Doctors must get more involved in the public health crises that climate change will bring
The recent Supreme Court decision in the case known as West Virginia v. EPA weakened the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to regulate carbon emissions from power plants. At the heart of this ruling is the capacity of the U.S. federal government to regulate the release of substances that can be harmful to American people.
For every 4,434 tons of carbon dioxide emitted, one additional death is predicted. Using U.S. Energy Information Agency data for carbon emissions from coal-generated electricity in the U.S., I have calculated that 200,000 lives will be lost for each year the U.S. continues to use coal instead of a non-carbon dioxide emitting alternative to generate electricity.
As we have done with the public health crises of tobacco and opioid misuse, clinicians should take a more prominent role in the public health crises that climate change portends and pollution creates right now. Clinicians have powerful voices, as well as the science and evidence to back up their claims. These voices can rise above the din of marketing, lobbying and shareholder profits to speak for the young, the sick and the poor, whose lives will be harmed by climate change first.
The fossil fuel industry has been aware of the connection between fossil fuel emissions and harm to global public health since the 1960s. In the 1990s, industry sought to delegitimize climate science and created the “Global Climate Science Team” with the intention of undermining climate-focused regulatory efforts. Notably, the messages disseminated by the “Global Climate Science Team” were in direct contradiction to actual global climate scientists’ at that time and today.
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