Andy Haines

Carbon pricing is considered an important instrument in the fight against climate change (World Bank, 2022). In particular, many experts and stakeholders have called for the implementation of carbon pricing as a part of ambitious climate policy agendas (Hepburn et al., 2020). This requires consideration of the interactions of carbon pricing with other policies, as well as of the societal outcomes of carbon pricing. In particular, carbon pricing has been found to have potentially large health impacts, leading to important co-benefits as well as potentially some trade-offs (Parry et al., 2014), (Hasegawa et al., 2018). Information on health impacts of carbon pricing, their distribution and how they are affected by policy design is necessary in order to progress towards more socially sustainable and politically feasible policy design. Recent reviews have focussed on various aspects of carbon pricing design and outcomes, synthesizing evidence on its effectiveness, equity impacts or soci...

This chapter describes the resultant emerging challenges to population health and the global change-related health risks. An overview of climate change, its impact on health, and detecting health (or directly health-related) impacts attributable to climate change are discussed. The focus and purpose of research and policy response are also discussed.

... impacts of global climate change DIARMID H. CAMPBELL-LENDRUM, PAUL WILKINSON, KATRIN KUHN ... variation in climate (eg temperature in city centres versus nearby rural areas), or ... 1997; McGuffie et al., 1999), and consequently riverine and coastal flooding (Arnell, 1996 ...

Resumo Esta Série examinou as implicações à saúde das políticas que tratam da problemática da mudança climática. Avaliações das estratégias de abrandamento nos quatro domínios-energia doméstica, transporte, alimento e agricultura, e geração de eletricidade-sugerem uma importante mensagem: as ações para reduzir a emissão de gases de efeito estufa frequentemente, embora nem sempre, acarretam benefícios líquidos para a saúde. Em alguns casos, os potenciais benefícios parecem ser substanciais. Essa evidência fornece uma razão a mais e imediata e para reduzir a emissão de gases de efeito estufa, além do abrandamento da mudança climática em si. A mudança climática é uma ameaça em evolução e crescente à saúde da população mundial. Ao mesmo tempo, pesados encargos à Saúde Pública continuam em muitas regiões. Portanto, a mudança climática adiciona também urgência à tarefa de resolver as prioridades internacionais da saúde, como por exemplo, as Metas de Desenvolvimento do Milênio das Nações U...

Unprecedented environmental changes threaten to reverse progress on health and development unless they are addressed by decisive actions. The implementation of policies to reduce the environmental impact of human societies can reduce risks and also bring a range of near-term health benefits—for example, from lowered emissions of pollutants co-emitted with greenhouse gases. This chapter outlines potential transformative policies in sectors such as energy, transport, urban development and food systems, which can reduce their environmental footprint and improve health.

Dietary changes which improve health are also likely to be beneficial for the environment by reducing emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG). However, previous analyses have not accounted for the potential acceptability of low GHG diets to the general public. This study attempted to quantify the health effects associated with adopting low GHG emission diets in the UK. Epidemiological modelling study. UK. UK population. Adoption of diets optimised to achieve the WHO nutritional recommendations and reduce GHG emissions while remaining as close as possible to existing dietary patterns. Changes in years of life lost due to coronary heart disease, stroke, several cancers and type II diabetes, quantified using life tables. If the average UK dietary intake were optimised to comply with the WHO recommendations, we estimate an incidental reduction of 17% in GHG emissions. Such a dietary pattern would be broadly similar to the current UK average. Our model suggests that it would save almost 7 mi...

In 2005 the World Health Organisation (WHO) asked its Advisory Committee on Health Research (ACHR) for advice on ways in which WHO can improve the use of research evidence in the development of recommendations, including guidelines and policies. The ACHR established the Subcommittee on the Use of Research Evidence (SURE) to collect background documentation and consult widely among WHO staff, international experts and end users of WHO recommendations to inform its advice to WHO. We have prepared a series of reviews of methods that are used in the development of guidelines as part of this background documentation. We describe here the background and methods of these reviews, which are being published in Health Research Policy and Systems together with this introduction.

