Joining other international medical groups the Australian Medical Association (AMA) has formally recognised climate change as a “health emergency”, pointing to “clear scientific evidence indicating severe impacts for our patients and communities now and into the future”..
The AMA said the evidence on climate change is irrefutable and warned there would be more deaths from heat stress, severe weather events, hunger and disease.
AAP Newsagency reports the AMA Federal Council declared at a meeting in Austraia’s national capital, Canberra, that, “climate change is real and will have the earliest and most severe health consequences on vulnerable populations around the world, including in Australia and the Pacific region”.
The AMA has joined other international health organisations, including the American Medical Association, the British Medical Association, and Doctors for the Environment Australia, in labelling climate change a “health emergency”.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has recognised since 2015 that climate change is the greatest threat to global health in the 21st century, and argued the scientific evidence for that assessment is “overwhelming”.
“The Federal Council recognises climate change as a health emergency, with clear scientific evidence indicating severe impacts for our patients and communities now and into the future,” the federal council said.
AMA President, Dr Tony Bartone, said today the evidence on climate change was “irrefutable”.
“The AMA accepts the scientific evidence on climate change and its impact on human health and human wellbeing,” Dr Bartone said.
“Climate change will cause higher mortality and morbidity from heat stress.
“Climate change will cause injury and mortality from increasingly severe weather events.
“Climate change will cause increases in the transmission of vector-borne diseases.
“Climate change will cause food insecurity resulting from declines in agricultural outputs.
“Climate change will cause a higher incidence of mental ill-health.
“These effects are already being observed internationally and in Australia. There is no doubt that climate change is a health emergency.”
Dr Bartone said the AMA was calling on the conservative Liberal-National federal government of the Prime Minister Scott Morrison to adopt several measures, including “mitigation targets” on carbon and policies that promote transitioning from fossil fuels to renewable energy.
Health and medical groups, including Doctors for the Environment, the Climate and Health Alliance, the Royal Australian College of Physicians, and the Australian Medical Students’ Association wrote an open letter to all political parties in April pointing out the “significant and profound impacts climate change has on the health of people and our health system”.
Dr Bartone said all of the political groups in the Australian parliament had a responsibility to move past the toxic partisan politics that had characterised the debate and find durable solutions to a difficult public policy challenge.
He said the AMA would continue to assess the evidence about climate change as it emerged and update its stance to reflect the science.
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