Together for a Healthy, Resilient, and Green Recovery

SIDE EVENT
Friday 3 June
15:15-16:30 CEST
Stockholmsmässan, Room 2

Organizers: World Health Organization, UN OHCHR, UNFCCC, UNDP, International Federation of Medical Student's Associations, Karolinska Institutet

About: "The pandemic is a reminder of the intimate and delicate relationship between people and planet. Any efforts to make our world safer are doomed to fail unless they address the critical interface between people and pathogens, and the existential threat of climate change, that is making our Earth less habitable.” WHO Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. Address to the 73rd World Health Assembly. May 18, 2020.

This event will bring together various UN agencies, NGOs and academic institutions working on the intersection between the human right to health, environment, and sustainable development to discuss and elevate the 6 Prescriptions of the WHO Manifesto for a healthy and green recovery from COVID-19.

The six prescriptions are accompanied with over 70 Actionables, or practical steps, for implementing the Manifesto and creating a healthier, fairer and greener world while investing to maintain and resuscitate the economy hit by the effects of COVID-19.

Policy makers, national and local decision-makers, as well as a wide array of other stakeholders wishing to contribute to a healthy recovery, can now take decisive steps by shaping the way we live, work and consume.

Moderator(s): Maria Neira (WHO)

Panelists:

  • Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (WHO)
  • Anders Nordström (Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs)
  • Naoko Yamamoto (Healthier Populations)
  • Kazi Zubair Hossain (World Organization of the Scout Movement)
  • David Boyd (UN Special Rapporteur on human rights and the environment)
  • Rosamund Kissi-Debrah (Ella Roberta Family Foundation)
  • Mohamed Eissa (International Federation of Medical Students Association)
  • Ole Petter Ottersen (Karolinska Institutet)

Contact person: Marina Maiero (maierom_at_who.int)

Event outcomes (Key transformative actions):

  • COVID-19 is the greatest global shock in decades. Prescription 1 of the WHO Manifesto for a healthy recovery from COVID-19 states: Protect and preserve the source of human health: Nature. Economies are a product of healthy human societies, which in turn rely on the natural environment - the original source of all clean air, water, and food. Human pressures, from deforestation, to intensive and polluting agricultural practices, to unsafe management and consumption of wildlife, undermine these services. They also increase the risk of emerging infectious diseases in humans  – over 60% of which originate from animals, mainly from wildlife. Overall plans for post-COVID-19 recovery, and specifically plans to reduce the risk of future epidemics, need to go further upstream than early detection and control of disease outbreaks. They also need to lessen our impact on the environment, so as to reduce the risk at source.
  • According to the new WHO Policy Brief on climate change and mental health, climate change is increasingly having stronger and longer-lasting impacts on people, which can directly and indirectly affect their mental health and psychosocial well-being. Certain groups are disproportionately at risk from climate change-related hazards, including people with pre-existing mental health conditions.
  • To protect our health and our environment, it is crucial to stimulate and strengthen collaborations across stakeholders at all levels, including national governments and decision-makers, NGOs, academia, youth, indigenous and local communities.
  • Such partnerships can promote more integrated and evidence-based policy-and decision-making to address issues at the interface of environment, climate, health and sustainable development.

 


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