Department of Environmental Health Sciences

As the global population continues to grow and encounters increasingly limited resources, strained ecosystems, and climate change, environmental health is emerging as a dominant concern in the 21st century. Pollution has become a leading cause of death -- resulting in over 9 million deaths per year.

In this video, Vasilis Vasiliou, Environmental Health Sciences Department Chair at the Yale School of Public Health, discusses the department's work to assess and eliminate the risks of chemical exposures, address the health impacts of climate change, and more.

"I’m a big fan of collaboration," says Vasiliou. "I think this is the uniqueness of our department. We’re very good at connecting the department not only with the other departments within the School of Public Health, but also with other schools at Yale. Then also we collaborate with state agencies, with the community. So it’s very important not only for our department, our faculty, to be in touch with them, but also to pass this kind of mentality to our students. How as scientists how we do the community engagement. How we listen to the community that tell us what are their concerns, and direct our research towards that."