Médecins Sans Frontières - MSF & Planetary Health (ENG)

Unique Identifier Code / URN MSB48633

Date taken / Date Recorded 01/02/2021 8:58 AM

Country Unspecified Country

Commissioning section MSF-SWITZERLAND

Photographer / videographer / producer May AbdelSater

Copyright MSF

Usage Rights (MSF) External Media, MSF Fundraising, MSF Publications, Social Media

Formal Consent Copy available no

Editor's rating ★★★ (F)

Video format h264 (Main) (avc1 / 0x31637661)

Duration 7m27s

Maximum Size 1920px × 1080px 388.50 MB

Additional Information / Shotlist Script Planetary Health video - English

(VO)
There can be little doubt that our global environment is changing.
The science is unequivocal – it is all-too clear that we will be seeing rising temperatures and sea levels, more frequent and intense extreme weather events such as heavy rains, heat waves, cyclones and floods.

This will impact fundamental issues like access to food and water. This in turn will impact people’s health. We are also likely to see new and changing diseases, and people falling sick because of pollution. And people will start leaving their homes, as some places become uninhabitable over time.

All existing projections point to large-scale changes ahead. – We can only anticipate the humanitarian needs this will bring, and we need to adapt the way we work to be able to respond.
We know from experience that it is the most vulnerable who will be the most affected - making them even more vulnerable. We know, because we are already seeing them in our waiting rooms.

We are now looking how we can best address this and get ready for the future – we have chosen to do this through the lens of Planetary Health.

(txt) What is planetary health ?
Brian Willett, Planetary Health coordinator

(itw)
Planetary health is a relatively new health discipline. It focuses on the changes that humans are making to our environment and the impact that it has on human health.

These changes to the environment destabilise the natural ecosystem causing climate change and pollution of our air, soil and rivers.

This in turn affects the water we drink and the air we breathe. It means we will see disruptions to our food production systems and changing patterns of diseases such as malaria. It means we may see new diseases we didn’t know before and also the re-emergence of other diseases as the ecological conditions for transmission of disease change.

The main idea behind Planetary Health is that it is looking at how all this is linked, and how humans are responsible for these changes . Our health depends on the wellbeing of the planet, and the wellbeing of the planet depends on how we act. It is all linked.”

(txt) What does this have to do with MSF?
Monica Rull, Medical Director

(itw)
We are a medical humanitarian organisation so it touches us on two fronts. It touches us as medics, because as medics we are concerned about the health of our patients, their communities and the populations we are trying to serve, but also as humanitarians we are concerned, to preventing negative outcomes of humanitarian crises. And we do know that the environment has an impact on health and has an impact to worsen already existing humanitarian crises. So it’s part of who we are in a way.

We are seeing now malaria in places where there was none before, because the mosquito now can survive. We see introduction of mosquito transmitted diseases such as zika or dengue in urban settings in a larger scale. If the water changes temperature, the vibrio cholerae can survive easier. So there is a direct link between the environment and environmental conditions and mainly the vector transmitted diseases.

(txt) How are we going to do this ?
Christine Jamet, Director of Operations

When we talk about looking at all new interventions with a planetary health lens, it means asking ourselves, what is happening here climate wise? Are the droughts more dry? Are there more rains? Or are there less? When there are more, do they wash off all the top soil? Is there any increase in average temperatures? What does it mean for the populations?
We have looked at these kind of issues in the past, but not always in a systematic way. We need to know these things, because they will bring medical needs for the populations that are probably different from what saw ten years ago.
The objective to understand what is happening from an environmental point view, in terms of temperature, in terms of “planetary health” – because this terms regroups all these phenomena – is to be able to anticipate what the needs will be for the populations – and how we can guarantee that we put in place health services that actually correspond to those needs, and not just what we used to do in the past for this kind of problem.
Monica
(itw)
Our medical action is not fundamentally going to change but we are going to add an eco-friendly lens to it. Our medical action should not be implemented in a way that jeopardises the future of our patients tomorrow.
And our medical action needs to be aware - the way we implement it without jeopardising quality or reactiveness - doing it in a way that is less harmful for people and the environment.
(txt) Why is this our responsibility?
Monica
(itw)
We can cure people but we also have to avoid making people sick, so we have a double responsibility as a medical organisation of restoring physical health but maintaining environmental health to avoid making people sick tomorrow.
As running hospitals and large medical programmes, we are reviewing the way we are working in those programmes to be able to provide the same level of care and with the same speed and impact, but trying to make it in a way that does not contribute to the climate emergency.
Christine
(itw)
We will do good by the populations, we will adapt, but - are we as an institution – “clean” ourselves? Do our own practices contribute to the deterioration of the planet?
If we provide care for communities affected by emerging diseases that could be linked to the worsening climate and environment, or role is obviously to ensure we avoid deteriorating the environment even further.
For me, it is totally normal that this is an important part of our Strategic Plan. It is no longer a question of ‘should we do it?’, or ‘should we do it in ten years’’- No, we should have done it ten years ago. We are already very late, but now we have to move forward with this. We have no choice, we have no choice.
Monica
(itw)
We need to care for our patients in a way that does not harm them and their communities tomorrow. And for doing that we need to take our own responsibility to be the most environmentally-friendly medical organisation we can be.
(txt)
Why planetary health ? Our health depends on our environment and our environment’s health depends on us.

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