Environmental Health Risk

Risk is defined as the probability that a substance or situation will produce harm under specified conditions. Risk can be assessed with regards to safety, human health, ecology, public welfare, and goodwill. Environmental risk assessment involves both risk assessment and management of natural and technological hazards by estimating the potential impact of a chemical, physical, microbiological, or psychosocial hazard on a specified human population or ecological system. Environmental health assessment focuses on the aspects of public health and is concerned with the factors (contaminants and hazards), circumstances (exposure scenarios), and conditions in the environment. Health risk assessment process utilizes a series of assumptions, preferably in a conservative range, about the chemical hazards, exposure scenarios, and the toxicological factors in order to characterize the risks with a minimum level of uncertainty. The environmental health risk assessment provides guidelines for assessing human health risks from environmental hazards.

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Citing Literature

Encyclopedia of Quantitative Risk Analysis and Assessment

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