Challenges to a Sustainable Recovery: International Law, Climate Change and Public Health

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and the call for a “green recovery”, the new US administration has called climate change an “existential threat”. The World Health Organisation has stated that “Climate change is the greatest threat to global health in the 21st Century”. Climate scientists discuss a range of different climate futures, and these are largely dependent on the level of global ambition for climate action. Accelerating the economy-wide decarbonisation for climate change mitigation can yield major co-benefits for health, for example by reducing the effects of air pollution on health since in many cases the sources of air pollutants and greenhouse gases are the same.

Is international law equipped to support a sustainable recovery from the current pandemic that promotes public health and healthy ecosystems, including protecting biodiversity, to achieve the climate goal of the Paris Agreement? This multi-disciplinary conference will bring together experts from international law, climate science and epidemiology, to discuss some of the complex linkages between air pollution, climate change, biodiversity loss and human health. These interactions may concern not only the underlying causes of the current public health crisis and the climate crisis, but also the responses to them where co-operation of states is urgently required to work towards achieving common objectives and protecting global public goods. Science can inform states’ action and point towards consequences of inaction, by predicting the probable impacts of different decisions but rarely gives a definitive single option for policy- and lawmakers. Scientific models and warnings are important for setting climate targets to mitigate climate change, to adapt to the forecasted impacts of climate change, and to return to a “better normal” after the COVID-19 pandemic. A sustainable recovery from both crises requires us to strengthen the legal response that takes the science into account and addresses both emergencies simultaneously and immediately.

The full programme for the conference is available to download as a PDF: Challenges to a Sustainable Recovery - Programme

Register here: Online Events Registration : Event Details - Durham University