An open letter to politicians on climate change and obesity

Egger, Garry J; Swinburn, Boyd; Stanley, Fiona; Phelps, Kerryn

doi:10.5694/j.1326-5377.2010.tb03550.x

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To the Editor: As health professionals, we urge Australian politicians (and the public) to recognise the overlap in the underlying cause of two great health threats that our population now faces: the rise of obesity and its life-threatening disease consequences, and the great threats to health from global climate change.1-3

1 Southern Cross University, Lismore, NSW.
2 Deakin University, Melbourne, VIC.
3 University of Western Australia, Perth, WA.
4 University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW.

Correspondence: garry.egger@scu.edu.au

Acknowledgements:

Plus over 300 medical and health practitioners, including 40 professors of medicine or health sciences (names available from authors on request).

1. Haines A, Wilkinson P, Tonne C, Roberts I. Aligning climate change and public health policies. Lancet 2009; 374: 2035-2038.
2. Bloomberg MR, Aggarwala RT. Think locally, act globally: how curbing global warming emissions can improve local public health. Am J Prev Med 2008; 35: 414-423.
3. Edwards P, Roberts I. Population adiposity and climate change. Int J Epidemiol 2009; 38: 1137-1140.
4. Delpeuch F, Maire B, Monnier E, Holdsworth M. Globesity: a planet out of control. London: Earthscan, 2009.
5. Tapia Granados JA, Ionides EL. The reversal of the relation between economic growth and health progress: Sweden in the 19th and 20th centuries. J Health Econ 2008; 27: 544-563.
6. Rao M. Climate change is deadly: the health impacts of climate change. In: Griffiths J, Rao M, Adshead F, Thorpe A, editors. The health practitioner’s guide to climate change. London: Earthscan, 2009.
7. Haines A, Smith KR, Anderson D, et al. Policies for accelerating access to clean energy, improving health, advancing development and mitigating climate change. Lancet 2007; 370: 1264-1281.
8. Jackson T. Prosperity without growth: economics for a finite planet. London: Earthscan, 2009.

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