REGISTRATION 

In spite of lingering global public health problems, human wellbeing has never been better.  In the past 65 years through scientific advancement, for example, the proportion of the world’s people living in extreme poverty has dropped from 63% to 10% in spite of a tripling  of the global population. That same technological advancement that has pulled much of humanity out of extreme poverty and provided other dramatic human benefits, has also increased man’s the human ecological footprint and exploded consumption of natural resources.      

The impacts on the planet’s natural systems have been extraordinary measured by the composition of the atmosphere, loss of biodiversity, acidification of the oceans and loss of tropical forests as well as rapidly changing environmental conditions led by climate change.  Planetary Heath recognizes that the well being of humanity and degradation of the rest of the biosphere cannot remain disconnected much longer. Rapidly changing environmental conditions alter our exposures to infectious diseases, such as COVID 19, and natural hazards including heat waves, droughts, floods, fires, and tropical storms.   Our species has been slow to systematically address the devastating impact we have had on the planet that also threatens continued human wellbeing in spite of 40 years of international attempts by the United Nations and other international bodies.     

COVID 19 is forcing all sectors of society to rethink how they operate and remain resilient in a post COVID future.   Join Island Press and SSF in an insightful discussion about the potential for A New Deal for Planetary Health.  Building on the new Island Press Publication, Planetary Health – Protecting Nature to Protect Ourselves, the webinar, led by the book editors Howard Frumkin and Samuel Meyers, will explore reframing planetary health thinking to reimagine food, energy, placemaking, chemistry, and the economy in ways that can leads to a convergence of human wellbeing and the protection of natural systems.