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Stressed about climate change? Take a hike
Is your anxiety spiking along with the temperatures, fires and floods this summer? (I’m asking for a friend.) If we’re going to stay functional amid spiralling climate impacts, it seems like an important time to look at proven strategies to counter climate anxiety. So, like more and more people are doing lately, I called the doctor.
She told me to take a hike.
She wasn’t kidding and it wasn’t just good general advice. Dr. Melissa Lem has distilled the evidence for nature’s healing powers down to prescription-level precision: “Two hours a week, at least 20 minutes at a time,” she gently instructed.
You get big improvements in your levels of the stress hormone cortisol after 20 or 30 minutes, according to medical research. And there’s similar evidence for nature’s healing effects across a wide spectrum of problems. Health professionals across Canada are now writing prescriptions through a program called PaRx (who knew doctors were so deft with the double entendre?).
I reached Dr. Lem after a full day seeing patients but she showed no hint of fatigue. Quite the opposite — her enthusiasm for getting people into nature is infectious and she’s riding a wave of success. Barely three years ago, the PaRx program started as a side project with the BC Parks service and already doctors are bringing nature-based programs into hospitals in London, Ont., and schools in Nova Scotia. The Canadian Medical Association is on board and the World Health Organization has profiled the PaRx program globally. Within Canada, nature prescriptions are now being filled in all provinces by over 11,000 Canadian medical professionals.
Some patients even receive a free Parks Canada Discovery Pass on doctors’ orders. “Medical research now clearly shows the positive health benefits of connecting with nature,” said Minister Steven Guilbeault when the feds formalized a collaboration with PaRx. Canada’s environment and climate change minister called it “a breakthrough in how we treat mental and physical health challenges.”
If it is a “breakthrough,” it’s one of those peculiarly ancient ones. Indigenous spokespeople have been trying to impress the importance of connection to the land on settlers for a very long time. Hippocrates — he of the Hippocratic oath — was recommending time in his garden to patients well over 2,000 years ago. Japan’s Forest Agency has been recommending forest bathing, or shinrin-yoku, since the 1980s.
What’s new is the growing body of scientific evidence. Beyond that 20-minute point, we get an extraordinary range of health benefits. Dr. Lem ticks off a cornucopia of evidence: improvements in blood pressure, heart health, diabetes, recovery after illness. Mental health improves markedly. Time in nature helps with depression, attention disorders and anxiety. Better memory. More creativity. People of all ages become happier. Kids do better in school. The list goes on and on.
Dr. Lem started sifting through the research after her own encounter with what she calls “nature deficit.” In 2009, she moved back to Toronto following a stint running an emergency department in rural B.C., “I found myself way more stressed even though my job was way less stressful.” It makes sense when you think about evolution, she told me. “Our brains are wired for biodiversity.”
But she’s not one to rely on thought experiments. By temperament and training, she’s the type who doesn’t trust anything until someone’s done a randomized trial and the results have been replicated. Like so many medical professionals, she found the evidence undeniable. “We now call nature the fourth pillar of health,” she says, “along with sleep, diet and exercise.”
Most of us intuitively know that nature heals. But, as with so many things we know are good for us, the trick is in the doing. That’s even harder when it comes to ecological anxiety because the reaction isn’t always fight or flight, it can often be “freeze” — a kind of deer-in-the-headlights paralysis. Maybe doomscrolling or an entirely understandable urge towards distraction.
That’s one reason for the PaRx program, says Dr. Lem. Advice from a trusted health professional is proven to add motivation. And a written prescription is even more motivating.
And PaRx offers other strategies to overcome inertia as well. Scheduling is one deceptively simple tactic: That means entering it in your day planner (writing things down comes with its own evidence base). Schedule and prioritize green time like you would a doctor’s appointment or a dinner date.
Another strategy is to enlist others — co-workers, friends and family — which has also been shown to increase success at getting out into green spaces.
You’re probably not going to get out to a national park for several 20-minute sessions a week. And time in nature can sound awfully ableist and unattainable for city dwellers. There’s good news on that front, too.
“You don’t even have to walk,” says Dr. Lem. You can roll a wheelchair under a tree or sit on a bench in an urban green space. The health benefits of nature start to add up when you feel you've had a meaningful nature experience.
