ENVIRONMENTAL activists in the Borders have supported a campaign highlighting a ‘prescription’ to help solve the climate crisis.
The drive, headed by the doctors of Scotland and MedAct (a charity which works to tackle health inequalities and the impacts of social, political and environmental factors on health), asks world leaders to help cure the climate crisis.
The prescription recommends that world leaders “take decisive action to mitigate the wide-reaching health impacts of climate change, take steps to ensure climate justice, apply pressure to establish a global Green New Deal, and remove the influence of polluters from COP”.
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On Monday, local activists took to the streets in Galashiels handing out copies of the prescription, inviting Borderers to engage with the campaign and take some actions of their own.
Dr Shelagh King, one of the Borders doctors backing the campaign, said: “We’re asking people to take one climate action a day.
“This could include having a conversation with a friend, family member or work colleague, about the climate crisis and its impacts on health, or writing to the UK government to demand they stop the construction of a huge new oil field off the coast of Shetland, or sending a card to their MP and MSPs asking them to inject urgency into the action for getting to zero-carbon.
“Or all three preferably.”
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The campaign says that the climate crisis is a health crisis, with those “least responsible” feeling the greatest impact.
A MedAct statement reads: “Both in Scotland and globally, it is those least responsible for the causes of climate change and ecological collapse who are suffering the most.
“Climate policy must centre on the most marginalised groups within our communities.”
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