Comment un océan sain peut-il améliorer la santé humaine et améliorer le bien-être sur une planète en évolution rapide ?

This Blue Paper commissioned by The High Level Panel for a Sustainable Ocean Economy (the ‘Ocean Panel’) is the first in the series to explore the topic of human health and its relationship with the ocean. It demonstrates that the health of the ocean and human health are inextricably linked.

Traditionally, conversations about ocean and human health relationships have focused on risks and threats. Hotter ocean temperatures, coastal urbanisation and nutrient and microbial pollution affect health by encouraging harmful algal blooms. Mercury, lead, chemicals leaching out of plastic polymers, persistent organic pollutants, pharmaceuticals and others can enter food chains and increase the risk of some cancers, infertility and birth defects, neuro-behavioural toxicity and endocrine disruption. Flooding, land erosion, rising sea levels and more frequent and violent storms pose a growing threat to the physical and mental health of coastal communities.

What is communicated much less often are the enormous opportunities for improving human health, supporting mental health and wellbeing, creating economic opportunities and advancing social justice and wellbeing that the ocean offers. Ocean biodiversity can provide new medicines to fight disease, inspiration for new technologies, new materials and energy sources. Sustainable production of blue food holds promise for ending hunger and malnutrition. Access to healthy marine environments supports recreation and promotes mental health.

The authors of this Blue Paper are international and interdisciplinary experts with diverse backgrounds and broad experiences. They present a menu of actions to promote equity, sustainability, biodiversity and human flourishing. They also emphasise that healthcare professionals, as expert communicators and trusted members of society, are uniquely well positioned to advocate for change, advance equity and promote sustained global action to protect both ocean health and human health. Yet they are an underutilized ally at present.

The UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development strives to promote the science we need for the ocean we want. However, little emphasis has been placed by the Ocean Decade to date on understanding the relationships between ocean health and human health. Similarly, the World Health Organization’s draft fourteenth general programme of work makes no mention of the ocean. We hope that the publication of this Blue Paper ultimately creates an inflection point in the mainstreaming of ocean health and human health research and understanding.

As the Lead Experts of the Ocean Panel Expert Group, we would like to warmly thank the authors, the reviewers and the Ocean Panel Secretariat at World Resources Institute for supporting the production of this resource. We are also grateful for the continued enthusiasm of Ocean Panel member states in their work towards realising a global sustainable ocean economy.

Humans cannot thrive when the ocean is sick. Acting on the opportunities identified in this report will help inspire the world towards a new vision of universal ocean citizenship and planetary stewardship with sustainability, equity and inclusion at the core.

Prof. Peter Haugan, Ph.D.

Institut de recherche marine, Norvège

Dr Judith Kildow, Ph.D.

Director Emeritus of the National Ocean Economics Program USA

Dr Jacqueline Uku, Ph.D.

Senior Research Scientist, Kenya Marine and Fisheries Research Institute (KMFRI)