News from the Secretary, January 2008

How times have changed! It is now reported  that “Climate change is the single most pressing challenge Australia faces over the coming decade, according to a confidential  Treasury brief prepared for the new Labor Government” The Age, Feb 1st 2008.
Your Committee is now reviewing our activities to determine how best we can deploy our limited resources to continue to have an impact. There is now wide community acceptance that climate change is upon us and using our knowledge of the health aspects of climate change, we must encourage urgent and effective action. We always welcome your thoughts. Meanwhile we continue to build on our achievements and ask you to note reference to our educational work in the article on global environmental change and health in the BMJ written by Tony McMichael and colleagues from WHO.(URL given later in this newsletter)

The new biodiversity poster can be ordered.
In December, this poster was distributed by RACGP to their general practitioner members.  Those of you who are RACGP members must have received it, so please let us have feedback! The poster can be ordered now. Go to www.dea.org.au -> Menu -> posters
There is also an information sheet (click on information sheets) about personal carbon footprints that you can print out and place near to the poster in your waiting room. Also under ‘information sheets’ we have a  one page “Healthy Patients and Healthy Planet” which we encourage you to offer to your patients. We feel sure you will see the value in this as a simple educational tool.

DEA submission to the Ross Garnaut report.
The Stern Report from the UK estimated that if we acted now the cost of prevention of dangerous climate change would be 1 per cent of GDP. Members of Australia’s Productivity Commission recently criticised Stern and said that his estimate was excessive. The Australian Government's own version of the Stern Review, by Professor Ross Garnaut, will be released later this year. Garnaut has indicated that he believes emissions should rely on market mechanisms not necessarily targets. 
I have re-read the Stern report. If one understands the potential consequences of the range of interlocking global ecological changes already underway, it is naive to believe that the cost will be as small as Stern envisages. Stern tends to categorize the tipping points as future events, whereas there is increasing evidence that they are underway and climate change is accelerating. Furthermore, could it be that Stern is psychologically imprisoned by the paradigm in which he works, and the small predicted reduction in GDP as a consequence of treating climate change is a panacea that allows us to carry on as usual?
On the question of cost, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon warns in a new report that global warming could cost the world up to $20 trillion over two decades for cleaner energy sources alone. If one recognizes that this is only one part of the expenditure, then the magnitude of the financial cost becomes apparent.
The Stern report served a useful purpose in educating economists that environmental damage had economic cost but there are significant dangers in allowing economists to lead this debate. DEA is making a submission to Garnaut. Our contribution will be within our sphere of expertise and will emphasize that the health costs of climate change have not been estimated and are likely to be huge when one considers their widespread nature.

Peter Doherty joins Scientific Advisory Committee
We are pleased to announce that Peter Doherty has joined the Scientific Advisory Committee. The presence of distinguished persons on this committee often opens the way for DEA to be heard by governments.

Professor Peter Doherty AC, FRS, FAA is Laureate Professor of the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Melbourne, Michael F. Tanner Chair of Biomedical Research at St Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital and Nobel Laureate for Physiology or Medicine. He received the Nobel Prize in 1996 and was Australian of the Year in 1997. Recognising the importance of the issue, Professor Doherty has written on climate change and his recent book "A Light History of Hot Air" published by Melbourne University Press has a sub-text promoting this message to a wide readership.

Management Committee
The re-establishment of an interest in children’s environmental health was foreshadowed at the AGM in Fremantle. We are pleased to announce that Dr David Strong has joined the Management Committee.  David Strong FRACP is Staff Specialist in Paediatrics in the Women’s and Children’s Health Service, Launceston General Hospital. He has the qualification of Master in Public Health and has a strong interest in international health, intercultural studies, infectious diseases and poverty alleviation.  Born in Kenya, he has travelled widely and lived in China for six years with his wife Tania. He has two adopted daughters and enjoys healthy living, forests, music and mountain walking.

Asthma Foundation
 We have a request from the Asthma Foundation SA www.breathebetter.com.au  for us to contribute an article for their quarterly newsletter Every Breath Matters. The Foundation has for a long time been interested in environmental issues but with all the publicity given to climate change of late, they would like to have an authoritative voice explain the relevance of climate change to respiratory health.

Please would a member who would like to write this brief article on behalf of DEA identify themselves to me—perhaps a general practitioner with a respiratory interest. We also have a lack of information as to which members are respiratory physicians—please would you identify yourselves in case we need your advice in the future.

We recommend you read these important articles
“Healthy patients, healthy planet” GP recommendations for GP health promotion by Graeme Horton, member of DEA management Committee was in the AFP, see
http://www.racgp.org.au/Content/NavigationMenu/Publications/AustralianFamilyPhys/2007issues/afp200712/200712Horton.pdf
The article was rated as the top story in the Primary Health Care and Information Service, congratulations Graeme.

Please also read the article in the British Medical Journal by Tony McMichael (Member of DEA Scientific Advisory Committee) and colleagues  “Global environmental change and health: impacts, inequalities, and the health sector”   in which DEA gets prominent mention on two occasions.
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/336/7637/191 

Of interest to all practicing doctors is the article  “Of bats, bugs and men: Lessons for Australia in 2008”   a biosecurity review of emerging infectious diseases in Australia
http://www.scienceinpublic.com/>

The DEA Web site www.de.org.au
A sub-committee of the DEA Management Committee will soon commence meetings to review the web site with a view to increasing its educational potential. Your views on the site are always welcome. Meanwhile, for those of you who have put questions to us on personal carbon offsets for your travel, I have posted an article which lists the access of appropriate sites.

David Shearman, Hon Secretary