Toward a Sustainable Health System: A Call to Action.

Abstract

"Toward a Sustainable Health System: A Call to Action" speaks of the challenge that the climate crisis poses for health systems. The scale of the accelerating crisis will require that health systems adapt in response and also become visible champions for change, mitigating the environmental harms of their operation and mobilizing their social networks and leadership potential to build community resilience and transformative capacity. The authors pay principal attention to the issues of environmental sustainability and also review the linked challenges of social and economic sustainability, given the imperatives of environmental and social justice and the need for a revitalized economic vision to support livable futures. The authors' aim is to accelerate ambition in Canada, where coordinated effort and national leadership have been lacking. They close with recommendations to achieve a net-zero health system in Canada by or before 2050.