higher. Increases in hurricanes, floods, droughts and crop failures will take ever higher tolls on human life.
• Every day, between 50 and 100 animal species and at least one plant species become extinct. Within two decades, one- fifth of all living species could disappear. Such extinctions potentially threaten ecosystems as well as potential medicines and chemicals.
• Carbon dioxide, the largest waste product of our society, is expected to double during the next century causing unprecedented global warming. Effects will include melting polar ice, disappearing islands and colder winters with up to $60 billion lost annually in the United States, up to a 20 percent loss of the world gross domestic product.

"Stopping this destructive process must be given top priority on the world's political agenda," Rodriguez says. She calls on public health professionals -- doctors, nurses, hospitals, teachers, community educators and policy-makers-to serve as public figures to raise awareness and encourage those around them to respect the environment.

"Instead of recommending 20 minutes of workout three times a week, we could talk about 'taking back the streets,' walking to the store, using cars with moderation and demanding better public transportation," Rodriguez suggests. Governments could divert some money now used for unemployment benefits and welfare payments to create jobs dedicated to preserving the environment.

"And we must dispel the myth that environmentally conscious enterprises are uneconomical," she adds, citing examples such as New England Electric that saved its customers millions of dollars by producing more energy-efficient systems and encourages energy conservation, and Volkswagen that takes back its Golf cars for recycling. "Rigorous evaluations of environmental impacts and their costs are well under way, at both national and international levels. Now is our chance to take an active role and become leaders involved with this important issue."