Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-dk4vv Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-24T19:07:21.576Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

17 - Planetary Health

from Part 2 - Contexts for Public Health Practice

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 December 2023

By
James Smith
Edited by
Kirsteen Watson ,
Jan Yates  and
Stephen Gillam
Kirsteen Watson
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge
Jan Yates
Affiliation:
NHS England and NHS Improvement
Stephen Gillam
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge
Get access

Summary

The gross injustice of environmental change, with those who have polluted the least suffering the biggest consequences, is becoming more apparent. Society is not responding at the scale and pace required to avoid catastrophic loss of life, but from courtrooms to the streets changes are emerging. In this context, public health is now practised. Public health skills, knowledge and attitudes are essential to creating a more sustainable and fairer world.

This chapter defines key terms, describes some of the most important environmental transitions, challenges and opportunities, and considers what our public health response to these can be. It seeks to equip the reader with some basic knowledge and all-important motivation for becoming a more effective agent for change at a time when planetary health must become everyone’s business.

Keywords

Planetary healthglobal healthclimate changesustainabilitypollutiondisruptionjusticeenvironmentalbiodiversityadvocacycarbon
Type
Chapter
Information
Essential Public Health
Theory and Practice
 , pp. 323 - 338
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Wilkinson, R. G. and Pickett, K. E., Income inequality and population health: A review and explanation of the evidence, Social Science & Medicine 62(7), 2006, 1768–84.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Planetary Health Alliance, Planetary health. Available at: www.planetaryhealthalliance.org/planetary-healthGoogle Scholar
Persson, L., Carney Almroth, B. M., Collins, C. D. et al., Outside the safe operating space of the planetary boundary for novel entities, Environmental Science & Technology 56(3), 2022, 1510–21.Google ScholarPubMed
Raworth, K., Doughnut Economics: 7 Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist, London, Chelsea Green Publishing, 2017.Google Scholar
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, One Health basics. Available at: www.cdc.gov/onehealth/basics/index.htmlGoogle Scholar
Jackson, T., Prosperity without Growth: Economics for a Finite Planet, Washington, DC and London, Earthscan, 2009.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brundtland, G., Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development: Our common future, Oxford Paper, 1987.Google Scholar
United Nations, Transforming our world: The 2030 agenda for sustainable development, New York, NY, 2015. Available at: https://sdgs.un.org/2030agendaGoogle Scholar
UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, Paris Agreement, Bonn, 2015.Google Scholar
Friedlingstein, P., O’Sullivan, M., Jones, M. W. et al., Global carbon budget 2022, Earth System Science Data 14(11), 2022, 4811–900.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, Sendai framework for disaster risk reduction 2015–2030, Geneva, 2015. Available at: www.undrr.org/publication/sendai-framework-disaster-risk-reduction-2015-2030Google Scholar
UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, Annual report, Geneva, 2021.Google Scholar
Lamb, W. F., Mattioli, G., Levi, S. et al., Discourses of climate delay, Global Sustainability 3, 2020, e17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Climate Outreach. Available at: https://climateoutreach.orgGoogle Scholar
Redvers, N., Celidwen, Y., Schultz, C. et al., The determinants of planetary health: an Indigenous consensus perspective, The Lancet Planetary Health 6(2), 2022, e156–63.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lenton, T. M., Rockström, J., Gaffney, O. et al., Climate tipping points – too risky to bet against, Nature 575(7784), 2019, 592–5.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
van Daalen, K. R., Kallesøe, S. S., Davey, F. et al., Extreme events and gender-based violence: A mixed-methods systematic review, The Lancet Planetary Health 6(6), 2022, e504–23.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bola, G. K., Tweet by @guppikb, Twitter, 2022. Available at: https://twitter.com/guppikb/status/1519390154410143747Google Scholar
Preston, I., Banks, N., Hargreaves, K. et al., Climate change and social justice: An evidence review, York, Joseph Rowntree Foundation, 2014. Available at: www.jrf.org.uk/sites/default/files/jrf/migrated/files/climate-change-social-justice-full.pdfGoogle Scholar
Costello, A., Abbas, M., Allen, A. et al., Managing the health effects of climate change, The Lancet 373(9676), 2009, 1693–733.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Watts, N., Adger, W. N., Agnolucci, P. et al., Health and climate change: Policy responses to protect public health, The Lancet 386(10006), 2015, 1861–914.Google ScholarPubMed
Roberts, I. and Edwards, P., The Energy Glut, London and New York, NY, Zed Books, 2010.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Woodcock, J., Edwards, P., Tonne, C. et al., Public health benefits of strategies to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions: Urban land transport, The Lancet 374(9705), 2009, 1930–43.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Willett, W., Rockström, J., Loken, B. et al., Food in the Anthropocene: The EAT-Lancet Commission on healthy diets from sustainable food systems, The Lancet 393(10170), 2019, 447–92.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Springmann, M., Wiebe, K., Mason-D’Croz, D. et al., Health and nutritional aspects of sustainable diet strategies and their association with environmental impacts: A global modelling analysis with country-level detail, The Lancet Planetary Health 2(10), 2018, e451–61.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ritchie, H., Half of the world’s habitable land is used for agriculture, Our World in Data, 2019. Available at: https://ourworldindata.org/global-land-for-agricultureGoogle Scholar
Romanello, M., McGushin, A., Di Napoli, C. et al., The 2021 report of the Lancet Countdown on health and climate change: Code red for a healthy future, The Lancet 398(10311), 2021, 1619–62.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Landrigan, P. J., Fuller, R., Acosta, N. J. R. et al., The Lancet Commission on pollution and health, The Lancet 391(10119), 2018, 462–512.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Fuller, R., Landrigan, P. J., Balakrishnan, K. et al., Pollution and health: A progress update, The Lancet Planetary Health 6(6), 2022, e535–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
World Health Organization, Air pollution data portal, 2023. Available at: www.who.int/data/gho/data/themes/air-pollution.Google Scholar
Barlow, P., Regulation 28: Report to prevent future deaths, Ella Kissi-Debrah, 2021. Available at: www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Ella-Kissi-Debrah-2021-0113-1.pdfGoogle Scholar
Ceballos, G., Ehrlich, P. R., Barnosky, A. D. et al., Accelerated modern human-induced species losses: Entering the sixth mass extinction, Science Advances 1(5), 2015, e1400253.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Chivian, E., Why doctors and their organisations must help tackle climate change: An essay by Eric Chivian, British Medical Journal 348, 2014, g2407.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wheeler, B. W., Lovell, R., Higgins, S. L. et al., Beyond greenspace: An ecological study of population general health and indicators of natural environment type and quality, International Journal of Health Geographics 14(1), 2015, article 17.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Health Care Without Harm, Health care climate footprint report, 2019.Google Scholar
The NHS Net Zero Expert Panel, Delivering a ‘net zero’ National Health Service (2022 update), London, NHS, 2020. Available at: www.england.nhs.uk/greenernhs/wp-content/uploads/sites/51/2022/07/B1728-delivering-a-net-zero-nhs-july-2022.pdf.Google Scholar
Lavorini, F., Corrigan, C. J., Barnes, P. J. et al., Retail sales of inhalation devices in European countries: So much for a global policy, Respiratory Medicine 105(7), 2011, 1099–103.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Guzmán, C. A. F., Aguirre, A. A., Astle, B. et al., A framework to guide planetary health education, The Lancet Planetary Health 5(5), 2021, e253–5.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×