As world leaders open pivotal climate talks at COP-27 in Sharm El Sheikh next week, the stakes will be too high for our planet to end this year’s conference without resolving crucial, pending issues on finance, support on adaptation and resilience, and implementation of recent climate commitments. COP27 will be a further opportunity for the world to come together and demonstrate the requisite political will to take on the climate challenge through concerted, collaborative and impactful action.
But discussion around climate change and its impact on the world’s population cannot take place without acknowledging the importance of global public health and how this is inextricably linked with climate change and the environment. The World Health Organization will have a key role at the conference to highlight the health-environment nexus and critically, to ensure the inclusion of health content in the negotiations.
A dedicated Health Pavilion will showcase over 40 side events related to climate change and health, covering topics ranging from energizing health: accelerating electricity access in health-care facilities to the development of early warning systems and climate resilient food systems. WHO will be promoting the health argument for climate actions, the resilience of health systems, strengthening and reinforcing international cooperation and supporting the most vulnerable countries.
All health events will be featured here
A dedicated Health Pavilion will showcase over 40 side events related to climate change and health, covering topics ranging from energizing health: accelerating electricity access in health-care facilities to the development of early warning systems and climate resilient food systems. WHO will be promoting the health argument for climate actions, the resilience of health systems, strengthening and reinforcing international cooperation and supporting the most vulnerable countries.
Below some key media events. For the speakers and location please refer to the brochure on this page.
High Level Sustainable Markets Initiative (SMI)
and inauguration of WHO COP27 Health Pavilion
8 November 2022, 10:00-11:00 EET
The high-level event dedicated to the Sustainable Markets Initiative (SMI) Health Systems Taskforce is to accelerate the delivery of net zero, sustainable healthcare to improve individual, societal and planetary health. Health Systems Task Force was launched at COP26 in Glasgow and is comprised of healthcare leaders from the private and public sectors.
Location: Four Season’s Hotel
WHO Health Pavilion Inauguration
The price of Climate Change is paid by our Lungs
8 November 2022, 12:00-13:00 EET
The COP27 Health Pavilion is a reminder of how our health is impacted by climate change and environmental factors and why we need to put it at the centre of these negotiations. Over 90 per cent of people breathe air that that is polluted beyond WHO air quality limits and threatens their health, causing 7 million premature deaths every year. A heating world is seeing mosquitoes spread disease further and faster than ever before. Extreme weather events, land degradation and water scarcity are displacing people and affecting their health.
The central sculpture, titled Bodies Joined by a Molecule of Air, explores fractals, the biologic patterns that are present in human bodies and mirrored in the bodies of plants, trees and our more-than-human relatives. Branches and capillaries grow into each other: the land and the body are one. Sense your body touching the earth. Taste the air rushing into your lungs.
Location: Health Pavilion, Blue Zone
High Level Meeting
High-Level Event: Energizing health: accelerating electricity access in health-care facilities
WHO, World Bank, SE4ALL, IRENA
8 November 2022 15:30-17:00 EET
Access to energy is critical when it comes to the functionality of health-care facilities and the quality, accessibility and reliability of health services delivered. Hundreds of millions of people worldwide are served by health-care facilities without electricity. Even in cases when electricity connection exists, power supply is not reliable due to poor grid infrastructures or non-functional diesel generators. While most large hospitals have access to electricity, access rates drop dramatically for rural clinics. This COP27 high-level event will focus on the urgent need to accelerate electricity access in health-care facilities globally to protect public health and minimize the dramatic impacts of climate change. The event will provide the opportunity to highlight key challenges and to discuss concrete actions and cooperation opportunities, benefiting from the participation of high-level representatives of international organizations and governments.
Location: Health Pavilion, Blue Zone
Communicating efficiently on climate change and health
8 November 2022, 17:30-18:45 EET
WHO is currently collaborating with Health Canada and leading communication experts to develop guidance and tools for the global health community, in order to improve advocacy and its role in enabling policies that protect health from climate change. This will help to strengthen the authority and agency of health professionals to support more ambitious and socially beneficial climate and health policies.
This side event is an opportunity to promote an open dialogue among policy makers and communication experts, public health and climate communities to take stock on successes, failures and new opportunities to use the health topic in strategic climate talks as motivational factor to raise more ambitions and increase the overall understanding that: INVESTING IN CLIMATE EMISSIONS REDUCTIONS means INVESTING in BETTER HEALTH FOR ALL.
As an additional contribution to this alternative communication approach, one of the thematic film prizes of WHO’s Health for All Film Festival in 2023 will be dedicated to Climate Change and Health and the call for submissions is open until 31 January 2023.
