Back to SearchKINGSTON – Climate change is causing more extreme weather events such as heavy rains, flooding and prolonged heat waves. With the City of Kingston’s recent declaration of a climate emergency, the Kingston, Frontenac, and Lennox & Addington (KFL&A) Board of Health is advocating for climate change as a public health issue.
“Climate change has impacts on our health including effects such as temperature-related morbidity and mortality, poor air quality, food and water contamination, altered exposure to ultraviolet rays, and increasing risk of vector-borne infectious diseases,” said Dr. Kieran Moore, Medical Officer of Health, KFL&A Public Health. “Endorsement of this resolution is an initial step towards supporting and advocating for action on climate change”.
During the Board of Health meeting on April 24, 2019, the Board made a commitment to not only advocate to declare climate change as a public health issue, but to focus efforts on slowing down and reducing the health impact of climate change in our communities.
KFL&A Public Health will also lead in supporting and advocating for a climate change resolution to be endorsed by the Association of Local Public Health Agencies (alPHa) at its 2019 Annual General Meeting held in Kingston, from June 9 to 12, 2019.
Resolution on Climate Change
That the KFL&A Board of Health endorse the following resolution and furthermore, present it for endorsement by alPHa during the 2019 Annual General Meeting;
WHEREAS climate change is defined as a shift in long-term worldwide climate phenomena associated with changes in the composition of the global atmosphere; and
WHEREAS the World Health Organization states climate change to be the greatest global health threat of the 21st century; and
WHEREAS the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concludes that human influence on climate change is clear and is extremely likely that human influence is the dominant cause; and
WHEREAS climate change impacts the health of all people through temperature-related morbidity and mortality, extreme weather events, poor air quality, food and water contamination, altered exposure to ultraviolet rays, increasing risk of vector-borne infectious diseases, food security and indirectly impacts people by affecting labour capacity and population migration and displacement; and
WHEREAS climate change disproportionately affects vulnerable populations such as children, seniors, low income and homeless people, those who are chronically ill, Indigenous peoples, and rural and remote residents; and
WHEREAS the City of Kingston and the City of Hamilton declared a climate emergency for the purposes of naming, framing, and deepening commitment to protecting the economy, the ecosystem, and the community from climate change; and
WHEREAS tackling climate change requires political commitment by international, federal, provincial, and municipal stakeholders in acknowledging climate change as a public health issue
NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED THAT the Association of Local Public Health Agencies (alPHa) endorse the anthropogenic cause of climate change and its adverse impact on health in all people;
AND FURTHER will call upon strategic and provincial partners including the Ontario Ministries of Health and Long-Term Care, Environment, Conservation and Parks, Association of Municipalities of Ontario, Ontario Public Health Association, etc. to support climate change mitigation and adaptation measures in local communities.
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