Health response to climate change heats up

A new strategy exploring the links between healthcare and climate change – a first for an Australian Federal Government – is now out for public feedback.
 
Citing the recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, which projects global warming of 1.5°C from pre-industrial levels in the 2030s, the consultation paper warns that ‘climate hazards and their impacts on health and ecosystems will inevitably increase’.
 
Authors of the 43-page document say they are looking to create a vision across Australian jurisdictions for every level of the health system, with approaches to mitigate emissions as well as adapt to ‘the unavoidable impacts of climate change’.
 
Dr Kate Wylie, Chair of RACGP Specific Interests Climate and Environmental Medicine, says the very fact that a strategy is being put together is a promising change.
 
‘I very much welcome that there will be a strategy on health and climate,’ she told newsGP.  
 
‘It’s a massive step forward for climate and health action in this country.’
 
According to Dr Wylie, the impact of climate change on health and wellbeing is already being felt in Australia.
 
‘We all got a big wake-up call with the Black Summer fires and the extensive flooding we had last year,’ she said.
 
‘[There are also] things like vector-borne viruses being further south – Japanese encephalitis is probably the most obvious example we’re seeing now.
 
‘What we know absolutely is that as our planet continues to warm, we’re going to see more and more of these health-related climate events and so it’s absolutely vital that the health industry in Australia anticipates what’s going to happen and prepares for it.’
 
The consultation paper predicts that climate change’s impact is likely to be spread unevenly, with existing inequalities stretched further still.
 
‘A health equity approach recognises some populations are more vulnerable to and have less capacity to adapt to the health impacts of climate change, and that responses to climate change need to take account of disparities in health outcomes,’ it states.
 
Dr Wylie strongly agrees.
 
‘We’re seeing it already affect disadvantaged people more – rural and remote communities, First Nations communities, people that are doing it harder in our society … there’s a massive health equity lens when it comes to climate,’ she said.
 
‘Seeing a government recognise the need for improved public housing, street trees, ways of reducing the impacts of heat and extreme weather events on our communities, would end up supporting health, and it would support GPs to do their job better.’
 
Dr Wylie also recognises the challenges many GPs are likely to face in reducing emissions.
 
‘Mitigation is probably a complex area for us,’ she said.
 
‘A practice can mitigate in terms of who they choose to buy energy from, by choosing to get energy from a renewable energy provider.
 
‘But I very much want to acknowledge that GPs across Australia are really overloaded already, that we have so much that we are trying to do with so little.
 
‘It’s really important that any efforts coming out of the consultation process don’t put extra burdens on us as an industry, that it’s supportive.
 
‘Grants for [solar] panels would be good [and] ways that we can improve insulation in our buildings to reduce energy costs will be a massive step forward.’
 
However, the South Australian GP also believes general practice’s ability to help keep patients out of tertiary care is an important consideration.
 
‘Preventive care … is very much the way we think about health,’ she said.
 
‘In general practice, we keep people well and out of hospitals, and so by supporting general practice, we support fundamentally low carbon healthcare.’
 
Dr Wylie also highlights high emissions from the pharmaceutical industry and would like to see more information shared on this, including clear detail on the impact of specific medications.
 
‘So if I have a choice, I can consider the carbon footprint of those medications when I write that script,’ she said.
 
‘Things like the Ventolin inhaler has a high carbon footprint, compared to the dry powder inhalers, but we have a few bureaucratic things to jump through on the PBS.’
 
Dr Wylie describes the consultation process as ‘robust’ and urges GPs to have their say.
 
‘It does talk about primary care within that document, perhaps not as much as GPs would like, and I think it’s really our opportunity to reinforce that we are the backbone of the Australian healthcare system,’ she said.
 
A national and health climate policy was promised under a prospective Labor Government back in 2017, when the current Federal Health and Aged Care Minister Mark Butler was the Shadow Minister for Climate Change.
 
The then Shadow Minister for Health Catherine King also pointed out that the World Health Organization described climate change as a ‘defining challenge’ of the 21st century.
 
‘That’s why it’s so important that national governments make sure there are good links between climate policy and public health policy,’ Minister Butler said at the time.
 
For Dr Wylie, the strategy now being formulated six years later is a significant step, but it is what comes next that really matters.
 
‘What will be interesting going forward is what comes out of all these discussions,’ she said.
 
‘How much that will mean on the ground?’
 
To read the National Health and Climate strategy consultation paper, and to comment, see the Department of Health and Aged Care website. Consultation is open until 24 July.
 
A guide to sustainable healthcare is available on the Doctors for the Environment Australia (DEA) website.
 
The RACGP also has guidance on environmental sustainability in general practice on its website.
 
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