Medical leaders have called on the UK government to halt new oil and gas exploration to avoid further damage to the nation’s health.
Photo: Friends of the Earth Scotland
A letter, signed by the British Medical Association and the Royal Colleges of Physicians, Paediatricians, Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, and Psychiatrists, urged an end to the country’s dependence on fossil fuels to tackle climate change and fuel poverty.
The medical institutions, along with more than 600 individual health professionals, said there should be an immediate end to new North Sea oil and gas licences. They also called for an equitable energy transition to renewables.
The letter to the Prime Minister said a consultation on 30 new offshore oil and gas fields contradicted international recommendations against further fossil fuel developments.
The United Nations Environment Programme and the International Energy Agency said last year that development of new oil and gas fields must stop if the world was to meet the global warming limit of 1.5C.
The medics’ letter said:
“The country is facing two crises with the same underlying cause: the UK’s continued reliance on expensive and polluting fossil fuels for its energy supply.
“Millions of UK households face real energy poverty, whilst the impacts of climate change are already affecting the country.
The letter said:
“as healthcare professionals, we know that any new fossil fuel projects and their contribution to climate change constitute a grave threat to our patients and the resilience of our healthcare system”.
It said energy poverty, driven by rising bills, would lead to worsening health and increased winter deaths. It called for emergency support for vulnerable households.
The letter also called for end to subsidies for oil and gas extraction, redirection of funds to green industry and an end to the policy of Maximum Economic Recovery (MER) for the North Sea.
Dr Andrew Goddard, president of the Royal College of Physicians, said:
“It seems utterly wrong that at a time when the role of fossil fuels in climate change is better understood than ever, that anyone should think that drilling for oil is a good thing.
“The climate change we are witnessing is on a scale that is already harming health and will only get worse. Any short-term profits will soon be forgotten by everyone living with the consequences.”
Dr Adrian James, president of the Royal College of Psychiatrists said:
“We must move away from our dependence on harmful fossil fuel-based energy by rejecting proposals for new oil and gas fields, and instead focus on developing sustainable, renewable and affordable alternatives that will keep us and our planet healthy.
“Not only will this benefit the nation’s mental and physical health, but it also informs an effort to ensure that the cost-of-living crisis we are currently experiencing becomes a thing of the past.
“We urge the Government to curtail activities, which we know are contributing to the climate and ecological emergencies.”
Mark Hayden, paediatric cardiac intensivist at Great Ormond Street Hospital said:
“People in the UK are now being pushed into poverty because of our over reliance on fossil fuels.
“The government must stop locking us into this expensive, polluting fuel by handing out even more licences, which it knows will lead to dangerous climate change, when it should be directing that investment into cheap, clean renewable energy.
“The health benefits of transitioning away from unaffordable fossil fuels are innumerable but the government must act to make them happen.”
DRILL OR DROP? 
Why didn’t the medical leaders also mention the deleterious effect air pollution (partly caused by drilling operations including extra trucks), on people’s health who live near and around drilling sites?
[Edited by moderator] How about the extra trucks delivering the wind turbines to pristine parts (previously not industrialized) of the UK countryside-which then fall over and need more trucks to remove the debris and deliver a new one? How about all those wood burners-domestic, and amongst the protest camps-see Guardian!
Meanwhile, for those medics who don’t want to play politics, but wish to be seen as educated by their patients, perhaps they should read:
“Crude Awakening: The necessity of oil and gas in the green transition”. CITY A.A. Tuesday.
Not based upon dogma, not based upon fantasy but based upon the facts as displayed over the last twelve months. Those facts need sorting out to allow progress. Just more of the same that does not sort out those facts will simply end up with more failed opportunities to make progress.
Is Russia/Crimea timing an accident? Believe that if you like, but please do not expect everyone to be so gullible. There are huge consequences globally getting transition wrong. This is very obviously the case currently. Continuing with the same old, but more, will produce more of the same consequences. Saving the planet? Nope, complicit in it’s destruction.
Hmm.
When the doctors have achieved it, then perhaps the rest can follow?
Last time I visited my local hospital there was a flying ambulance landing, lots of plastic tubing and syringes and a stand by diesel generator in case of a power outage-just for starters.
Perhaps the health of the nation would be improved if the doctors concentrated upon the backlog, like my daughter in law who was fully prepped for an operation last week, my son had taken two weeks off work to nurse her and look after the children, but the surgeon decided he needed to finish early so operation cancelled. The operation was to repair a botched operation done several months ago within the same hospital.
More operations from the BMA etc. and less politics might make the difference.
The collective voice of respected health professionals. Very well said.
Thanks KatT, but it was only me!
I am amused/ amazed some in the medical profession have so much time to become experts in other professions. If it is that easy, then I shall open a surgery shortly. I could start by refusing to give out numbers to those waiting, and waiting and waiting. A small gesture but vets. can manage it.
