Thread by @CroakeyNews

#HEAL2022 Plenary session now begins

First up, Prof Eugenie Kayak, anaesthetist from Austin and Alfred Health and @DocsEnvAus's National Sustainable Healthcare Special Interest Group #HEAL2022, acknowledges Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander knowledges, custodianship of Country

We are living well beyond our means, need 1.7 planets to deal with all our resource consumption and waste. So we really have a climate emergency, says Prof Kayak.

#HEAL2022

Heat is a silent killer. In Victoria in 2009, morgues were already full before Black Saturday bushfires.

in 2019, unprecedented stress on an already pushed health care system. #HEAL2022

Unfortunately health care system itself is part of the problem, makes up 7pc of national emissions in Australia - Prof Kayak points to y'day's State of the Climate report from @CSIRO

Health care has responsibility to get its own house in order, but system been slow to act: Kayak #HEAL2022

Is growing acceptance of the need for the health sector to act: Kayak #HEAL2022

What is needed? @DocsEnvAus report says need 80pc by 2030: audacious but what evidence tells us is needed. #HEAL2022

Heath care sector well placed to act and have influence: it's big, influential - can create change far beyond the sector, a major purchaser of supply chains (not just pharma/equipment but food too) #HEAL2022

Prioritising prevention is key: effective pathways, eliminating low value care

We have a 'sick care system' that promotes and reimburses acute vs preventive care: Kayak #HEAL2022

Victoria, brown coal capital of the world, made an extraordinary commitment (ACT, SA, Tas also on the way): Kayak, notes sector is a big big gas user, need to advocate for hospitals to be "off gas" #HEAL2022

Last year in midst of COVID, more than 200 medical journals published same editorial, calling for emergency climate action, pointing out unprecedented funding for COVID, environmental crisis demands a similar response #HEAL2022

Health care sector, alongside others, has ethical imperative to lead. Climate mitigation is preventative health care: Kayak #HEAL2022

Health care sector has taken the lead in the past: done this on tobacco control, seatbelts and other transformational change: Kayak #HEAL2022

Less than 2pc of fed health budget to prevention: long term advocacy to get to at least 5pc. "It's not a good media story: much more photo opportunistic to be opening new buildings" but also problem in the way we measure gains (1:12 - long-term, hard to account for). #HEAL2022

Now hearing from Norway's @KrAunan, who is leading the @ENBEL_H2020 networking project and part of the research project EXHAUSTION, which she says is e.g of how different research communities can collaborate to create new knowledge on the health effects of climate change.

#HEAL2022 @KrAunan

Focus on what makes some communities, people more vulnerable to climate change impacts: @KrAunan

#HEAL2022

#HEAL2022 @KrAunan

#HEAL2022 @KrAunan

See more re @ENBEL_H2020 here enbel-project.eu/about

While some projects look at specific vulnerabilities, others look at broader population, eg EXHAUSTION re heat stress in Europe #HEAL2022

#HEAL2022 - codesigned projects with local partners, where the people actually affected are engaged (focus of ENBEL is on Europe and Africa)

How to engage with @ENBEL_H2020 #HEAL2022

#HEAL2022

Wrap of @ENBEL_H2020 (a sister coaliton to @HEALenviron) ends with animation

Now @DiarmidCL, head of @WHO Climate Change and Health unit, Lead Author of three @IPCC_CH reports, who led the 1500 kilometre #RideForTheirLives to deliver the Healthy Climate Prescription Letter and a call for a Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty to #COP27 in Egypt.

