Home > A Community Guide to Environmental Health
Hesperian celebrates the publication of our newest title, A Community Guide to Environmental Health!
Drawing the connections between people's health and the environments in which we live, this groundbreaking book empowers health promoters, development workers, educators, activists, community leaders and ordinary people to take charge of their communities’ health.
Individual copies of the book are available for $28, plus shipping and handling, and we can offer a 20% discount on orders of 5 or more copies of this book. It’s also available on CD for $18, and the two together are $36, a savings of $10 off the retail cost of each if purchased separately. Order now!
There is also a digital version available for free download by clicking here.
Years in the making, this comprehensive guide has twenty-three chapters which break down the broad overview of environmental issues and concerns into specific examples of how they affect peoples’ health, and how communities have organized to improve their environment and thus their own lives. These chapters include: Promoting Environmental Health; Environmental Rights and Justice; Protecting Community Water; Building Toilets; Mining and Health; Solid Waste: Turning a Health Risk into a Resource; Preventing and Reducing Harm from Toxics; Sustainable Farming; Restoring Land and Planting Trees, The False Promise of Genetically-Engineered Foods; and Clean Energy.
Eighty-two specific stories from communities around the world enliven the chapters, showing the environmental challenges faced, and what people and grassroots organizations have done to empower themselves and transform their communities. The book also includes 22 activities and 40 easy-to-build “how-to” projects.
We are also looking for organizations to facilitate translations of A Community Guide to Environmental Health. As you may know, Hesperian's open-copyright policy grants permission to interested organizations to translate/adapt our materials, so long as they do so on a not-for-profit basis. If you or anyone you know has the interest to take on such a translation effort, please contact our International Publications Associate, Tawnia Litwin, at tawnia@hesperian.org.
You can help us get the news out about this book by arranging a review of A Community Guide to Environmental Health in your magazine or newsletter, mentioning it on your website or listserv, recommending it in a training or academic course, including it on a resource list, or just passing the word on to your friends and colleagues. Please contact kiriyo@hesperian.org with any ideas or support you can give in this regard.
Finally, you can contribute to our efforts to put this book into the hands of poor people who need it worldwide by contributing to our Gratis Books Fund or our forthcoming Spanish translation. To make a donation please click here, or contact Edith Friedman, Individual Giving Coordinator, at edith@hesperian.org for more information.
All over the world, from small villages to large cities, environmental health is in crisis. But the tools, know-how, and inspiration to transform this crisis are everywhere at hand.
A Community Guide to Environmental Health is a clear, easy-to-read, and highly-illustrated guide to help people take charge of their environmental health. Whether the issue is poor sanitation or toxic pollution, by starting from the most immediate problems, we can work together to protect our environment and improve health for all.