Floods – Radio Free TV

Health needs to be integrated into climate action!

When addressing climate change, it is essential that health must be included in the discussion. The floods that occurred in Asia this past summer have affected 42 million people, destroying their homes, healthcare infrastructure, crops, access to clean water and exposing them to viral outbreaks like cholera and dengue. The insecurity that occurs post climate disaster can heavily impact an individual’s mental health. Despite the clear link between environment and health, there is a lack of integration in new climate policies. Health must become a part of climate action and climate change must be incorporated in the healthcare sector.
Doctors of the World calls on intergovernmental organizations and national governments to take action for the integration of health in the development and implementation of climate policies.

Renewable based energy transition is needed

Antonio Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations, has argued that the only veritable path to a livable planet requires that we abandon the polluting fossil fuels and accelerate our transition to renewable energy. Yet, according to Inger Andersen, Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme, “Only about 133 billion dollars are channeled into nature-based solutions, and investments must triple by 2030 to meet the climate, the nature, and land-neutrality targets.”
Doctors of the World calls on governments to replace fossil fuels with renewables-based energy and to invest in and encourage the use of nature-based solutions for a real energy transition.

Multinational corporations (MNCs) and overconsumption are part of the problem

MNCs and their supply chains are some of the biggest polluters in the world. They are accountable for 20% of CO2 emissions. Thus, when it comes to the COP27 agenda, MNCs must be a central figure in the discussion of resolving climate change. Furthermore, the global community must reflect on the whole social system they have based on consumption and massive production. It is time to call for governmental regulations that are rooted in social change and change our role as mass consumers.
Doctors of the World urges governments and NGOs to take action in the fight against overconsumption and massive production through necessary regulations and awareness raising.

Photography
Fahran Khan Anadolu AFP

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The main obstacles we are facing is that the needs are huge, and our capacity is limited, same as for other actors. For the population, the situation was not great to begin with, even before the floods. There was an ongoing economic crisis that was hitting Pakistan, mostly vulnerable populations like the poor and the Afghan refugees. With the floods, many people lost literally everything.
Now one of the challenges is that we are receiving the cases in advanced stage: during emergencies, even the health seeking behavior in the communities changed. For example, parents don’t bring their child in at the beginning of an illness, like in the first days of a fever. They wait. Not because they are bad parents but because they have other priorities: “Where can we get our next meal? Where can we sleep tonight? What can we do to restore our lives?”. Consequently, we receive children in bad conditions.
So in general, we have logistic challenges and infrastructural challenges in the health facilities, but we are improving that and we are working on it with the government hand by hand. We need to rehabilitate the health structures to make them an environment to provide not only health care but also health education in the waiting area, to do the triage and make sure we don’t miss the more critical cases.

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