Location: Health Pavilion, Blue Zone
High level meeting
Alliance for Transformative Action on Climate and Health (ATACH)”
9 November 2022, 11:30-13:00 EET
This high-level side event take place at COP27 in Egypt to showcase the experience of countries that have already committed to building climate-resilient and low-carbon health systems and invite other Member States, as well as non-state actors, to join ATACH. The Alliance for Transformative Action on Climate and Health (ATACH) works to realize the ambition set at COP26 in Glasgow last year to build climate-resilient and sustainable health systems and promote the integration of climate change and health nexus into respective national, regional and global plans. ATACH is co-convened by the UK and Egypt. As part of this initiative, over 60 countries have already committed to building climate-resilient and low-carbon health systems, and among these, 20 countries have also set a target date to reach net- zero carbon emissions from their health systems before 2050.
More information on the ATACH can be found here.
Useful resources:
Alliance for Transformative Action on Climate and Health (ATACH)
Live streaming of this side event will be made available on this page.
Location: Memphis Room, Sharm El-Sheikh International Convention Center (SHICC)
Global Youth Forum on Health and Climate Change
WHO and Government of Egypt
8-9 November 2022
WHO, the International Federation of Medical Students’ Associations (IFMSA) and the Global Climate and Health Alliance (GCHA) are organising the first ever Global Youth Forum on Health and Climate Change ahead of COP27 to support meaningful youth engagement in climate and health action.
The forum will take place over three days:
The Global Youth Forum will be organized under the Patronage of His Excellency Minister of Health and Population of Egypt Dr. Khaled Abdel Ghaffar and His Excellency Minister of Youth and Sport of Egypt Dr. Ashraf Sobhy.
More information available here
Location: Virtual
Health and Energy Platform of Action (HEPA): Tackling the health-energy-climate nexus through increased capacity, finance and actions on the ground to accelerate clean cooking
9 November 2022, 15:30-16:45 EET
This COP27 side event will showcase concrete actions, projects and programmes, partners of the Health and Energy Platform of Action (HEPA) are implementing on the ground to improve clean household energy within the most vulnerable communities. A variety of HEPA partners working on health and energy issues have committed to accelerate action towards clean cooking and will share practical experience in various countries and regions. Furthermore, speakers will highlight examples on how to tackle issues linked to household energy and show how governments, ministries and other decision makers and stakeholders can be supported sustainably and successfully. The session will also showcase successful interventions and technical tools to accelerate access to clean cooking in different countries and regions. After a short introduction of the Clean Household Energy Solutions Toolkit (CHEST), representatives and partners will walk through several examples of how CHEST has been applied practically on the ground. This includes the application of the Benefits of Action to Reduce Household Air Pollution (BAR-HAP) tool or the implementation of the Household Energy Assessment Rapid Tool (HEART).
This event will be organized in a hybrid format – with limited in-person participation and live-streaming available on the Health Pavilion webpage.
Location: Health Pavilion, Blue Zone
This year, hundreds of healthcare providers from around the world – including the United Kingdom, the United States, Colombia, Chile, France, Switzerland, and Italy – have been organizing cycle rides to inspire action on air pollution and support children’s health.
“The Global Stock Take: incorporating health metrics to meet the Paris goals”
12 November 2022, 10:00-11:30 EET
At this event, WHO will launch a technical brief “Review of IPCC Evidence 2022: Climate Change, Health, and Wellbeing”. This policy brief will summarize and unpack the state of evidence on health outlined in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)’s sixth assessment report (AR6). It will take a health perspective on the scope of the climate problem, outline observations and projections for physical and mental health, summarize knowledge on climate change impacts to environmental determinants of health (food, water, air), and provide discussion on actioning this evidence in adaptation and mitigation strategies and climate change negotiations.
COP27 accredited media and participants welcome to join.
Location: Health Pavilion, Blue Zone
Integrating nutrition and food security in Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs)
12 November 2002, 14:00-15:15 EET
This side event intends to raise awareness of the links between climate change, health and nutrition. It will discuss concrete solutions that target both climate change adaptation and mitigation, with a particular focus on integrating nutrition and food security in Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs). In addition, the event will present an overarching UN-Nutrition narrative, emerging from the several COP27 events, on the need to reduce food systems’ impact on the environment and protect the food security and nutrition of populations, leaving no one behind. Speakers from different constituencies (UN agencies, governments, academia), will present concrete examples and challenges of integrating nutrition in climate change mitigation and adaptation policies and strategies.
Location: Health Pavilion, Blue Zone
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