The infernos of this summer have yet to be quenched. Commentaries that outline the enlarging scope of the challenges we face, the resultant inadequacy of many systems and the need to design and implement appropriate strategies, crowd our media.
Dr Courtney Howard and colleagues, in a recent opinion piece in the Globe and Mail, highlight the impact of wildfires in Yellowknife and the hope that the lessons learned will lead to the implementation of changes that will allow us do better. These are important observations. We are learning that the climate crisis is more advanced than is commonly perceived. Forecasts will be revised in light of recent experience. But forecasts are only that. The ferocity of this fire season has surprised us, over 1% of the surface area of Canada has burned. We have produced over 4 times our annual emissions of carbon already. Can it get worse? How much worse? What will next year bring?
It will be important that we do all that is possible to mitigate the ongoing impact of the climate crisis. This is particularly important for vulnerable populations, elderly, precariously housed, remote indigenous, children. The list goes on.
What can we do?
We can focus on our individual behaviors and action. It is critical that we all become more thoughtful and aware of the demands we make on the planet and avoid activities that are unjust and injurious. We can contribute to collective action by being aware politically and supporting policy solutions that are just and helpful. There is increasing recognition of the importance of the age-old mantra, think globally, act locally.
As an organization of doctors and health care professionals, we collaborate to ensure that our organizations and institutions take their own actions to foster awareness, action and, above all, impact nudging society towards peace. For example, we are working with the Doctors of BC and the Canadian Medical Association to garner their considerable influence to help Canadians choose proven, healthful pathways forward in our policies, regulations and actions. Youthful Canadians are increasingly beset by despair about their future. Health professionals know that seeing and engaging in positive responses is the best “medicine” for the unhealthy state we are inflicting on them by our indifference to their and the planet’s suffering. They deserve better.”
We need to mitigate and adapt in a fashion that will allow us all to become resilient in the face of climate change. Inequalities will need to be realistically addressed if climate change is not to disproportionately impact certain populations, in Canada and across the world.
But there is an elephant in the room that has largely been ignored.
There is a distraction that continues to undermine global efforts to deal with the climate crisis. The recent dramatic surge in state-based conflict and the increasing death toll of women and children in war zones across the world underscores that war, its preparation and its prosecution, exacts an enormous toll. Its impact on human health, the environment, and the economy is well documented. https://www.sipri.org/sites/default/files/2023-06/yb23_summary_en_1.pdf. The resultant instability and diversion of resources interferes with the global collaborative efforts that the climate crisis demands. Simply put, we cannot work together as we must, if we plan to kill each other.
At the dawn of the nuclear era, Einstein lamented that “the only things that has not changed is our way of thinking and thus we drift toward unparalleled disaster.” A prescient perspective.
The film, “Oppenheimer” highlights the Faustian nature of the bargain we have made. Nuclear weapons states possess the power to initiate conflagration that could end life as we know it. These states, as we have witnessed, can act as they please with flagrant disregard for accepted norms and international laws. They hold humanity hostage. They articulate the chimera of nuclear deterrence. They insist that modernization of the current arsenals is in humanity’s best interest.
But nuclear weapons are but the most egregious underpinning in our commitment to use war as a tool of national sovereignty. Conventional war is enormously destructive as is demonstrated by the ongoing conflicts in an increasing number of countries.
If we are to meet the challenge of the climate crisis we have to become serious about preventing war. This will require us to view humanity as one family inhabiting a common and increasingly fragile homeland. The prejudices, the tribalism and the economic injustices of previous eras are required to be surrendered to the tides of history.
The future will need to be designed. This will require a careful examination of what it is to be human. Recent climate catastrophes have highlighted the capacity of humans to help each other. Again and again, we have examples of selfless service to others. It may be our second nature to be quarrelsome, but it is, perhaps, our first nature to serve others.
This capacity is at the heart of resilience, mitigation and adaptation. Attention to this will be critical in all our efforts. This reminds us that the challenge we face is as much spiritual as it is physical. Harnessing both these dimensions of our reality is key.
While preventing war may seem aspirational, there is a pathway, the elements of which can already be discerned. These include nuclear disarmament, reform of the UN Security Council, strengthening of international law, the creation of in international defense force, common security etc.
We are beginning to understand that our planet will never be the same again and that our demands on it have exceeded its capacity. This underscores that our attitudes and behaviours will have to change if we are to halt the progression that this summer heralds. We should not be surprised at this. What we choose to do and how we choose to behave have always been key to better health. This has never been truer.
We will not have peace with the earth if we do not have peace on the earth.
