Healthcare is an expansive industry with numerous fields. To choose a career path in this industry, it’s essential that you understand all of its various roles and responsibilities.
Health systems account for 4-5% of global emissions and can significantly decrease their climate footprint through various initiatives, including renewable energy projects, low-carbon procurement strategies and digital redesign. Many of these efforts also bring health co-benefits.
Climate change
Climate change is a global occurrence caused by human activities. Earth’s temperature is steadily increasing due to an accumulation of greenhouse gases; and its effects are already felt globally. Human activities that contribute to these changes can be reduced through cutting back fossil fuel use, cutting waste production and switching over to more renewable energy sources like wind power or solar.
Health systems contribute 4-5% of global greenhouse gas emissions and play an essential role in combatting climate change. Their purchasing power can help shape sustainable procurement policies with suppliers. Furthermore, the health care sector can promote more eco-friendly practices within communities by encouraging communities to adopt them.
Healthcare facilities can reduce their carbon footprint by cutting emissions from fleet vehicles, buildings and offices as well as by adopting more energy-efficient LED lighting and using renewable energies to lower energy consumption and consumption costs. They can also utilize more effective medical equipment and limit waste production.
Since 2008, England’s National Health Service (NHS) has been undertaking annual carbon footprint assessments that are regularly revised and improved upon. This effort represents the longest-running effort to quantify healthcare-related greenhouse gas emissions with its bottom-up approach that integrates NHS input-output tables with UK’s sophisticated MRIO model.
These analyses can assist the NHS in identifying opportunities to reduce its climate footprint, leading to savings on both operational costs and energy costs. This can be accomplished by decreasing fuel usage, switching to renewables or adding a climate lens into planning processes.
Climate-informed approaches to healthcare systems are applicable across other aspects, too, such as prioritizing decarbonization and resilience, adapting data infrastructure, building climate-ready workforces, paying for care, etc. All of these efforts will contribute towards creating more resilient health systems which are better prepared to deal with climate change.
The Biden Administration seeks to demonstrate the leadership of the health care sector in actively reducing greenhouse gas emissions and becoming more resilient against climate-related harms. By signing the Health Care Sector Pledge, organizations can demonstrate their dedication to mitigating their climate impact.
Impacts on health
Climate change is already having a serious impact on human health in multiple ways, most evidently through rising temperatures and hotter weather, which increases heat-related illnesses while aggravating existing chronic conditions. Warmer conditions also increase mosquito-borne diseases like dengue fever and Zika virus transmission rates as well as expanding tick range, raising Lyme disease risks.
Other impacts include air pollution from fossil fuels and other sources, food insecurity caused by climate-change-related droughts, floods and displacement as well as climate-sensitive health risks that are particularly acute among vulnerable communities, which will only increase with further warming.
Health care systems are at the frontline of climate change and must be prepared to rapidly respond to threats arising from changing weather patterns and events, which pose health threats. The American Public Health Association is working hard to ensure health systems and communities are equipped to face these new climate challenges and support community efforts to safeguard human health.
Climate change will have health repercussions for every community in the United States, but vulnerable groups may be especially at risk. These groups include rural and remote residents, communities of color with lower incomes, indigenous and immigrant populations, children and pregnant women, people living with preexisting medical conditions or those who experience mental illness.
Frequent storms, droughts, floods and sea level rise threaten essential services like water, power and transportation, which in turn disrupt healthcare access as well as quality of care provided.
Health care professionals are particularly vulnerable to climate change. Heat waves and other extreme weather events may increase their chances of dehydration and heat stress, worsen their chronic illnesses and lead to trauma injuries – particularly among those working outdoors or living near coastal regions.
The APHA is also working to prepare health care workforce by emphasizing training and building resilience against climate-related hazards and stresses. We support initiatives like the Third National Climate Assessment’s Health Chapter, as well as advocating for greater inclusion of justice, equity, diversity, and inclusivity into climate adaptation planning processes.
Impacts on the health care sector
Health care sectors play a pivotal role in global population health and can be particularly susceptible to climate change impacts. Going forward, they must take measures to mitigate their impacts and ensure a strong and resilient supply chain – this requires adopting an operational mindset focused on sustainability as well as adopting new business models that actively promote health promotion.
Climate change is anticipated to lead to significant reductions in access to key determinants of health, such as clean air, safe water, adequate food and shelter – particularly among vulnerable communities in developing nations. Furthermore, healthcare costs could skyrocket; at present essential and elective medical services account for up to 25 percent of household income in low-income nations, potentially undoing progress toward universal coverage while increasing inequality across and within populations.
Health care’s huge carbon footprint can be reduced through effective energy use and waste reduction practices, switching to renewable energy sources, or using on-site combined heat and power plants that generate electricity from natural gas or biomass with lower greenhouse gas emissions than grid electricity. Furthermore, hospitals can cut non-renewable usage by purchasing eco-friendly products and equipment, using digital and remote tools, or forgoing unnecessary care services.
Health care organizations can work to incorporate climate risk into clinical practice and education by creating core climate knowledge in various medical disciplines. Such information should then be incorporated into undergraduate and graduate program curricula as well as licensure or board exams to facilitate rapid implementation.
The health care sector contributes to climate change through energy usage and supply chains, while its effects are compounded by impacts such as social determinant shifts related to climate change, increasing healthcare needs and costs, shifting geopolitical tensions from migration into climate-affected areas, as well as reduced profitability and liability issues that stem from climate change. Furthermore, health care faces potential financial risks from climate change such as reduced profitability and liability exposures.
Solutions
Health and life sciences organizations can take several steps to mitigate climate risks and prepare for the effects of climate change, such as reducing carbon emissions and building resilience against it. They could also incorporate this strategy into their business transformation efforts over the next 5-10 years or take advantage of billions available through government support programs that offer assistance for reducing operational footprints while investing in sustainable infrastructure projects.
The health care sector is directly affected by climate changes and is responsible for over four percent of all global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, including direct operations (scope 1) and electricity purchases (scope 2) as well as indirect GHG emissions from manufacturing, transporting and disposing of pharmaceuticals, medical devices and hospital supplies. Carbon emissions can be decreased significantly by improving efficiency and implementing energy saving technologies that reduce energy and water use – this will have an immediate impact on GHG emissions while simultaneously contributing towards meeting sustainable development goals in this industry.
Health care institutions can make an impactful contribution by educating their staff and the public on the significance of climate change mitigation. Furthermore, they can advocate for policies that support sustainability and resilience, promote renewable technologies like solar panels and participate in sustainability-related events and activities.
Climate change is an intricate issue and poses serious health risks, impacting all spheres of society and directly impacting health care systems, which themselves contain numerous moving parts that make identification and prioritizing actions to address this challenge a challenging process.
An effective approach to climate change will require collaboration across the healthcare ecosystem. This requires moving away from siloed approaches towards more holistic ones that integrate climate and sustainability initiatives with business transformation – ultimately, this will allow medicine’s triple aim and reduce its environmental footprint; short term this will involve focusing on emissions reduction from facilities while long term this means including a climate lens into business transformation processes.
