Cycling to work, collecting pain relief gases — doctors working to reduce hospitals' carbon footprints

Aware of the link between climate change and health, medics are campaigning to raise public awareness and make their hospitals more sustainable

Dr Aoife Kirk who works in the Mater Hospital, Dublin. Photo: Ray Ryan

LAST month, the World Health Organisation declared climate change ‘the single biggest health threat facing humanity’. It warned that global warming would lead to escalating physical and mental health problems.

The signs are already there. A 2018 Belgian study  found a positive relationship between temperatures rising above 21ºC and admissions to emergency rooms. This reinforced the findings of a 2003 French study which examined data from 16 European countries and linked a continent-wide heatwave to 70,000 additional deaths over the summer.