Berkeley, California – On the eve of Earth Day (22 April), many countries are preparing to resume activities after their Covid-19 peak. The decisions governments make now must prepare the way for a safer and healthier future for everyone and for the planet on which we depend, when we emerge from this pandemic, said the Global Climate and Health Alliance (GCHA) (1).
Jeni Miller, GCHA Executive Director, said: “We won’t get another shot at this: only a global green recovery can sustain a safe and healthy future for all. Our health is a truly global issue: we must choose a sustainable path for our planet, to prevent further crises and protect lives. Pandemics such as COVID are likely to happen again, along with many other health crises, unless we fundamentally change the way we travel, trade, power our communities, and produce food and goods”.
COVID response and recovery packages investing trillions in public dollars are being rolled out around the world in the next days, weeks, and months. They provide a generational opportunity to co-solve the COVID-related economic crisis and the climate and air pollution emergency by bringing to life a vision of a healthy and stable planet that will keep us and our kids safer and healthier, and help ensure a global crisis of COVID’s magnitude never happens again.
Note to Editors:
(1) The Global Climate and Health Alliance was formed in Durban in 2011 to tackle climate change and to protect and promote public health. The Alliance is made up of health and development organisations from around the world, united by a shared vision of an equitable, sustainable future. Our vision is a world in which the health impacts of climate change are kept to a minimum, and the health co-benefits of climate change mitigation are maximised.
Contacts:
Jeni Miller, GCHA Executive Director, m.+1 510 409-2456 (PDT, Berkeley, California, UTC-7), [email protected]
Luisa Colasimone, GCHA communication, m.+351 910 678 050 (WEST, Lisbon, Portugal, UTC+1) [email protected]