Eat, drink, and deplete? Long-term threats to health, environment and food systems, and food security policies needed to reverse them

The greatest long-term public health threat facing the world's population relates to deficient diets. Water and energy depletion synergistically contribute to this third crucial resource gap: food. Food production is a major consumer of water and fuel, but it represents in itself a major source of energy—the nutrient-base for all human activity. In the United States, food production is responsible for 11% of total national energy use and 17% of fossil fuel use. Globally, agriculture is responsible for >70% of all water usage--far more than industrial or household sources. Climate change contributes to the depletion of such resources and converges with natural disasters and human-made crises to exacerbate malnutrition globally. Attention is needed to national policies that address the multiple crises of resource depletion and promote forms of agriculture which improve access to diets of sufficiency quality and quantity. Both prongs are needed, supported by appropriate research and effective investments. Public health professionals can, and should, be at the forefront of interdisciplinary conversations on global food security, as it links inextricably to dialogues on health (and emerging diseases) and environment (and climate change). Human health underpins, and is underpinned by, a healthy environment and healthy food systems. As the problems are inextricably linked, solutions require us to think outside of disciplinary silos.