If there’s any concern that sitting on a park bench sounds more like a prescription for quietism than activism, Dr. Lem is living proof to the contrary. She’s a mother herself, has a medical practice and a role as an assistant professor at the UBC Medical School. All of which hasn’t stopped her from spearheading programs like PaRx and becoming president of the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE).
At CAPE, Dr. Lem is a leading force behind campaigns against fossil fuel advertising and the dangers of natural gas while rallying health professionals to support federal regulations for a clean electricity system and a cap on oil and gas pollution.
Time in nature is “a gateway into bolder climate advocacy,” she’s discovered. Medical professionals start engaging on issues of broader planetary health. And, for all of us, the more we’re connected to nature, the evidence demonstrates more pro-environmental attitudes and behaviours.
If you want more about effective antidotes to climate anxiety, make sure you’re signed up for future newsletters. But you might also want to check out some back issues like Coping through climate change, where we looked at research out of Lakehead University and reviewed Britt Wray’s wonderfully helpful book, Generation Dread. Or click through to find out why a Tibetan meditation master recommends gratitude as the surprising antidote to climate despair.
In the meantime, you’ve got your doctor’s orders: go sit on a bench or get out on the land. Two hours a week, at least 20 minutes at a time.
Deforestation drops
Last week, we looked at the impact of voting in Brazil where deforestation is down 34 per cent since President Lula took office. This week’s encouraging news comes from Colombia, where deforestation has dropped nearly 30 per cent.
“The numbers come as the left-wing government of President Gustavo Petro promises to step up efforts to halt deforestation and prioritize environmental protection,” reports Al Jazeera. “His administration has urged wealthier countries to cancel foreign debt as part of an exchange to ensure greater investment in Amazon conservation.”
Cerberus bites
The Italian Meteorological Society has started naming heat waves like hurricanes. And the one bearing down on Europe is being called Cerberus after the three-headed monster in Dante's Inferno. Even before Cerberus sinks its fangs, the temperatures in Spain have been brutal.
The ground temperature in some areas of Spain has hit more than 60C! (140F) Sixty C! This is no longer a "Holiday" destination - #Spain is now a torturous sweatshop. You can't sustain crops in this heat for long - nor a society. pic.twitter.com/LtgVxUNLDH
— Peter Dynes (@PGDynes) July 13, 2023
Last week, Zaragoza in northeast Spain had the worst day of flooding in its history. Cars were swept backwards down the street with drivers clinging to the roofs while a surreal supercell battered the region. (Extreme floods also hit Japan, the U.S., England, India and Turkey.) This week, thermometers in Zaragoza topped 42 C and Cerberus is forecast to bring temperatures higher still.
New research published in the journal Nature found over 61,000 people are estimated to have died during the heat last summer in Europe.
Meanwhile in North America, Canada’s North is smashing temperature records. Norman Wells in the Northwest Territories hit 37.9 C (100.2 F) this week. For the record, Ottawa’s all-time high temperature record is 37.8 C.
And the southern United States and Mexico are bracing for a widening heat dome. Agencies haven’t officially started naming them yet but advocates are lobbying for them to be named after oil companies — meteorologist Guy Walton is calling this one “heat wave Chevron.” Water temperatures in the Florida Keys are hot tub hot — a buoy at Marathon hit 99 F this week (37.2 C). Almost 100 million Americans are already living under excessive heat warnings (the highest alert category) and the U.S. National Weather Service is forecasting this weekend will bring the highest temperatures ever reliably recorded anywhere on Earth.
Ottawa won’t back down, Guilbeault promises
“Environment and Climate Change Minister Steven Guilbeault is facing virtually unprecedented opposition from almost every corner of the country as he works to implement a suite of clean energy policies,” reports John Woodside.
Obstructionist premiers are ignoring this summer’s climate klaxons and fighting the feds on everything from clean electricity rules, an emissions cap for oil and gas pollution and carbon pricing.
“I'm not saying they're all climate deniers,” Guilbeault said. “But most of the time when we listen to some of (the premiers) talk about these things, it's to say there's too much being done to fight climate change, and I profoundly disagree with that.”
Guilbeault was speaking over the phone from a climate summit in Belgium where Canada upped the ante on climate funding amid fears other wealthy nations will backslide. Guilbeault announced Canada would contribute $450 million to a fund to support developing countries in paying for climate action.