Dr. John Guilfoyle, has had a diverse and varied career in medicine including a full service family practice in rural Newfoundland and Manitoba, a stint as the Chief Medical Officer of Health for the province of Manitoba and a short period as the Chief Medical Officer of a small Caribbean country. Most recently he has been involved with the development and the delivery of an ALARM International Program for health care administrators in Uganda and Ethiopia. is the President of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War-Canada and lives in Squamish, British Columbia with his wife Geraldine. They have two adult children.
It will be important that we do all that is possible to mitigate the ongoing impact of the climate crisis. This is particularly important for vulnerable populations, elderly, precariously housed, remote indigenous, children. The list goes on.
What can we do?
We can focus on our individual behaviors and action. It is critical that we all become more thoughtful and aware of the demands we make on the planet and avoid activities that are unjust and injurious. We can contribute to collective action by being aware politically and supporting policy solutions that are just and helpful. There is increasing recognition of the importance of the age-old mantra, think globally, act locally.
As an organization of doctors and health care professionals, we collaborate to ensure that our organizations and institutions take their own actions to foster awareness, action and, above all, impact nudging society towards peace. For example, we are working with the Doctors of BC and the Canadian Medical Association to garner their considerable influence to help Canadians choose proven, healthful pathways forward in our policies, regulations and actions. Youthful Canadians are increasingly beset by despair about their future. Health professionals know that seeing and engaging in positive responses is the best “medicine” for the unhealthy state we are inflicting on them by our indifference to their and the planet’s suffering. They deserve better.”
We need to mitigate and adapt in a fashion that will allow us all to become resilient in the face of climate change. Inequalities will need to be realistically addressed if climate change is not to disproportionately impact certain populations, in Canada and across the world.
But there is an elephant in the room that has largely been ignored.
There is a distraction that continues to undermine global efforts to deal with the climate crisis. The recent dramatic surge in state-based conflict and the increasing death toll of women and children in war zones across the world underscores that war, its preparation and its prosecution, exacts an enormous toll. Its impact on human health, the environment, and the economy is well documented. https://www.sipri.org/sites/default/files/2023-06/yb23_summary_en_1.pdf. The resultant instability and diversion of resources interferes with the global collaborative efforts that the climate crisis demands. Simply put, we cannot work together as we must, if we plan to kill each other.
At the dawn of the nuclear era, Einstein lamented that “the only things that has not changed is our way of thinking and thus we drift toward unparalleled disaster.” A prescient perspective.
The film, “Oppenheimer” highlights the Faustian nature of the bargain we have made. Nuclear weapons states possess the power to initiate conflagration that could end life as we know it. These states, as we have witnessed, can act as they please with flagrant disregard for accepted norms and international laws. They hold humanity hostage. They articulate the chimera of nuclear deterrence. They insist that modernization of the current arsenals is in humanity’s best interest.
But nuclear weapons are but the most egregious underpinning in our commitment to use war as a tool of national sovereignty. Conventional war is enormously destructive as is demonstrated by the ongoing conflicts in an increasing number of countries.
If we are to meet the challenge of the climate crisis we have to become serious about preventing war. This will require us to view humanity as one family inhabiting a common and increasingly fragile homeland. The prejudices, the tribalism and the economic injustices of previous eras are required to be surrendered to the tides of history.
The future will need to be designed. This will require a careful examination of what it is to be human. Recent climate catastrophes have highlighted the capacity of humans to help each other. Again and again, we have examples of selfless service to others. It may be our second nature to be quarrelsome, but it is, perhaps, our first nature to serve others.
This capacity is at the heart of resilience, mitigation and adaptation. Attention to this will be critical in all our efforts. This reminds us that the challenge we face is as much spiritual as it is physical. Harnessing both these dimensions of our reality is key.
While preventing war may seem aspirational, there is a pathway, the elements of which can already be discerned. These include nuclear disarmament, reform of the UN Security Council, strengthening of international law, the creation of in international defense force, common security etc.
We are beginning to understand that our planet will never be the same again and that our demands on it have exceeded its capacity. This underscores that our attitudes and behaviours will have to change if we are to halt the progression that this summer heralds. We should not be surprised at this. What we choose to do and how we choose to behave have always been key to better health. This has never been truer.
We will not have peace with the earth if we do not have peace on the earth.
Dr. John Guilfoyle, has had a diverse and varied career in medicine including a full service family practice in rural Newfoundland and Manitoba, a stint as the Chief Medical Officer of Health for the province of Manitoba and a short period as the Chief Medical Officer of a small Caribbean country. Most recently he has been involved with the development and the delivery of an ALARM International Program for health care administrators in Uganda and Ethiopia. is the President of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War-Canada and lives in Squamish, British Columbia with his wife Geraldine. They have two adult children.
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