Thank you to our intern Daisy Valdivieso for writing this update!
SF Bay PSR EHC Members continue to work energetically on wide-ranging collaborative efforts to engage health professionals and students, health care institutions, and policy makers to address the unceasing threats of our climate to our health.
Recent highlights include:
Health Professional Education / Curriculum Development
EHC members are continuing to participate in the expansion of climate-and-health education at UCSF, Stanford, and California State University, Hayward, including organizing and teaching cross-disciplinary courses on climate change and health; organizing student-led electives on climate change, and more; presenting dozens of lectures and talks on environmental and climate health issues in across medical specialties; and serving as journal editors and publishing on the impacts of climate change on health. EHC members are also actively working within their health professional societies to educate their peers advance policies in support of environmental health and justice.
Climate Crisis / Health Impacts / Environmental Justice
SF Bay PSR works at the intersection of the climate crisis, health, and equity, and continues to support community-driven environmental justice movements and projects. Some recent examples include:
SF Bay PSR’s Building Electrification (BE) Project educates the public about and advocates for justice in BE policies. Building electrification would reduce the use of fossil fuels and promote renewable alternatives to produce electricity, with concomitant improvements in air-quality and health. READ MORE.
SF Bay PSR also collaborated with UCSF Center for Climate, Health and Equity and UCLA in organizing a virtual meeting to educate health professionals about harmful effects of oil and gas drilling on community health. To this end, SF Bay PSR also supported the VISION Coalition’s health professional comment letter to support 3,200-foot setbacks for new oil and gas operations permits to CalGEM.
SF Bay PSR, with the guidance of Board Member Aude Bouagnon, PhD, continues to support the Bayview Hunter’s Point community-led efforts to demand the complete clean-up of toxic and radioactive waste from the Naval Shipyard and surrounding areas. READ MORE.
Divestment in Fossil Fuels / Investment in a Green Economy Task Force
SF Bay PSR’s divestment task force members advocate for individual, health-care institutional, health professional society, and public retirement fund divestment from fossil-fuels. Members are actively working on targeting divestment of the personal retirement funds in UCSF and other UC systems from fossil fuels and connected industries.
SF Bay PSR is a founding member of the NGO coalition that has been working for more than a year to bring a bill to divest public pension funds from fossil fuels to fruition. In February 2022 SB-1173 was introduced by Senator Gonzalez and Senator Wiener. The Act would require CalPERS and CalSTRS to divest from fossil fuels within the next five years. READ MORE on our Action Alert page.
