A world of mass disaster

…Professor McMichael is giving the annual Florey Lecture at the University of Adelaide at 5.30pm.

He will warn that society has a “rather naive and false view” of the main determinants of human health, stating: “Ninety-nine per cent of the discussion has been about what individuals do, whether they smoke, drink, practice unsafe sex, whether they wear their seatbelts, whether they’ve inherited good or bad genes.

“We’ve forgotten that the big deal is the wider environment out there as the support structure for the health of population.”

Professor McMichael pointed out that great civilisations have crumbled when their food production has failed or they have run out of fresh water, and warned that we are heading down the same path.

Adelaide Now