In Victoria, the largest impact on health from pollution is related to air pollution (everybody breathes in air!) and noise pollution (mainly noise from traffic and other transport). However, depending on where you live, other environmental factors may affect your health too – living next to contaminated land, smelly, or noisy industries, or swimming in polluted water.
EPA Victoria is responsible for the environmental public health function, which is about trying to prevent everyone from getting sick from the effects of pollution and waste.
What is environmental public health?
Environmental public health is the science and practice of preventing harm to human health from environmental pollution.
EPA Victoria does this by making policies and programs to reduce chemical and other environmental exposures in air, water and soil to protect you and provide your community with a healthier environment.
Environmental public health aims to provide benefit for the largest number of people and therefore focuses on groups of people rather than individuals and activities that are targeted at populations.
There are many things you can do to prevent impacts on your health from pollution, and this site provides information to help you do that.