Using Precision Public Health to Manage Climate Change: Opportunities, Challenges, and Health Justice

Publication Title

Journal of Law, Medicine, and Ethics

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2020

Abstract

Amid public health concerns over climate change, “precision public health” (PPH) is emerging in next generation approaches to practice. These novel methods promise to augment public health operations by using ever larger and more robust health datasets combined with new tools for collecting and analyzing data. Precision strategies to protecting the public health could more effectively or efficiently address the systemic threats of climate change, but may also propagate or exacerbate health disparities for the populations most vulnerable in a changing climate. How PPH interventions collect and aggregate data, decide what to measure, and analyze data pose potential issues around privacy, neglecting social determinants of health, and introducing algorithmic bias into climate responses. Adopting a health justice framework, guided by broader social and climate justice tenets, can reveal principles and policy actions which may guide more responsible implementation of PPH in climate responses.

Recommended Citation

Walter G. Johnson, Using Precision Public Health to Manage Climate Change: Opportunities, Challenges, and Health Justice, 48 J.L. Med. & Ethics 681 (2020).

Volume

48

Issue

4

First Page

681

Last Page

693

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