Geosciences Fina Public Health: Geochemical Variables as Causal Co-Factor Diseases of Unknown Aetiology in the Dynamic and Highly Evolving Environment

Abstract

Geo-medicine is a multi-disciplinary field of study in Geosciences which studies the health effects of Geologic materials and processes on man, plants and creatures on earth. Such health effects can be good but mostly hazardous. It thus integrates professionals from Geology, Medicine, Pharmacy, Chemistry and Geography to handle problems accruing from the geological environment of an area. Metals can have a number of detrimental or beneficial effects in the cell, but first they must get into the body system. Nonessential metals often enter the cell through use of the machinery provided for essential goods. These metals are transported across the plasma and organelle membranes and many can bioaccumulate in the body system. Human exposure to these metals through the food, air, fossil fuel, water media have risen due to the use of these elements as industrial products as well as sources of potable aquiferous water and erosion to combat the global pandemic of climate change. Many metals like lead, arsenic, mercury cadmium, cobalt, zinc and selenium which have been diagnosed in various occupational and environmental exposures around the world results in serious morbidity and mortality, thus, posses various serious risks to public health. Metals are taken into the body via inhalation, ingestion and dermal routes, accumulates and can be stored in both soft and hard tissues. They disrupt metabolic processes by altering a number of homeostatic processes including antioxidant balance, binding to free sulfhydryl groups, competing for binding sites on a vast array of enzymes, receptors and transport proteins.