Children, Adolescents, and Youth Pioneering a Human Rights-Based Approach to Climate Change.

Climate change is the greatest challenge of our century. Children, adolescents, and youth will bear the most severe impacts, physically, socially, economically, and psychologically. In response to this immense threat and to the failure of international climate negotiations to date, young people are taking to the streets and using global fora to call for climate justice. While these protests have received much attention, there has been limited examination of these and other youth-led efforts through the lens of a human rights-based approach and its operational principles: participation, equality and nondiscrimination, accountability, and transparency. This paper draws from academic and gray literature, as well as the authors' experience as practitioners and young activists, to argue that young people, by promoting human rights-based operational principles at the international, national, and local levels, are pioneering a human rights-based approach to climate change. The paper concludes by suggesting how policy makers can support and empower young people to advance an explicit human rights-based agenda, while concurrently translating human rights-based operational principles into climate change policies and practice.

Envisioning planetary health in every medical curriculum: An international medical student organization's perspective.

BACKGROUND: With deteriorating ecosystems, the health of mankind is at risk. Future health care professionals must be trained to recognize the interdependence of health and ecosystems to address the needs of their patients and communities. Health issues related to, e.g. climate change and air pollution, are not, however, generally included in medical education. OBJECTIVES: To assess the inclusion of climate change and air pollution in medical curricula and to guide the International Federation of Medical Students' Associations' (IFMSA) Vision of Climate Change in the Medical Curriculum. METHODS: A study comprising three surveys (March 2019, August 2019, March 2020) explored medical students' perceptions of the current status of formal and non-formal elements of climate change and air pollution and health in their medical programs. RESULTS: Respondents originated from 2817 medical schools in 112 countries. Only 15% of medical schools have incorporated climate change and health into the curriculum. Students led climate-related activities in an additional 12% of medical schools. With regard to air pollution and health, only 11% of medical schools have formal education on the topic. CONCLUSIONS: It is crucial to acknowledge the current omissions from medical curricula and the importance of meaningful student involvement in curriculum transformation.