Health Professionals Call For Phase Out of Fossil Fuel and Demand Urgent Climate Action

As health professionals increasingly see patients suffering from the effects of climate change, global health organizations are urging international governments to phase out fossil fuels and accelerate the use of renewable energy.

Open Letter

The world's leading general practitioners (GPs) and health bodies, representing more than three million health professionals globally, delivered an open letter advocating for immediate action against climate change to defend community health.

"We the family doctors, doctors and health professionals of the world call on world leaders to take urgent action to safeguard the health of global populations from the climate crisis," the open letter read.

Signatories from 39 top health organizations, including Australia's national body for GPs and rural medicine, claim that they are already seeing extensive effects of climate change on human health in their patients.

Other organizations from Canada, India, Europe, Pacific nations, and the United Kingdom also sign the letter. They demand that all governments stop building new fossil fuel infrastructure and production, phase out existing fuels, eliminate subsidies, and invest in renewable energy.

The health professionals stressed that to limit the warming of the Earth to 1.5 degrees Celsius and halt the escalation of the climate health emergency, there must be an end to the proliferation of fossil fuels.

Read Also: Sydney's Water System Health Worsening Due to Climate Crisis, Study Shows

Health Impacts Of Climate Change

Nicole Higgins, president of Australia's leading GP association, believes that Australia and the rest of the globe must prepare for the health consequences of climate change.

She said that as Australia braces for one of the worst bushfire seasons since Black Saturday, it serves as yet another reminder of what our new 'normal' looks like.

"Preventative action is crucial, and GPs have an important role to play, including in discussing and motivating patients to prepare emergency plans based on local climate threats and their own personal circumstances and health needs," Higgins added.

The call comes as Sydney hosts a meeting for doctors from around the world to explore their countries' experiences with climate change and its effects on patient health and well-being.

According to Maria Neira, the World Health Organization's director of Environment, Climate Change, and Health, air pollution causes more than seven million premature deaths each year.

Climate change has been regarded as the greatest health challenge of the twenty-first century.

A study claims that the climate crisis poses an "existential risk" to the health and well-being of all children.

Several studies have found that rising temperatures around the world as a result of the climate disaster are harming fetuses, neonates, and children.

This phenomenon has potentially disrupted the normal development of physiological systems, cognitive capacities, and emotional skills in often irreparable ways.

Research shows that extreme weather events caused by climate change can disrupt normal fetal development and increase the likelihood of anxiety or depressive illness, ADHD, educational impairments, and poorer levels of self-control, as well as psychiatric diseases later in life.

The United Nations earlier reported that extreme weather events resulted in about 43 million child displacements between 2016 and 2021.

Floods and storms accounted for 95% of all observed child relocations during the aforementioned years.

Related Article: Climate Change: The Negative Effects on Human Health