The extreme floods that hit Midleton, Co Cork, last year resulted in the loss of three healthcare settings and illustrated Ireland was not escaping climate change, according to Health Service Executive public health specialist Dr Philip Crowley.
Living with rising temperatures also means Irish people are going to die in significant numbers due to climate change impacts, he told a conference in Dublin on initiatives being taken to make Ireland’s healthcare sector more resilient to global warming. “As a health service – and citizens – we should be worried about that,” he said.
The conference follows the HSE – with 31 organisations – backing a joint declaration on planetary and human health. Working under the Climate and Health Alliance, it includes public and private healthcare providers, third-level colleges led by the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland and professional bodies committing to transitioning to “a clean, healthy, sustainable, carbon-free and socially just environment”.
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The HSE will lead efforts tackling climate action across the health service, while committing to improve healthcare outcomes for the public up to 2050. Its chief executive, Bernard Gloster, said that as the largest employer in the State, the HSE could be a major force for change. As a healthcare provider, “we have to consider every aspect of what we do in the context of climate change”, he said.
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Healthcare was at the climate frontline, notably in emergency departments and at primary care level, Dr Crowley said. It also had to address its emissions, being responsible for at least 5 per cent of Ireland’s carbon footprint. At the same time, it had to meet people’s changing health needs due to climate disruption.
“Sustainable healthcare isn’t a concession; it is quality evidence-based medicine that recognises the gravity of the accumulated climate and nature crisis and the consequences for health,” said Dr Sean Owens, a GP and chair of the alliance.
“The alliance flips this paradigm and asks us to realise the generational health benefits of timely and just climate action. Active transport, sustainable diets and access to nature are all wins for health and the planet. With this joint declaration, we now have a unified voice that recognises this and holds us accountable for what we need to do,” he said.
The declaration asks the question “what is worth doing now?” and was not just another promise, he said.
It helped bridge the gap between modern lifestyles with immediate preoccupations such as elections and “the catastrophic decline in the natural world”. It was a tool to enable the organisations accelerate their response in providing “good solid public health” in challenging circumstances and was reinforced by commitments on tackling misinformation and divesting from fossil fuels.
“Healthcare can have a huge domino effect in the changes that are needed,” Dr Owens added.
Climate commentator John Gibbons said the global health emergency due to climate and nature loss meant health gains over past centuries were threatened. “This is going to undo 500 years of progress,” he said.
There was a need to “weatherise” key infrastructure including healthcare facilities to withstand extreme weather events, while people should realise “the less we do, the more suffering there is to ourselves; our children; and future generations”. That meant paying for mitigation actions to cut emissions now “or pay later”.
He highlighted the 2024 Lancet Countdown Report which found children born in Ireland today and their peers around the world face malnutrition, a shorter life expectancy and a myriad other health hazards including an undermining of food security caused by climate change.
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