Structural Equations Modeling in an Applied Study to Analyze the Impact of Environmental Health on the Human Health Index in Basrah Governorate

Abstract

Pollution and disruption of the ecosystem are serious problems for human life, especially since the rate of pollution and environmental degradation is constantly increasing. Therefore, it is necessary to study the interaction between the environment and health by analyzing the impact of some environmental factors (climate change, air quality, environmental awareness, toxic drinking water and sanitation systems, noise....etc) and how they affect the health of the human. In this research, structural equation models (SEM) were used to construct causal models that study the relationships between variables at one time, especially in the presence of latent variables, where each of the environmental factors included in the study were evaluated and their contribution to the calculation of the humans health index was evaluated. The information was collected by making a questionnaire that was distributed to different groups of residents of the Basrah city in Iraq. Through the results, it was found that environmental health has a high positive effect on the health index ,therefore, it is necessary to pay attention to environmental health and reduce the sources of environmental pollution.