The UN Climate Change Conference
A Call to Action from Health Professionals to Governments
As health professionals,
- We recognise that:
- The factors contributing to climate change threaten present and future generations with reduced access to food, water, shelter, clean air, and health;
- Declining crop yields threaten starvation and will be exacerbated by changes in rainfall patterns, drought and temperature;
- Associated sea level rises, flooding and drought, and economic impacts, will displace millions and spark conflict;
- Climate change will increase the spread of vector-borne diseases such as malaria and dengue fever;
- These impacts may be most bitterly felt by the poorest.
- We know that:
- Policies to reduce carbon emissions can bring important public health benefits, through increases in physical activity, improvements in air quality, decreases in road traffic injuries, increased home energy efficiency and the adoption of diets that contain less animal products.
We thus urge governments and the international community to:
- Establish a global implementation framework which
- Caps the emissions of greenhouse gases such that the atmospheric concentration of CO2 does not rise above 450 ppm;
- And is coupled with a transfer of resources to the poorest populations of the world so that they can
- adapt to the climate impacts that are now unavoidable;
- meet their development needs without further contributing to adverse health and environmental impacts;
- establish policies supporting population stabilisation.
We also urge governments to
- Fund research institutions to invest resources in exploring the most effective way of reducing carbon emissions;
- Provide incentives and information to enable individuals to measure and reduce their own carbon dioxide emissions/carbon footprint;
- Encourage and reward sustainable practices in health-related and other institutions.