This publication presents the Agenda for the Americas on Health, Environment, and Climate Change 2021–2030 (the Agenda). The Agenda is a call to action to the health sector to lead the charge to address environmental determinants of health in the
...
Americas. The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) will work with Member States to achieve its goal and objective to ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages using a sustainable and equitable approach that places a priority on reducing health inequity. The Agenda has been developed under the umbrella of the WHO Global Strategy on Health, Environment, and Climate Change, and builds upon the commitments set forth in the Sustainable Health Agenda for the Americas 2018–2030 and the PAHO Strategic Plan 2020–2025. The Agenda was developed in consultation with the Technical Advisory Group and through a consensus-driven decision-making process with Member States during the 2019–2020 period. Looking toward the achievement of Sustainable Development Goal 3, the Agenda focuses on: improving the performance of environmental public health programs and institutions; fostering environmentally resilient and sustainable health systems; and promoting environmentally healthy and resilient cities and communities. Its implementation will be context-specific, based on the needs and realities of the countries. It will benefit countries and territories by promoting good governance practices, strengthening the leadership and coordination roles of the health sector, fostering cross-sectoral action, focusing on primary prevention, and enhancing evidence and communication. It will facilitate access to human, technical, and financial resources necessary to address environmental determinants of health and ensure that the Region is fully engaged in global health, environment, and climate change processes and agreements. The objective of the Agenda is to strengthen the capacity of health actors in the health and non-health sectors to address and adapt to environmental determinants of health (EDHs), prioritizing populations living in conditions of vulnerability, in order to meet Outcome 18 of the PAHO Strategic Plan 2020–2025 directly and several other outcomes of the Plan indirectly. To address and adapt to the challenges of EDHs in the Region, an integrated and evidence-informed approach within the health sector and across sectors will be needed, one enabled, and supported by good governance practices, adequate management mechanisms, high-level political will, and adequate human, technical, technological, and financial resources.
more
The Atlas of health and climate is a product of this unique collaboration between the meteorological and public health communities. It provides sound scientific information on the connections between weather and
...
climate and major health challenges. These range from diseases of poverty to emergencies arising from extreme weather events and disease outbreaks. They also include environmental degradation, the increasing prevalence of noncommunicable diseases and the universal trend of demographic ageing.
more
Globalization and Health (2021) 17:74 https://doi.org/10.1186/s12992-021-00722-3
The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health recognises that climate change
is an existential threat to the health and wellbeing of children and young people.
In October 2020, we joined national health and academic alliances to declare
...
climate change an emergency requiring accelerated collaborative actions. This
position statement summarises our recommendations and activity about
mitigation and adaptation against the impact of climate change on children and
young people around the world.
more
This open access book not only describes the challenges of climate disruption, but also presents solutions. The challenges described include air pollution, climate change, extreme weather, and relat
...
ed health impacts that range from heat stress, vector-borne diseases, food and water insecurity and chronic diseases to malnutrition and mental well-being.
more
Over half a billion children are living in areas with extremely high levels of floods and nearly 160 million children live in areas of high or extremely high droughts. The World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates that 26% of the annual 6.6 million deaths of children under five are linked to environ
...
ment-related causes and conditions. Children are also disproportionately affected by pollution, not only in terms of death rates, but also in terms of cognitive and physical development. This report illustrates that environmental causes also have an impact on whether children are pushed to work and on the kind of work they engage in, the conditions of work, exposure to dangerous toxicants and the risk of exploitation. However, the report raises more questions than it answers as it is one of the first reports addressing the question, how environmental degradation and climate change affect the vulnerability of children towards exploitation.
more
Recent United Nations Conferences of the Parties (COPs) have demonstrated that health professionals are
playing an increasingly prominent role in calling for rapid action to address the climate crisis.
The discourse on climate change and migration has shifted from labelling migration merely as a consequence of climate impacts, to describing it as a form of human adaptation. This article explores t
...
he adaptation framing of the climate change and migration nexus and highlights its shortcomings and advantages. While for some groups, under certain circumstances migration can be an effective form of adaptation, for others it leads to increased vulnerabilities and a poverty spiral, reducing their adaptive apacities. Non-economic losses connected to a change of place further challenge the notion of successful adaptation. Even when migration improves the situation of a household, it may conceal the lack of action on climate change adaptation from national governments or the international community. Given the growing body of evidence on the diverse circumstances and outcomes of migration
in the context of climate change, we distinguish between reactive and proactive migration and argue for a precise differentiation in the academic debate
more
As climate impacts intensify across the globe, nations must dramatically increase funding and implementation of actions designed to help vulnerable nations and communities adapt to the climate storm
...
more
Climate change is having the largest impact on the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people. Within this group, 20% are people with disabilities, who are nearly always doubly disadvantaged.
Research Programme on Religious Communities and Sustainable Development Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
The Planetary Health Report Card is a student-driven, metric-based initiative to inspire planetary health and sustainable healthcare education engagement in medical schools. In addition to inspiring expansion of medical school curricula, we hope to inspire medical schools to expand research efforts,
...
engage with communities most affected by climate change and environmental injustice, support passionate medical students who are trying to organize around planetary health at the institutional level, and implement sustainable practices. A set of metrics in these five category areas allows students and faculty to conduct a needs assessment at their medical school.
more
This report challenges policy-makers and political leaders to tackle fossil fuel production and consumption as a health control issue, in the same way that smoking has been reduced and regulated. Fossil fuel combustion is a major source of toxic air pollution that kills 7 million people every year,
...
almost the same as the number of deaths caused by tobacco smoking.
In 2018, the World Health Organization (WHO) recognised air pollution as a major health risk factor. There is widespread public discussion about the effects of fossil fuel combustion and emissions on climate change… but what about the effect on our health? Climate change poses a threat not only to the health of the planet, but also to humans.
The case studies evaluated in this report offer examples of mechanisms that can be used to restrict the production and consumption of unhealthy commodities, so that the health, air pollution and climate communities can learn from one another, using shared approaches and language. These case studies show that the connection with health is a strong argument to support sustainable change.
more
Best Practices Report.PART 1 Primary Protection: Enhancing Health Care Resilience for a Changing Climatei Primary Protection: EnhancingU.S. Department of Health and Human Services
2.4 billion reasons to end the global climate and inequality crisis. An estimated 774 million children across the world – or one third of the world’s child population - are living with the dual impacts of poverty and high
...
climate .The country with the highest percentage of children impacted by this double burden is South Sudan (87%), followed by the Central African Republic (85%) and Mozambique (80%).risk,
more
Climate Action Network (CAN) is a global network of more than 1,500 civil society organisations in over 130 countries driving collective and sustainable action to fight the climate crisis and to ach
...
ieve social and racial justice. CAN convenes and coordinates civil society at the UN climate talks and other international fora.
more
Accessed on 19 July 2019.
Themes of Catholic Social Teaching important in the face of climate change.
Project Drawdown (2022) provides evidence of how climate solutions can also be win-win opportunities for meeting development and human well-being needs while boosting prosperity for rural communities in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. The report
...
summarizes the co-benefits of five groups of a subset of Project Drawdown climate solutions (28 total solutions) for advancing human well-being in rural areas of low- and middle-income countries
more
This concept report was prepared by Faith for Earth Initiative in support of the efforts of the Government of Iceland to put forth a new resolution during UNEA 5.2 1