Global Health Institute

Horton began by detailing a meeting he attended in a Roman chapel and gave a rousing—and slightly romantic—account of human civilization. “This,” he said, “is planetary health.” In less abstract terms, planetary health is currently defined as “the health of human civilization and the state of the natural systems on which it depends” and addressing it requires an unprecedented interdisciplinary approach. It is poetic that planetary health is often defined with reference to human civilization, since climate change and our current unhealthy ecosystems are undoubtedly a product of our modern civilization.

Following this, the rest of the panel gave a grim but definitive picture of where the world was heading if things continued on business as usual in respect of environmental degradation and climate change. Horton was brutal in his assessment, stating that humanity had a single generation, 20 years, to start turning things around. This contention was backed by weighty scientific evidence and vociferously supported by his other panelists. Despite the overwhelming evidence supporting both the reality of climate change and its potentially devastating consequences, there remains unwillingness from governments to take the definitive and drastic action needed.

These discussions—which pervaded many of the sessions—were reminiscent of Margaret Chan’s address in 2013, where she stated: 

“Mosquitoes do not have front groups, and mosquitoes do not have lobbies. But the industries that contribute to the rise of NCDs do. When public health policies cross purposes with vested economic interests, we will face opposition, well-orchestrated opposition, and very well-funded opposition.”

Similarly, in the case of climate change, we are seeing a direct contradiction between scientific consensus and political—and industry-driven—opposition. In this situation, the role of lawyers and policymakers is clearer than in many other areas of global health. Despite the critical role of law, we have seen mixed success on this front when dealing with non-communicable diseases. While tobacco control efforts were crystallized through the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, regulation of other risk factors like sugar and fast foods have been less successful.

However, there is an additional role for law that has rarely been articulated. Law traditionally sets the lowest standard of behavior. It is designed to reduce harms, in a sense, but this objective has really been framed as an issue of individual autonomy. Human rights were initially a mechanism to prevent the government from interfering with individual actions. As a result, the law tends to prevent state actions rather than compel individual or community action. In the context of environmental regulation, the law has been used to enable industry activities and attempted to avoid “unnecessary interference” with commercial activities to encourage investment and job creation.

However, as Horton articulated, responding to climate change and protecting the environment requires collective action and in this sense, the right to personal liberty is a barrier to action. Given the urgency in addressing climate change as an immediate problem, governments need to be prepared to potentially use the law to force compliance, even where it would encroach on autonomy. More importantly, the law needs to be used as an enabler of environmental protection rather than an obstruction that prizes individual liberty above the well-being of the planet and future generations. In this respect, the role of the law—and lawyers—needs to shift away from being a barrier towards enabling coordinated and effective action to preserve and promote planetary health.

The resounding message from CUGH this year was that humanity needs to take immediate action to avert the predicted devastating impacts of climate change and environmental degradation. The question now is whether we, as the next generation of lawyers, can use transform the law to respond to this call.

Safura Abdool Karim (LLM’17) is currently a student in the Master in Global Health Law program at Georgetown University Law Center.