Environmental Public Health

Healthy Environments

Environmental public health professionals work to prevent disease and create healthy environments that promote well-being, fostering healthy, and safe communities by ensuring the safety of what we eat, breathe, touch, and drink. 

As a key component of public health, environmental public health focuses on preventing and controlling human diseases caused or impacted by our environment.

Many aspects of our environment, both built (pools, sidewalk and park access), and natural (water, air, soil and food), can impact our health. The Florida Department of Health conducts environmental health services to prevent diseases of environmental origin. Statewide activities focus on prevention, preparedness, and education through routine monitoring, outreach, surveillance, and sampling of facilities and other environments that may contribute to injuries and the occurrence or transmission of disease.

Environmental health services are provided throughout the state and integrated within our county health departments.