The UN-led discussion about the post-2015 sustainable development agenda provides an opportunity to develop indicators and targets that show the importance of health as a precondition for and an outcome of policies to promote sustainable development. Health as a precondition for development has received considerable attention in terms of achievement of health-related Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), addressing growing challenges of non-communicable diseases, and ensuring universal health coverage. Much less attention has been devoted to health as an outcome of sustainable development and to indicators that show both changes in exposure to health-related risks and progress towards environmental sustainability. We present a rationale and methods for the selection of health-related indicators to measure progress of post-2015 development goals in non-health sectors. The proposed indicators show the ancillary benefits to health and health equity (co-benefits) of sustainable development policies, particularly those to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and increase resilience to environmental change. We use illustrative examples from four thematic areas: cities, food and agriculture, energy, and water and sanitation. Embedding of a range of health-related indicators in the post-2015 goals can help to raise awareness of the probable health gains from sustainable development policies, thus making them more attractive to decision makers and more likely to be implemented than before.

Reed Elsevier does not need The Lancet to highlight its inconsistencies. It is a signatory of the UN Global Compact1 which includes a commitment to “the rights to life, liberty and security”. Reed Elsevier's “Socially Responsible Supplier Group”2 includes a “comprehensive ...

Abstract Human-induced changes in the global climate system pose a range of health risks. Irrespective of any actions, which may soon be taken to reduce or halt these environmental changes, human populations will be exposed to some degree of climate change over the coming decades. Objectives: In June 2001 the EC funded project (EVK-2000-00070) started to a) to identify the vulnerability to adverse impacts of climate change on human health; b) to review current measures, technologies, policies and barriers to improve the adaptive ...

Earth's natural systems represent a growing threat to human health. And yet, global health has mainly improved as these changes have gathered pace. What is the explanation? As a Commission, we are deeply concerned that the explanation is straightforward and sobering: we have been mortgaging the health of future generations to realise economic and development gains in the present. By unsustainably exploiting nature's resources, human civilisation has fl ourished but now risks substantial health eff ects from the degradation of nature's life support systems in the future. Health eff ects from changes to the environment including climatic change, ocean acidifi cation, land degradation, water scarcity, overexploitation of fi sheries, and biodiversity loss pose serious challenges to the global health gains of the past several decades and are likely to become increasingly dominant during the second half of this century and beyond. These striking trends are driven by highly inequitable, ineffi cient, and unsustainable patterns of resource consumption and technological development, together with population growth. We identify three categories of challenges that have to be addressed to maintain and enhance human health in the face of increasingly harmful environmental trends. Firstly, conceptual and empathy failures (imagination challenges), such as an over-reliance on gross domestic product as a measure of human progress, the failure to account for future health and environmental harms over present day gains, and the disproportionate eff ect of those harms on the poor and those in developing nations. Secondly, knowledge failures (research and information challenges), such as failure to address social and environmental drivers of ill health, a historical scarcity of transdisciplinary research and funding, together with an unwillingness or inability to deal with uncertainty within decision making frameworks. Thirdly, implementation failures (governance challenges), such as how governments and institutions delay recognition and responses to threats, especially when faced with uncertainties, pooled common resources, and time lags between action and eff ect. Although better evidence is needed to underpin appropriate policies than is available at present, this should not be used as an excuse for inaction. Substantial potential exists to link action to reduce environmental damage with improved health outcomes for nations at all levels of economic development. This Commission identifi es opportunities for action by six key constituencies: health professionals, research funders and the academic community, the UN and Bretton Woods bodies, governments, investors and corporate reporting bodies, and civil society organisations. Depreciation of natural capital and nature's subsidy should be accounted for so that economy and nature are not falsely separated. Policies should balance social progress, environmental sustainability, and the economy. To support a world population of 9-10 billion people or more, resilient food and agricultural systems are needed to address both undernutrition and overnutrition, reduce waste, diversify diets, and minimise environmental damage. Meeting the need for modern family planning can improve health in the short termeg, from reduced maternal mortality and reduced pressures on the environment and on infrastructure. Planetary health off ers an unprecedented opportunity for advocacy of global and national reforms of taxes and subsidies for many sectors of the economy, including energy, agriculture, water, fi sheries, and health. Regional trade treaties should act to further incorporate the protection of health in the near and long term. Several essential steps need to be taken to transform the economy to support planetary health. These steps include a reduction of waste through the creation of products that are more durable and require less energy and materials to manufacture than those often produced at present; the incentivisation of recycling, reuse, and repair; and the substitution of hazardous materials with safer alternatives. Despite present limitations, the Sustainable Development Goals provide a great opportunity to integrate health and sustainability through the judicious selection of relevant indicators relevant to human wellbeing, the enabling infrastructure for development, and the supporting natural systems, together with the need for strong governance. The landscape, ecosystems, and the biodiversity they contain can be managed to protect natural systems, and indirectly, reduce human disease risk. Intact and restored ecosystems can contribute to resilience (see panel 1 for glossary of terms used in this report), for example, through improved coastal protection (eg, through wave attenuation) and the ability of fl oodplains and greening of river catchments to protect from river fl ooding events by diverting and holding excess water. The growth in urban populations emphasises the…

