Warming ‘as big a threat as COVID-19’

CLIMATE change is as big a threat to public health as COVID-19, according to a former NT Chief Health Officer

Former Chief Health Officer of the Northern Territory and newly appointed president of the Public health Association of Australia Dr Tarun Weeramanthri. Picture: Julianne Osborne

• Darwin will get hotter and people will die thanks to climate change, scientists warn

CLIMATE change is as big a threat to public health as COVID-19, according to former NT chief health officer and new Public Health Association of Australia president Tarun Weeramanthri.

Dr Weeramanthri said tackling climate change and mitigating its impact on the health of Territorians will be one of his main focuses.

When asked whether climate change was as big an issue to the Territory as COVID-19, he replied “it absolutely is”. “The impacts of climate change are here and they’re now,” he said.

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“The stories I’ve heard from the NT is heat records are getting consistently broken. There are many more days per year over 35C.”

Dr Weeramanthri, who served as the chief health officer of the NT from 2004 to 2007 then as the CHO of Western Australia from 2008 to 2018, conducted an inquiry into the impacts of the changing climate on health in WA.

He said a similar inquiry would be beneficial for the NT.

“We need to be able to tell a story that relates to local circumstances,” Dr Weeramanthri said. “It’s not just a physical thing, it’s also a threat to their identity of living and what we value.”

Alice Springs based doctor Simon Quilty.

Alice Springs-based specialist physician Simon Quilty said climate change was “without doubt” the biggest public health issue the Territory is facing “from a 50-year perspective”. “When you work in the NT as a doctor, the impact heat has is vicious and tangible,” he said. “You might have people who faint on a really hot day because of chronic kidney disease and fall on the tarmac and burn themselves – you see it all the time.”

He said there were parallels between the response to COVID-19 and climate change.

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“If you ... listen to scientists and healthcare leaders you can massively reduce the impact on human health,” he said. Dr Quilty commended the NT Health Department on recent commitments including making all NT hospitals members of the Global Green and Healthy Hospitals network.

“I am acutely aware of the need to address climate change from a health perspective … and know meeting our climate-related goals is important for our future generations,” Health Minister Natasha Fyles said.

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