Health professionals led climate awareness banner tour on Dartmoor

Huge banners were flown from Hound Tor on Dartmoor on Tuesday, 2^nd September, as health professionals and campaigners in the South West called for urgent political action to “End fossil fuels, Protect Public Health and Save Lives”.

The event marked the first stage of a national tour organised by Health and Climate UK, which is using iconic locations to highlight how the climate emergency is already harming people’s health. The banners had previously been displayed at St Michael’s Mount in Cornwall and on Plymouth Hoe, before continuing to other sites across the country.

The South West was chosen to launch the tour as the UK experienced the hottest summer on record, part of a pattern of rising temperatures. The UK has now seen nine of the ten hottest years in recorded history within the past two decades, according to the Met Office.

Dr Hilary Neve, a Plymouth GP, said the banners were deliberately similar to those used during the Covid-19 pandemic.
“Politicians made sure we understood the health risks of Covid, but they aren’t explaining the risks of death and illness from the climate emergency. If we don’t act now these will continue to increase,” she said.

Health experts warn that climate change is already having profound consequences for public health. More frequent heatwaves, flooding and wildfires are linked to rising levels of respiratory and cardiovascular illness, while air pollution from traffic and industry is responsible for tens of thousands of premature deaths in the UK each year. Vulnerable groups, including children, older people and those with existing medical conditions, are most at risk.

Doctors are also reporting knock-on effects on nutrition. Droughts and floods have damaged food production globally, pushing up prices and creating shortages. Warmer conditions are also enabling diseases spread by mosquitos, such as dengue fever, to move further north towards Europe and the UK.

The NHS itself is not immune to climate impacts. Last year, extreme heat caused computer systems at major London hospitals to crash, while the health service also faces risks to its water, medicine and equipment supply chains.

Dr Neve said:
“Our banners are to help explain that, in order to protect everyone’s health and our NHS, we need to take urgent action including ending the extraction and burning of fossil fuels.
Other changes such as clean energy, insulation, restoring nature and expanding public transport, walking and cycling are great for health and will also reduce demand on the NHS. These are win-win solutions.”

The action at Hound Tor formed part of a wider effort to link climate change with public health, echoing international studies that show climate change is the single biggest health threat facing humanity, according to the World Health Organization.