Climate Change and Leadership Key Focus of Latest Health Progress Journal
The latest issue of Health Progress, a journal of the Catholic Health Association of the United States, features many articles which place an emphasis on environmental stewardship as a necessity in working toward a healthy world. From the impact the health care sector can have on renewable energy to the basic health benefits of the outdoors, authors address climate issues big and small. Among these authors are also figures from the HCWH community as well as members of the Health Care Climate Council.
How Health Care Can Lead the Way on Renewable Energy
Gary Cohen, President and Founder of HCWH
The 2015 Paris climate treaty marked a critical moment in which world governments agreed to cut greenhouse gas emissions, signaling the need to end reliance on fossil fuels in order to continue life on planet Earth. Climate change has come home, but not only as an environmental issue. It is recognized as affecting the health of billions of people.
In 2009, the Lancet/UCL Commission for Global Health, a collaboration between The Lancet medical journal and University College London, UK, reported that climate change's threat to human health is so great that it could overturn the last 50 years of development and public health gains worldwide. No one is immune from the health impacts of climate change. Rising temperatures and air pollution will contribute to heat stress and respiratory diseases. In coastal cities, extreme flooding and sea level rise will contribute to illness from waterborne bacteria. In the U.S. Midwest and Gulf Coast, extreme weather events like hurricanes and tornadoes will lead to loss of life and housing.
Sr. Mary Ellen Leciejewski, OP, Rachelle Reyes Wenger, MPA, and Sr. Susan Vickers, RSM
Catholic heath care leadership played a critical role in making the case for health care reform. This role in securing the successful passage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) boldly demonstrated an ongoing commitment to a healing mission and the realization that the transformation envisioned by the ACA would require an expanded and vivid vision for health care. Health insurance coverage is now a reality for millions of Americans, and a 2015 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study using census data shows that the U.S. is experiencing the lowest uninsured rate in 50 years.
Green Design Helps Children, Families Heal
Lois Sechrist, Ascension Health System
Ashley needed a place to walk and reflect during eight days of waiting while Hudson, her 4-year-old son, lay in a hospital bed after a car accident left him with a traumatic brain injury. The child and his mother (names changed for privacy purposes) were in the intensive care unit at Dell Children's Medical Center of Central Texas in Austin.
