There are many factors and vectors that are medium or precursor in the transport and spread of diseases, health outcomes or conditions. More importantly, human beings are not just victims to the health outcomes but also a facilitator to the problem. Technically, there are many disease conditions that result from human activity or contamination of the environment. In fact, contamination or exposure to human activity in the environment ranges from radionuclide contamination, biological-pathogens, infectious diseases etc to chronic disease precursors.

Currently, one of the most destructive priority area of human activity in the spread of disease is the idea of “Silent Trade”. Silent trade is the secretly negotiated or non-negotiated exportation of solid waste including hazardous waste from developed countries to developing countries for disposal (Moeller, 2011). This idea basically assumes that developing countries are “warehouses of neglect” and perhaps that lives living in these “warehouses” are not worth protecting. Proponents to the idea believe that the disposal waste-house in developing countries solely helps the economic income in the dumping ground. While the opponents disagrees with the concepts and ask the question, how so? Solidifying the question was the fact that most developing countries do not have standard infrastructure to maintain, contain or properly dispose the wastes and hazardous material they produce. Hence, the exportation of hazardous wastes to developing countries from developed countries exposes every life within the vulnerable population at a very high health risk.

Unfortunately, one of the many cases of silent trade that brought the world’s attention to this increasing human-vector method of transmission of diseases or chronic disease precursors is the disposal of several thousand tons of hazardous wastes at inland and coastal sites in Lebanon in 1987 (Moeller, 2011). The actions produced critical human health hazards and environmental impacts (Jurdi, 2002a). Based on the rising prevalence of such activities, in 1989 the United Nations Environmental Programme, convened in Basel and developed three recommendations to the problem. The committee recommended that receiving country’s official must give their consent before such exportation is made, official in countries through which the wastes will transit must be notified, and official in the transient and importing countries must provide a written consent to the arrangements (Moeller, 2011). These three recommendations were met with several flaws in protecting human lives and the environment because the burden of proper safety provisions were directed towards the receiving countries and not the primary exporting sources.

The ethical impact of generating hazardous wastes and probably radioactive wastes in one continent or country and exporting it to sub-structured regions or developing countries for disposal is basically unethical and inhumane. It is perhaps, a criminal act regardless of whether the government were officially involved or not (Jurdi, 2002b). Furthermore, the exportation of carcinogens, nuclear wastes and pathogens to less equipped developing countries may also explain the origin and prevalence of many diseases in the region. The fact that developing countries may not have the satisfactory methods or standardized facilities for the treatment and disposal of such wastes in such big capacity; an “end of pipe” approach should have been the major foundation and ethical criteria recommendation by the world body or the UN in discouraging silent trade and disrupting the transmission of diseases associated with waste exportation in developing countries.

In public health and environmental health, the general accepted ideology or philosophy is that waste management and disposal must not be treated as a “free-standing”, a waste management practice that requires their own justification (Moeller, 2011). This philosophy emphasized that waste management must be an integral of processes that generate them. It also emphasizes that waste management must be addressed from the conception and initiation of a given process or operation before the product is produced or distributed to the public (Moeller, 2011). In a sharp contrast, computers or electronic wastes (e-wastes) containing many hazardous materials such as dioxins, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), cadmium, chromium, radioactive isotopes and mercury etc are currently and silently exported to many developing countries including Nigeria.

Based on these facts, “Silent Trade” is an increasing epidemic, another detrimental medium for transmission of disease and pollution of the environment. The vectors for this health and environmental problem is human, and the victims are humans. Fortunately, the possible community-based public health or environmental stewardship intervention that should be employed to prevent or eliminate this problem is an ethical and rational human intervention. Thus, the world body must completely ban this form of waste disposal trade and negotiation.

References

Jurdi, M. (2002a).  Transboundry movement of hazardous wastes into Lebanon. Part1. The silent trade. Journal of Environmenta; Health, 64(1), 9-14.  Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubme d/11826629

Jurdi, M. (2002b).  Transboundry movement of hazardous wastes into Lebanon. Part2. Environmental impacts and the need for remedial actions. Journal of Environmenta; Health, 64(1), 15-19. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11826629

Moeller, D.  W. (2011). Environmental health (4th ed.). Harvard university press, Cambridge  Massachusetts