by Mary Bruno
Health care reform dominates the news as Dems struggle to
push their reform package through Congress. I applaud the effort, but can’t
help wondering why climate change is being left out of the debate.
Research shows that
climate change is harmful to our health, raising rates of cancer and of
respiratory and neurological diseases. So why aren’t climate scientists taking advantage
of healthcare reform to spotlight these very real and worrisome connections?
What better platform from which to advocate for their own favorite cause: comprehensive
climate legislation that sets a strict limit on greenhouse gases.
Puzzled by the silence, I called Dr. Matthew Nisbet at
American University in Washington, D.C. Nisbet is a strategic communications
specialist who focuses on science, the environment and public health. Since his freshman science writing class
at Dartmouth College, Nisbet has been intrigued by how media portrayals of
science issues, particularly controversial ones such as climate change, can shape
public opinion and behavior and also public policy debates. Since then, he’s
been fascinated by the “intersection” of science and policy. “How could
government agencies, science organizations and environmental groups, and also
journalists, be more effective at engaging the pubic, communicating about the
relevance of these issues, motivating and enabling learning, and empowering
members of the public to participate politically and in their local
communities?” asks Nisbet. Good question, but first things first:
Q. A climate policy that
limits the environmental pollutants that cause cancer, respiratory and other
diseases would save billions of dollars—not to mention lives. That seems like
a win-win, no? So, why has the climate science community been largely absent
from the healthcare reform debate?
Matt NisbetAmerican UniversityA. In the 2007 IPCC report [that’s the United Nation’s
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change], in the sections on human dimensions
of climate change, the public health consequences are detailed. The authors
also talk about the deeper adaptation strategy in order to protect against
these health consequences. The CDC [Centers for Disease Control] and Howard
Frumkin in particular, has written a series of articles in places like the Journal of the American Medical Association and the American Journal of Public Health discussing the connection between climate change and public health and the need
for adaptation. The Lancet has
published a whole series of synthesis articles on the research. So the efforts
within the academic literature are there.
Oftentimes, with any social problem, and climate change is
no different, once a particular narrative or frame of reference becomes locked
in about that issue it’s very difficult to break from that narrative. The
dominant narrative has been that climate change is an environmental problem
with environmental impact, or it’s a political fight. That’s how it’s generally
been reported on by mainstream journalists. Conservatives have been focusing on
the uncertainty of the science and the alleged devastating economic impact of
any action.
Those are the narratives that have come to dominate news
coverage and commentary. Those are the mental boxes that the public and policy
makers apply to the issue. There’s a lot of momentum and traction to those
interpretations, and it takes a lot of effort to interject new interpretations.
Only recently has there been an emphasis on how climate
change connects to other problems and other sectors in society. For example, there’s
been a lot of focus on the economy, and action on climate change as a way to
grow the economy. Climate change and public health has been dramatically under-communicated,
historically. Taking action on climate change should really be thought of in
terms of preventive health measures that make our communities better places to
live, make our lives healthier, and also reduce costs in the long run. I’ve
mentioned to journalists the fact that the public health consequences of climate
change have gotten very limited attention. An analysis I recently completed finds
that historically The New York Times and the Washington Post have
mentioned public health consequences in fewer than 5 percent of articles about climate
change.
Q. So, there’s lots of evidence
and awareness about the link between climate change and public health in the
scientific and public health communities, but that isn’t being mirrored in the
mainstream press coverage of either. How can we introduce new
“interpretations,” as you put it?
A. It takes a kind of a top down stimulus from institutions
and opinion leaders, starting with the White House and major government
agencies. Imagine, for example, if you were to introduce new attention to the
issues with a Surgeon General’s report on the health consequences of climate
change. Those reports have had a lot of moral authority in the past [think
tobacco], and they gain a lot of media attention. It’s a way to spread the
discussion of climate change across different segments of society.
