In Rare Joint Editorial, Over 220 Health Journals Call For Emergency Action To Limit Climate Change

Over 220 health journals have in a joint editorial called for world leaders to take emergency action to transform societies, restore biodiversity, and protect health to tackle climate change.

Impart of climate change | Fire burns vegetation of Brazilian savanna - Getty Images

New Delhi: The recent measures taken and promises made to reduce emissions and conserve nature are not enough, and they are yet to be matched with credible short and longer term plans to limit climate change — medical, nursing and public health journals across the world have said in a rare joint editorial calling for world leaders to take emergency action to transform societies, restore biodiversity, and protect health.

The editorial published in over 220 leading journals, including The Lancet and India’s National Medical Journal, comes ahead of the 76th UN General Assembly, scheduled to take place from 14-30 September. This will be one of the last international meetings taking place before the climate conference (COP26) in Glasgow, UK, to be held in November.

Calling upon high-income countries to “do far more”, it also argues that sufficient global action can only be achieved if these countries support the rest of the world and reduce their own consumption.

Stating that all countries must deliver the climate plans to honour the goals of the Paris Agreement, the editorial warns that the greatest threat to global public health is the “continued failure of world leaders to take adequate action to keep the global temperature rise below 1.5°C and to restore nature”. 

“The risks posed by climate change could dwarf those of any single disease. The COVID-19 pandemic will end, but there is no vaccine for the climate crisis,” Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), said in a statement.

Referring to the recent IPCC report that shows “every fraction of a degree hotter endangers our health and future”, he said: “Similarly, every action taken to limit emissions and warming brings us closer to a healthier and safer future.”

Climate Change Impacts

Health professionals and health journals have long warned how climate change and the destruction of nature could result in severe and growing impacts on health.

A changing climate has already started to cause heat-related mortality in regions that didn’t experience this before, and other health impacts from destructive weather events. Widespread degradation of ecosystems essential to human health are other impacts of climate change being seen across the globe. 

These impacts, health experts say, disproportionately affect the most vulnerable — children, the elderly and those with underlying health conditions, poorer communities and ethnic minorities.

The recent IPCC report has said the planet will continue to warm until the world has reached net-zero greenhouse gases. 

‘Wealthy Nations Should Increase Climate Finance’ 

In the joint editorial, the health journals have urged governments to intervene to transform societies and economies to limit climate change and its impacts.

They have suggested supporting the redesign of transport systems, cities, and production and distribution of food, besides markets for financial investments, and health systems. 

Such investments, they say, will produce “huge positive benefits” — which include reduced air pollution, high quality jobs, increased physical activity, and improved housing and diet. 

Health benefits realised from better air quality alone would offset the global costs incurred to reduce emissions, the editorial claims. 

The journals also say these measures will improve the social and economic determinants of health, stating that it was the poor state of health that may have made populations more vulnerable to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic. 

Stating that the developed countries must commit to increasing climate finance, the editorial says these high-income nations should fulfil their outstanding commitment to providing $100 billion a year, and “have dual focus on mitigation and adaptation, including improving the resilience of health systems”. 

The editorial makes a crucial point that this money should be provided in the form of grants, and not loans, and come alongside forgiving large debts that “constrain the agency of so many low-income countries”. 

“A business as usual scenario would spell disaster for the planet,” the journals warn, adding that governments must put forward ambitious climate goals for people’s health and future generations. 

Journals Part Of The Editorial 

Apart from The Lancet, health journals that have contributed to the editorial include the East African Medical Journal, the Chinese Science Bulletin, the New England Journal of Medicine, the International Nursing Review, the National Medical Journal of India, The British Medical Journal, the Revista de Saúde Pública (Brazil), and the Medical Journal of Australia. 

It is for the first time that so many journals have got together to publish one editorial.

Professor Lukoye Atwoli, Editor-in-Chief of the East Africa Medical Journal, said: “While low and middle income countries have historically contributed less to climate change, they bear an inordinate burden of the adverse effects, including on health. We therefore call for equitable contributions whereby the world’s wealthier countries do more to offset the impact of their actions...”

Ambassador Aubrey Webson, Chair of the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) and Ambassador, Antigua and Brabuda, and Permanent Representative to the United Nations, said: "Equitable funding must be at the core of our response so that vulnerable nations...can have a fighting chance. We need developed countries to keep their promise to provide US$ 100 billion in finance with a higher goal by 2025... This is not simply a matter of money. It is a matter of our actual survival."

Dr Fiona Godlee, Editor-in-Chief of The BMJ, said: “Wealthier nations must act faster and do more to support those countries already suffering under higher temperatures. 2021 has to be the year the world changes course - our health depends on it."

Dr Richard Horton, Editor-in-Chief of The Lancet, said: “Urgently addressing the climate crisis is one of the greatest opportunities we have for advancing the wellbeing of people worldwide. The health community must do more to raise its critical voice in holding political leaders accountable for their actions to keep global temperature rises below 1.5°C.”

Sheikh Hasina, Prime Minister of Bangladesh and Chair of the Climate Vulnerable Forum, said: “Dedicated support is required for reducing the cost of capital and encouraging private sector participation. Strict implementation of the Paris Agreement is the only way to check global emissions and thereby global warming."

Dr Peush Sahni, Editor-in-Chief of the National Medical Journal of India and one of the co-authors, said: “The recent examples of extreme weather all over the globe have brought into focus the reality that climate change is. We must act now lest it is too late. We owe it to the future generations.”

The editorial has been coordinated by the UK Health Alliance on Climate Change, a coalition of leading UK health bodies.

As many as 19 authors, including the editors-in-chief of 17 health journals around the world, contributed to the editorial.