Perhaps they should brush up on dealing with health issues from nuclear waste? Then, there is that cancer risk from cobalt exposure. Car accidents from EVs that spontaneously combust. Pedestrians knocked down by E-scooters. How to run a health service in N.Ireland when
there is no one willing to make decisions following a Cash for Ash scandal-let alone the air pollution.
Or, concentrate upon the price of energy and therefore mug up on hypothermia or starvation?
Limit supply against demand, price rises. If the medics can’t see that currently, I advise Specsavers.
Maybe cut the salaries of the said professionals until they join their patients and learn that lesson!
Meanwhile, in Norway, they enjoy a superb health service. I wonder how that is the case?
(Is the BMA a voice of respected health professionals? Maybe once, not any longer.)
“We must move away from our dependence on harmful fossil fuel-based energy by rejecting proposals for new oil and gas fields, and instead focus on developing sustainable, renewable and affordable alternatives that will keep us and our planet healthy.”
Looking forward to reading what the good Dr.s propose as their alternative for transition away from fossil fuels, particularly the affordable bit, and the bit they missed, the requirement to be reliable. Also looking forward to them boycotting / lobbying Norway where most of our imported gas comes from:
https://www.norskpetroleum.no/en/exploration/licensing-position-for-the-norwegian-continental-shelf/
“18 January 2022, 28 companies have been offered ownership interests in a total of 53 production licences in the APA 2021. Of the 53 production licences, 28 are in the North Sea, 20 in the Norwegian Sea and 5 in the Barents Sea. 17 of the production licences are additional acreage to existing production licences. More detailed information can be found on the NPD’s website.”
I read that France is going to build 14 new nuclear power stations; this would certainly help displace some fossil fuel and provide base load – perhaps this is what the Dr.s would propose? I hope they can build them quicker than the one they are trying to build over here……
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/10/france-to-build-up-to-14-new-nuclear-reactors-by-2050-says-macron
Doctors and Helath Professionals?, When ever i have recieved a diagnosis i always look to getting a second opinion! In this instance i will get a second opinion! Thanks Medical professionals….
In other news: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-10515705/Worst-case-climate-predictions-no-longer-plausible-study-shows.html
Clutching at straws?
As medical professionals it is entirely appropriate for them to comment on the issues that negatively impact health and well-being. Fossil fuels harm health and cause climate breakdown, scientific fact. Quite correct to call for less not more and to transition away as quickly as possible from harmful fossil fuels.
Investment needs to go into alternatives and that transition. Exactly right.
KatT – it would appear that the Dr.s (and you) don’t want any new oil and gas developments in the UK sector? However as our reserves deplete, and demand (for gas) remains fairly static, is it acceptable for Norway (and others) to explore for, develop, produce, and export gas from new fields to the UK? I don’t understand why they and you would want to outsource the gas required for transition to other countries when it is possible we have the reserves in the UK which can provide revenue for the Government and jobs?
All the future energy scenarios for UK include natural gas for a long time to come.
Out of interest, what car does your GP drive? Most of the Dr.s and Consultants I know have 4x4s and high end petrol / diesel BMWs. They also drive their kids to school……
Very true Paul, what’s also true is universities which put Jnr doctors, physicians, health professionals and medical staff through endowments and receive funding from external sources. Currently universities have been ignorantly abstaining from receiving funding directly from energy companies. But indirectly the renewable and alternative energy companies of the future which will be “BP, Shell, Total and ExxonMobil” who all operate in the UK North Sea!
Who funds their research?,
Produces their plastics, saline drips and medical tooling?, fuels their 4×4 Audi Q7’s and 3litre BMW’s? Something stinks and it isn’t the bedpan in the elderly ward of the Royal
College
What directly pays you and yours, your interests lie in the future of renewable energy Katy?
So we are not discussing climate change hoax?
Doctors also comment about relationships, KatT. I wonder how a certain category of medical reps. are selected and frequently get the highest bonuses?
Perhaps there should be less money for the NHS and more for transition?
Sorry, this is no different to those who wander around in the countryside telling farmers, “you don’t want to do it like that, you should do it like this.” Very occasionally, there is some semblance of sense, usually not.
I shall really look forward to the BMA’s comments when the next pay award is being negotiated. Will they be requesting smaller salary increases in the NHS to allow more money to be diverted towards transition? Of course they will, as the health outcomes would make their jobs so much easier and the health of the nation would be so much better. If I hold my breath for that, one less patient.
Investment is going into transition, now. A lot of it, but it takes a long time to build nuclear and a lot of money. Equally, hydrogen infrastructure is getting money but that can not be done overnight.
Perhaps it would go quicker if the roads were not “glued” up, so builders could build and hospitals would not have their staff and their patients delayed?