#HEAL2022 @DiarmidCL - just back from #COP27, wants to talk re international responses re climate change and health

#HEAL2022 @WHO @DiarmidCL

Yes, climate change poses greatest threat to health this century, but action on climate change impacts on health represents the greatest health opportunity of the century: @DiarmidCL - we have all the evidence we need as imperative (as per slide!) #HEAL2022

Very large health gains that can come from climate action: @DiarmidCL - air pollution right there at the top of risks/threats #HEAL2022 (lung, right, of a non smoker living in highly polluted area)

. @DiarmidCL highlights this slide from @IPCC_CH - (the blues could actually save money) #HEAL2022

And yes, imperative on health system to put own house in order #HEAL2022

Health workforce: huge and trusted, gives further imperative to mobilise the voice #HEAL2022

Has been a step change in health advocacy on climate action, including from @DrTedros - pic shows the #RideForTheirLives which cycled messages to #COP27 - "health will always get the message through" #HEAL2022

Keeping hope alive from seeing what's been done: @DiarmidCL #HEAL2022 - biggest ever health engagement at #COP27, growing pressure re need to mention fossil fuel

The voice of health is coming through v strongly now but need still to step it up for the transformational change we need: @DiarmidCL #HEAL2022

Next up: #HEAL2022 plenary health panel to be led by @tarunw - fantastic to have Pacific voices : Dr Donald Wilson from @HealthFiji and Marshall Islands’ Francyne Wase-Jacklick, Deputy Secretary @rmihealth1

#HEAL2022

. @tarunw drawing an analogy with World Cup matches in recent days (testing my knowledge!): giants vs underdogs: "we're in that same situation, behind at half-time". Asks panelists to give a "half-time talk" to researchers, to motivate! #HEAL2022

Marshall Islands’ Francyne Wase-Jacklick
@rmihealth1: says lots of researchers coming in but don't return with findings/actionable areas: grant driven. Investigate outside the box: eg Disney movie Moana about climate change. Use these mediums/grassroots work. #HEAL2022

. @tarunw welcomes challenge from Wase-Jacklick to researchers: not just 'what' but 'so what' #HEAL2022

Dr Donald Wilson @HealthFiji highlights two projects;

RISE is a transdisciplinary research program working at the intersections of health, environment, and water and sanitation. rise-program.org

Watershed Interventions for Systems Health in Fiji (WISH Fiji)

#HEAL2022

Seeing how funds used in ways that are sustainable for people on the ground is critical, says Dr Donald Wilson @healthfiji.

We would expect that when you leave you have transferred your skills, tools, he says.

#HEAL2022

Capacity building is the key to transformation: it's in projects, but rarely clear what looks like, says Dr Donald Wilson @healthfiji

@tarunw acknowledges the echoes re power and trust for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities in research

#HEAL2022

Questions of trust, of co-development of research that comes from ground up, directly addresses the on-the-ground issues for communities are critical, agrees @DiarmidCL #HEAL2022

Trust partic an issue on climate because evidence empirically is very clear: we have to do, it saves money to do, and yet the conversations around what we need to do are not framed in that way, framed around the costs and difficulty, often by 'bad actors': @DiarmidCL #HEAL2022

When you are supplying sterilisers and washing machines with 100pc renewable energy, makes waste streams also more efficient: at the moment in Vic (coal), reusable equipment can have a higher footprint that single-use: Prof Eugenie Kayak #HEAL2022

. @tarunw sees networks like @HEALenviron as having an important role to keep governments to account on promises for emissions cuts #HEAL2022

Marshall Islands’ Francyne Wase-Jacklick talks re the impact of climate events - heavy rainfall, king tides - on staff. Had to look for additional funding to ensure continuity of services. But are their homes healthy? Are their families healthy? #HEAL2022

As much as we'd like to make changes, our health care system is still 'sick', says Wase-Jacklick, welcoming #HEAL2022 presentations re greening the health sector: procurements, infrastructure etc. Talks also re the need for champions in political system.

Dr Donald Wilson talking re impact of climate change on health infrastructure/services: guidelines have 4 major prerequisites: workforce, water, sanitation and waste, energy, infrastructure and technology: #HEAL2022 who.int/news/item/03-0…

. @tarunw closes the panel discussion. Short break now ahead of thematic breakout sessions....will begin a new thread for that.

PS - thanks to one of #HEAL2022 participants, this was a paper that Dr Donald Wilson cited on capacity building academic.oup.com/heapol/article…