Outline and Literature Review Alex (Zi Wang)
1. Outline
Introduction:
The world has experienced unprecedented urban growth over the past 200 years. In 1800, only 3% of the total population lived in urban areas. By 1900 this had grown to 14% (but had hardly changed in Africa). By the year 2007, more than 50% of the world’s total population has been urbanised, with the fastest rate of change in Africa. There are the downsides like overcrowding, pollution, social deprivation, crime, and stress-related illnesses. The rapid urbanisation has caused a lot of health problems to people. First, the essay will look at the reasons urbanisation is happening. Then, the researcher will provide specific examples of health problems caused by urbanisation. Subsequently, the possible solutions will be given. Finally, there will be a discussion of the feasibility of the solutions proposed in this paper.
Overview
The rapid urbanisation in the developing world
Health problems brought by rapid urbanisation
Solutions to the dangers to health
The feasibility of these solutions
Rapid urbanisation in developing world
According to Gong et al. (2012), in the past three decades, China has seen the largest human migration in history, leading to a rise in urban population from 191 million in 1980, to 622 million in 2009,an increase driven largely by rural-to-urban migration.
Nearly half the world's population now lives in urban settlements. Cities offer the lure of better employment, education, health care, and culture, and they contribute disproportionately to national economies (Antunes, 2002).
Health problems brought by rapid urbanisation
Briggs (1996) claimed that one feature of urban life is the close proximity of people. For example, families live in a small space because they cannot afford otherwise. Diseases transmitted through respiratory and fecal-oral routes are more frequent in situations involving crowding, for example tuberculosis (Antunes and Waldman, 2001) and rheumatic heart disease (Mabogunje 2002).
Air pollution is a major cause of morbidity and mortality in the developing world, and it the effects are mainly felt where air pollution is worst – cities. Air pollution, from both indoor and outdoor sources, is one of the major risk factors for developing acute respiratory infections, the most important cause of death for children between 1 and 5 years of age in developing countries (Bruce et al., 2000; EHP, 1999).
Solid waste collection is a major problem in cities in the developing world. Uncollected solid waste may also prevent adequate water drainage and contribute to water pollution (Mabogunje, 2002).
Solutions to these problems
Public sector agencies often one neglectful of these municipalities focused on solid waste collection and disposal.
Curitiba, Brazil, has developed a model public transportation and road system that moves more than one million people each year, while keeping pollution down.(Nantulya, V. M. and M. R. Reich, 2002)
Clean energy technologies like solar, wind and geothermal are growing these days. Governments of various countries have been providing grants to consumers who are interested in installing solar panels for their home.
Feasibility of the solutions
Developing an efficient public transportation system is the responsibility of the governments and should be treated as one of the top agenda.
Waste disposal collection may not be solved only by governments. It requires the participation of citizens.
It will take a long time to fix the air pollution problem. During the process, some industries may be affected in the short run.
2. Literature review
Evaluation of key sources:
Moore et al. (2003) provide a comprehensive and thorough study into global urbanisation and its impact on people’s health. However, it was published at 2003, which makes this article a little outdated.
Gong (2012) and his colleagues studied the urbanisation
