Code Red for a Healthy Future: The Lancet Countdown on Health and Climate Change

Anthropogenic climate change threatens to undermine the last 50 years of gains in public health, exacerbating inequalities and impacting the most on the world’s vulnerable. Yet, delivering the necessary mitigation and adaptation response, together with their associated health co-benefits, could be the greatest global health opportunity of the 21st century. The Lancet Countdown: Tracking Progress on Health and Climate Change is an international, multi-disciplinary research collaboration that exists to monitor the world’s response to this unprecedented challenge, and the health benefits that emerge from this transition. It draws on the expertise of 43 leading academic and UN institutions from around the world, providing annual updates on 44 indicators spanning across five key domains: the health impacts of climate change; progress on adaptation for health; mitigation actions and health co-benefits; economics and finance; and public and political engagement. Publishing its findings in The Lancet prior to the UN’s Climate Change Negotiations each year, the initiative aims to provide robust scientific evidence to put health at the centre of an accelerated response to climate change.

This talk will give an overview of the Lancet Countdown’s research, outlining the key findings of its 2021 report, and expose why this year’s findings give a code red for a healthy future.

This event is co-sponsored by the Office of Public Health Practice and the Office of Sustainability.