To understand the impact of weather on infectious diseases, information on weather parameters at patient locations is needed, but this is not always accessible due to confidentiality or data availability. Weather parameters at nearby locations are often used as a proxy, but the accuracy of this practice is not known. Daily Campylobacter and Cryptosporidium cases across England and Wales were linked to local temperature and rainfall at the residence postcodes of the patients and at the corresponding postcodes of the laboratory where the patient's specimen was tested. The paired values of daily rainfall and temperature for the laboratory versus residence postcodes were interpolated from weather station data, and the results were analysed for agreement using linear regression. We also assessed potential dependency of the findings on the relative geographic distance between the patient's residence and the laboratory. There was significant and strong agreement between the daily v...

The Paris Agreement binds all nations to undertake ambitious efforts to combat climate change, with the commitment to Bhold warming well below 2 °C in global mean temperature (GMT), relative to pre-industrial levels, and to pursue efforts to limit warming to 1.5 °C". The 1.5 °C limit constitutes an ambitious goal for which greater evidence on its benefits for health would help guide policy and potentially increase the motivation for action. Here we contribute to this gap with an assessment on the potential health benefits, in terms of reductions in temperature-related mortality, derived from the compliance to the agreed temperature targets, compared to more extreme warming scenarios. We performed a multi-region analysis in 451 locations in 23 countries with different climate zones, and evaluated changes in heat and cold-related mortality under scenarios consistent with the Paris Agreement targets (1.5 and 2 °C) and more extreme GMT increases (3 and 4 °C), and under the assumpti...

Agriculture is a major contributor to India's environmental footprint, particularly through greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from livestock and fresh water used for irrigation. These impacts are likely to increase in future as agriculture attempts to keep pace with India's growing population and changing dietary preferences. Within India there is considerable dietary variation, and this study therefore aimed to quantify the GHG emissions and water usage associated with distinct dietary patterns. Five distinct diets were identified from the Indian Migration Study - a large adult population sample in India - using finite mixture modelling. These were defined as: Rice & low diversity, Rice & fruit, Wheat & pulses, Wheat, rice & oils, Rice & meat. The GHG emissions of each dietary pattern were quantified based on a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) approach, and water use was quantified using Water Footprint (WF) data. Mixed-effects regression models quantified differences in the enviro...

Environmental changes threaten agricultural production, food security, and health. Previous reviews suggest that environmental changes will substantially affect future yields of starchy dietary staples. To date, no comprehensive global analysis of the impacts of environmental change on (nonstaple) vegetables and legumes—important constituents of healthy diets—has been reported. We systematically searched for articles published between 1975 and 2016 on the effects of ambient temperature, tropospheric carbon dioxide (CO2), and ozone (O3) concentrations, water availability, and salinization on yields and nutritional quality of vegetables and legumes. We estimated mean effects of standardized environmental changes using observed exposure-response relationships and conducted meta-analyses where possible. We identified 174 relevant papers reporting 1,540 experiments. The mean (95% CI) reported yield changes for all vegetables and legumes combined were +22.0% (+11.6% to +32.5%) for a 250-p...

Climate change can directly affect human health by varying exposure to non-optimal outdoor temperature. However, evidence on this direct impact at a global scale is limited, mainly due to issues in modelling and projecting complex and highly heterogeneous epidemiological relationships across different populations and climates. We collected observed daily time series of mean temperature and mortality counts for all causes or non-external causes only, in periods ranging from Jan 1, 1984, to Dec 31, 2015, from various locations across the globe through the Multi-Country Multi-City Collaborative Research Network. We estimated temperature-mortality relationships through a two-stage time series design. We generated current and future daily mean temperature series under four scenarios of climate change, determined by varying trajectories of greenhouse gas emissions, using five general circulation models. We projected excess mortality for cold and heat and their net change in 1990-2099 unde...