Q. You write about
“framing” the scientific discussion, putting scientific findings in a more
understandable and personally relevant context. If you were a paid media
consultant advising the climate science community, how would you suggest they take
advantage of the current attention on healthcare reform to re-frame the debate
and advance their cause for action on climate change? Who should they be talking
to? What should they be saying? And how should they be saying it?
A. Right now there isn’t an easy answer. There hasn’t been
enough specific work done on connecting climate change to public health or
healthcare reform. The first recommendation is that accomplishing that goal
will take a lot of resources, because there’s so much competing noise around
the healthcare debate and around climate change generally. Resources first need
to be spent on careful audience research and message development around climate
change and public health. [Nisbet is studying just that.]
Some of the general principles would be to first understand
the segment of the public who are very concerned about healthcare reform but
also ambivalent about climate change. That could be a number of different
groups: it could be non-college educated suburban mothers who are concerned
about health insurance for their families; it could be minority mothers living
in urban areas, who are concerned about health access for their kids and also
asthma, allergies and respiratory problems that their kids face; it could be people
primarily concerned about the long-term cost of health insurance—male
independents, who have more of a fiscal conservative orientation, who haven’t
dismissed climate change but don’t see it as a leading priority.
Then the strategy would be to come up with a message design
that connects the dots for those groups who are already sensitive to the
healthcare debate, but not necessarily concerned about climate change. [You’d want] to push this
group of people into the coalition of groups around climate change by way of
the health insurance debate. The key there is to identify the information
sources they use (news outlets, entertainment media, etc.), and design a
message that isn’t too focused on climate change as a problem, but rather the
actions on climate change need to be talked about in terms of their clear,
tangible benefits to health and healthcare cost.
Q. We’ve been talking
about climate scientists doing more to explain the ramifications of climate
change and promote action. But has the ongoing Climategate controversy hurt
their reputation and credibility? If they were to suddenly join the debate,
would anyone even pay attention?
A. Despite the conventional wisdom that they’ve lost the
public trust in the wake of Climategate, all the polling indicators both before
and after Climategate show that scientists generally, and climate scientists
specifically have almost unrivaled public trust. Scientists are admired as a
profession. Science is strongly trusted as an institution. The challenge is how
to use that communication capital successfully and not undermine it.
In the health reform debate, any efforts by scientists that
appear too partisan are likely to undermine the public trust. So, if scientists
started running TV ads saying, “Support healthcare reform NOW,” brought to you
by a group of scientists, that’s probably not a wise activity. On the other
hand, if scientists were to partner with other opinion leaders in their
communities, such as business leaders or clergy, and sponsor community forums
about the health risks of climate change and possible policy solutions, without
a partisan agenda, that’s probably the role best suited for them.
Q. So, the ongoing,
high-profile debate over healthcare reform is a great opportunity to start a
contextual discussion about climate change; a kind of “teachable moment” to
explain how climate change has very tangible and very personal health
consequences. Are there other “teachable moments” out there, in disciplines
other than healthcare, that the climate community should target?
A. The White House has been pushing
climate change as an economic issue. Insurance companies, businesses and others
have added climate change to the criteria by which they make decisions about
health and health coverage. There’s going to be a trickledown effect. The fact
that climate change is a criteria is becoming institutionalized and will, down
the road, influence members of these organizations and the wider public and
begin to be reported on in the news media. [Stories about climate change] will
stretch beyond the science and environment beats, and become part of the health
and business beats and constitute more of the political coverage.
But one area not getting enough
attention is the focus on how the faith-based community is responding to
climate change; not just religious communities discussing climate change as a
moral issue, but also ethics experts at universities discussing the ethical
implications of climate impacts. The idea that climate change is one of
society’s leading moral and ethical dilemmas is under-communicated. There’s
some work on the part of ethicists to try and engage journalists about how to
cover these questions substantively. There’s an opportunity for environmental leaders,
scientists, and public health leaders to partner with religious leaders [on
this issue].
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