Like unremoved garbage, illness is not evenly spread. Often, disease piles up in the same places rubbish does. The most underserved are also most vulnerable to getting sick, and staying that way. There is no ‘away’ to send our waste to. If it’s not biodegradable and it’s not being recycled (and most of it isn’t), then it goes to landfill. It becomes litter. That is a problem of waste generation, not waste removal. If we want less litter, we need less waste. Big companies must shoulder this responsibility. Consumers can help too by buying products that have less packaging or come in biodegradable containers.
Our own health and wellbeing is tied to the health and wellbeing of our environment. Ultra-processed food is bad for our bodies and its packaging is bad for the land. Unless we find ways to make healthy food more affordable, and support local food economies, many South African households will be forced to eat a diet that under-nourishes them.
A Bhekisisa Centre for health journalism investigation has found that residents are getting sick and struggling to breathe because of the air quality around an illegal dump site in Kya Sand, north west of Johannesburg. Residents from informal settlements and gated...
The stories offered here are an expression of how some people in the Karoo have come to think about the connections between rubbish, ill-health and their relationship to the land. It draws on local oral histories of land and health that were collected as part of a...
In 2019, the Eastern Cape Karoo was in the midst of a crippling drought — some said the worst they’d ever seen. The Nqwebo dam in Graaff Reinet had gone dry. More than 600 volunteers, young and old, had gathered to remove dead fish from its cracked floor. The clean-up...