Climate Change and the People's Health
Sharon Friel and Nancy Krieger
Abstract
Climate change threatens humanity and the planet on which we live. Social inequities, including in the health outcomes that different population groups enjoy, also pose a threat to humanity and our freedom to live healthy and flourishing lives. This book makes three key contributions to the current understanding of climate change and health inequity. First, it describes how climate change interacts with the social determinants of health and exacerbates existing health inequities. Second, the book introduces the concept of a “consumptagenic system.” This is an integrated network of market-based ... More
Climate change threatens humanity and the planet on which we live. Social inequities, including in the health outcomes that different population groups enjoy, also pose a threat to humanity and our freedom to live healthy and flourishing lives. This book makes three key contributions to the current understanding of climate change and health inequity. First, it describes how climate change interacts with the social determinants of health and exacerbates existing health inequities. Second, the book introduces the concept of a “consumptagenic system.” This is an integrated network of market-based policies, processes, governance, and modes of understanding that fuel unhealthy and environmentally destructive production and consumption. Finally, the book outlines some of the progressive steps that are necessary to move from denial and inertia toward effective mobilization against the status quo and hope for the future. The book argues that this requires a systems approach and calls for action that uses fit-for-purpose knowledge and analytical tools from across the sciences, social sciences, and even humanities. The book finishes with the offer of a policy vision and describes some pathways forward across economic, social, and health policy domains that will reduce inequality, mitigate further environmental degradation, and improve health.
Keywords:
climate change,
health inequalities,
social inequity,
health policy,
consumption,
production,
systems approach,
policy,
social determinants of health
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2019 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780190492731 |
| Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: January 2019 |
DOI:10.1093/oso/9780190492731.001.0001 |
Authors
Affiliations are at time of print publication.
Sharon Friel, author
Professor of Health Equity and Director of the School of Regulation and Global Governance (RegNet), Australian National University
Nancy Krieger, series editor
Professor of Social Epidemiology, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
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