Climate Change

Over the past few years, British Columbians have experienced two extraordinary wildfire seasons that blotted out the sun, a number of devastating floods, and now a ‘heat dome’ that meteorologists describe as a once-in-a-millennia event – except these climate-related crises are happening with increasing frequency all around the world. As if to punctuate this point, we are now learning that hundreds of British Columbians died in the recent heat.

Climate change is upon us. We are living the impacts: more intense and frequent extreme weather events such as flooding, water shortages, storm surges, heat waves, wildfires, and vector-borne disease.

Doctors of BC recognizes the significant threat climate change poses to our collective health and safety. The Association is committed to doing our part to combat climate change, and had previously implemented a number of initiatives prior to the COVID-19 pandemic such as using energy efficient lighting with motion sensors, adding a beehive to the building’s roof, and effective waste managements – including organics and installation of filtered drinking water systems, among others.

We have recently released a policy statement that commits us to even more:

• Continuing to meet virtually long after COVID-19
• Supporting the efforts of BC doctors to improve sustainability in their practices through quality improvement projects
• Working with doctors to spread and scale up successful quality initiatives that will limit waste, improve the use of resources, and reduce the carbon footprint of the workplace.
• Working with continuing medical education organizations to promote training in emergency preparedness planning for physicians

There will be some who wonder whether climate change is something that Doctors of BC should be tackling. Make no mistake, climate change is a crisis that affects our health – it chokes our air with smoke and other pollutants, triggers drought and floods that affect our food security, and causes extreme periods of heat contributing to severe medical conditions. Extreme weather events caused by climate change affect our mental health and anxiety levels, escalate infectious disease rates, increase respiratory and cardiovascular disease, not to mention increasing the number of injuries and premature deaths.

Doctors of BC has a proud history of advocating for changes to improve the health and safety of British Columbians including seatbelt legislation, car seats, bike helmets, smoking cessation, and most recently a policy to support decriminalization of drugs to stem the toll taken by the poisoned illicit drug supply.

We recognize the many others who lead and advocate in this space, in particular the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE). CAPE counts many BC doctors among its members. Doctors of BC is proud to stand up to climate change and believes that our Association representing 14,000 doctors in BC can and should make a difference. I invite you to read our policy statement on Climate Change and Human Health and to share your thoughts with me at View Email Addresspresident@doctorsofbc.ca.

- Dr Matthew Chow