Yesterday Health Care Without Harm and the Federation of Hospitals of France hosted a conference on climate change and healthcare in Paris. The conference focussed mostly on the role of large healthcare providers such as those providing hospital based care. Health Care Without Harm have identified three key ways in which health care organisations can contribute to… Read More
The Most Empowering Idea I’ve Ever Come Across – What if?
With the world’s attention on the issue of climate change and the global negotiations taking place in Paris, there has never been a more important time to challenge ourselves to think differently about the future and to question the boundaries we place on our choices. If I had to choose the single most influential idea which I learnt… Read More
Climate Ideas – Time for a Break
I love hip hop. I love how the words flow over the beat, how the hooks won’t leave you be, how it can be a vehicle for wit, wisdom and soul wrenching pain. I feel stronger when I listen to it. I hate the extreme violence, misogyny, homophobia and indulgent gluttonous consumption which some hip hop includes but… Read More
Change is coming. It’s time to change.
For too long we have dwelt on the ‘climate’ part of climate change. But now the threat is imminent. The direction of change isn’t in doubt. Now we must focus on the ‘change’ part of climate change. We must prepare for huge impacts to our world and work as hard as we can to limit these. I must… Read More
Leadership in the Age of Climate Change
Recently I was asked to run a session on leadership and sustainable development for public health trainees in the UK. This blog presents some of the ideas from the session with the specific aim of provoking thoughts about how the global challenge of climate change might change our ideas on leadership and how we can use the new understanding to inform how… Read More
Voting for a future we want #GE2015
Later this week people in the UK including me will have a chance to vote in a general election #GE2015. The outcome of this vote will change directly what happens in the next five years, which in turn will alter what happens beyond that. It will affect everyone in the UK and beyond. I want to use my… Read More
Alice and the Ambulance. A Story for NHS Sustainability Day
A small child, lets call her Alice, is having an asthma attack at home. Her mother gives her her inhaler but still she is struggling for breath. Her heart is pounding. Her chest is heaving up and down. She is wheezing. She looks scared. Her mother is scared too. She calls an ambulance. It arrives… Read More
Rushing towards a healthier transport system for Cambridge
I’ve done another blog for local charity Cambridge Carbon Footprint. This time it is about the relationship between transport and health. Please do have a read of it here My conclusion, having talked about the relationship between transport and health and considered how we are doing currently in Cambridge, is that we need to ‘engage with… Read More
Radical Emissions Reductions – An Opportunity for Improving Health – Commentary Published
I’ve written a commentary on the opportunity which radical carbon emissions reductions present for health in the journal Carbon Management. Its behind a paywall but a limited number of free copies can be accessed here: http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/vHBuNbc8z4p3g4wm8Thd/full
What has climate change got to do with health?
I recently wrote a blog for Cambridge Carbon Footprint, a local charity here in the UK, on the links between health and climate. It is an introduction for a non specialist audience on the health impacts of climate change, the benefits of climate action and the role of the health system can have. I conclude that understanding climate change… Read More
Dr James Smith 