Health according to the World Health Organisation (WHO) is "a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity"
Putting this together with respect to the topic I would say that a healthy environment is one which affords the occupants a state of complete physical, mental and social wellbeing.
That is to say that the environment should not be found wanting in terms of security, peace and even social amenities.
For an environment to be considered as healthy, it should bring out the best in the inhabitants with a wholistic approach. It should be non toxic and hospitable even for strangers.
Such environment should have the following;
Peace;
it is a no-brainer that a healthy environment should be peaceful both within and without. Free from internal squabbles and external attacks. One should be able to sleep without waking up to confirm if the gat is locked or if the noise outside is from a bird or an intruder.
Cleanliness;
the environment should be one where sanitation is top notch helping to not just maintain a good appearance but also to prevent the onset and/or spread of diseases.
Social Amenities;
it goes without saying that basic amenities like light, water, good road should not be deficient in a healthy environment. Having power outage for long hours in a day disqualifies an environment from being regarded as a healthy one.
An environment whose inhabitants have to make noise to generate electricity for their homes is not healthy, the emissions from generators along has disqualified such environment.
Good Leaders with sensible citizen centred policies;
A healthy environment should have leaders that are intentional about maintaining the status of the citizens and even making it better than it already is. Their primary focus would be making sure things work in such environment, sometimes even anticipating problems and tackling them before they surface.
One who lives in a healthy environment should be able to set plans as far as a week ahead and not be interrupted by preventable human factors like no electricity, no water, bad roads, etc.
Having mentioned these, I do not regard my environment as being anywhere near healthy. A lot needs to be put in place before I can reconsider my stand.
They include; steady power supply, regular and close supply of water, good leaders, peace and security, etc.
Virtually everything that qualifies an environment to be healthy is lacking in my country and my immediate environment.
What do you need to make it healthy?
They may seem like a lot but once good leaders are in place, I am quite certain that the story will begin to change instantly and within a short time, it would be regarded as a healthy environment.
The problem is that my country has never had good leadership. The one time we came very close in 2007, the man fell sick shortly after inauguration and subsequently died even before his first tenure elapsed.
Since then we have gradually declined from good to bad and now worse. A sad environment is not a healthy environment.
All image(s) are mine