“Canada can now play a key role in encouraging fellow donor countries to step up and provide the finance that's necessary to unlock climate ambition in advance of COP28,” said Catherine Abreu, executive director of Destination Zero and a member of Canada’s Net-Zero Advisory Body.
Elsewhere in Canada’s National Observer, Sen. Rosa Galvez writes that the handling of oilsands tailings spill is environmental racism, plain and simple.
Max Fawcett argues that if Danielle Smith wants a fight on climate policy. Justin Trudeau should give it to her.
Canada’s federal government joined the tide of nations calling for a moratorium on deep-sea mining in the high seas.
The Manitoba government has decided to adopt the lowest possible standard for energy efficiency when the newest national model codes take effect next year.
Neskantaga First Nation faced off in court against the Ontario government over a road proposed to link the province’s road infrastructure with the Ring of Fire mining region.
Critical wildlife corridors are under threat because of Premier Doug Ford’s plans for development in the Greenbelt, reports Abdul Matin Sarfraz.
Oil and gas companies can afford the billions it will take to clean up their messes and it’s up to governments to force them to do so, according to a new analysis by the Parkland Institute at the University of Alberta.
“Right now, it would cost an estimated $123 billion to clean up the environmental liabilities created by oil and gas companies in Canada,” reports Natasha Bulowski. “Oil and gas companies are not voluntarily going to pay their bills; they must be forced to do so by governments,” said Julia Levin, national climate program manager with Environmental Defence.
And, Ontario released a clean power plan that’s “not really a plan,” reports Cloe Logan. “The plan is silent on whether the province intends to construct new gas-fired generation facilities. The province should avoid building new gas plants since cost-effective alternatives are available, and such facilities are likely to end up as stranded assets,” said Jason Dion, senior research director with the Canadian Climate Institute.
Die-in over LNG
The liquefied natural gas industry held a global conference in Vancouver this week. Environmentalists were not invited. They showed up anyway.
Today outside the International #LNG Conference, a die-in welcomed fossil fuel delegates/arsonists as they entered the Vancouver Convention Centre. Was glad to be there. Check out this great video from @dogwoodbc & @hollymenderson pic.twitter.com/8d9HKXjqHP
— Seth Klein (@SethDKlein) July 12, 2023
Spraying orange
The oil rig explosion in the Gulf of Mexico is no laughing matter. Two workers were killed. But climate scientist David Ho couldn’t resist the bitterly ironic contrast to protesters spraying orange paint and tomato soup.
Breaking: Activist from Just Stop Oil sprayed orange paint on Mexican oil company Pemex’s offshore platform Nohoch-A in the Gulf of Mexico.
— David Ho (@_david_ho_) July 13, 2023
Oh wait, I’m told it’s an explosion and fire.pic.twitter.com/6EZB0xdJdS
High ambition
Eighteen ministers from the High Ambition Coalition of nations issued a letter calling for “an urgent phaseout from fossil fuels” to be agreed to at COP28. Signatories included ministers from countries as varied as Germany, France, Chile, Ethiopia, Vanuatu, Senegal and New Zealand.
Pedal progress in London
Cyclists are now a greater proportion of traffic than cars and taxis on London UK streets. Yes, wet, damp London, home of the very pricey Congestion Charge. A sea change in a relatively short period of time. pic.twitter.com/nWIwJYSNVU
— Jennifer Keesmaat (@jen_keesmaat) July 12, 2023
Ahead of the curve
Renewable energy is growing exponentially. Globally, wind, solar and batteries are now being deployed faster than the ambitious net-zero scenarios developed by the International Energy Agency, according to new analysis by the Rocky Mountain Institute.
And a case study from Systems Change Lab zeroed in on eight countries, “ranging from Uruguay to Denmark to Namibia, already proving this is possible, having scaled up solar and wind at rates faster than what’s needed globally to limit global warming to 1.5 C, based on IEA scenarios.”
Three very good reasons for optimism today:
— Outrage + Optimism (@OutrageOptimism) July 13, 2023
1/ Solar and wind are growing faster than expected.
New @RockyMtnInst research shows growth is now in line with @IEA's net-zero scenario for 2030.#AheadOfTheCurve [1/4] pic.twitter.com/eEkFcxrsoJ