I am pleased to see this and welcome their effort to support this vital cause – but would be much happier if the worthy medical college members put their combined efforts into stopping the Health & Care Bill currently under scrutiny in the Lords. This vital service available for all and answerable to us all, is becoming a US subsidiary of their health insurance businesses and we will be paying their shareholders profits for evermore, once the clauses including ISDS courts is signed. Even the Royal College of Nurses has signed. I despair!
Oh yes. And any vaccines from Pfizer should be returned to the USA! Perhaps not too many worn out staff in the NHS who would go for that, having to search for ventilators and put up with that synthetic rubber produced from fossil fuel.
The NHS has for a very long time enjoyed vital supplies from US Pharma, from vaccines to antibiotics to medical devices. There has been considerable investment and jobs created by US Pharma setting up production in the UK, and Europe, because health care is a global business-and good job that it is as the scale of investment to bring new drugs to market requires that sort of scale.
“We will be paying their shareholders profits”. Really? “We” can not be shareholders in US subsidiaries? What a quaint, but historic and incorrect world.
And, before this thread wanders off into private health care, let “us” remember that the NHS is constructed around the private sector ie. the way Consultants operate within the NHS. Get rid off the private sector and the Consultants are chucked out as well-probably off to USA! Never see the impact assessment around that from Labour within their manifesto!
Bring back Florence and leeches, Judith. Ahh, those good old days.
For those who want to tax the oil companies even more, (but Microsoft, Amazon, Starbucks, Brewdog and Google get away with paying minimal tax).
How’s about this then?,
https://www.agcc.co.uk/news-article/opinion-why-the-case-for-a-windfall-tax-misses-the-point
Eli-Goth – those that are pushing for a windfall tax on oil and gas companies don’t understand anything about the UK Petroleum Licence regime and the benefits this has brought to the UK. Including the Labour Party (of course they do, but in opposition they can say what they like to try and attract votes). They also don’t understand the pitfalls of production sharing agreements. The UK did experiment with this with BNOC (Labour Government) – and it was a financial disaster. Decommissioning tax breaks are a myth – as explained in your linked article. The only way we will make the transition is with investment from big oil in renewables, this is happening at pace and will continue to do so. The alternative of anti fairy dust policy will just make our future energy supplies more unreliable and more expensive. People seem to overlook or not want to understand that renewables companies are in business to make as much money as possible for their boards and shareholders., just like other businesses.
Well, I would suggest as a wind turbine has just fallen over in Wales, that could have caused death as well as destruction, then the good doctors should consider the health of the nation and ask for a ban on all new wind turbines. That precautionary principle the antis are so keen upon. Same with EVs until kids in DRC are safe and healthy.
For reference to your statement regarding Welsh wind turbine MFC:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10514957/amp/Villagers-wake-horrific-crash-300FT-wind-turbine-blown-storm.html
[Edited by moderator]
When the BMJ have reported that 1 in 5 (20 million based upon 2020 death statistics) people per year worldwide die of fossil fuel pollution.
That estimates now say that the increase in temperature due to fossil fuel pollution will now reach or exceed 2.4 degrees Celsius.
When the original COP26 target was to prevent the increase in global temperature from exceeding 1.5 degrees Celsius.
Which in itself will now create far worse climate degradation worldwide. Therefore, the temperature increase will lead to far more deaths due to violent weather and temperature fluctuations, already seen everywhere, there are worldwide fires, and inundation of the island communities from rising sea levels due to melting polar ice caps. It was those same island communities who were refused access to COP26, whereas the fossil fuel industry were allowed access and had their promoters in the worst nation delegates.
But apparently all of that is totally ignored by the usual fossil fuel protagonists, as if it doesn’t even reach their attention. In fact, they have totally ignored those facts no matter how often they have been very clearly laid before them, and have refused even to acknowledge the facts or answer the many questions put to them.
It is curious that when faced with a “windfall tax” on the fossil fuel polluters, that no mention is made of the fact, that it has been the fossil fuel industry which is killing the planet. So far the bill for reparation of the planet has not been levelled at the fossil fuel industry who are still allowed to profit from their pollution.
Perhaps attention should be put on the fossil fuel industry for making the polluter pay for hundreds of years of pollution?
If there is ever a better reason to impose a windfall tax, then worldwide destruction of the environment, ecocide, and the destruction of worldwide climates and all life on Earth, would seem to be the paramount rational reason to make them pay. And pay heavily.
There is another, and even more serious, issue to the deaths caused by fossil fuel pollution. And that is, the long term effects of fossil fuel pollution on all life on Earth, not just locally in the UK.
The melting ice caps and the melting of permafrost also releases vast amounts of frozen methane which is accelerating the greenhouse effect, which will in turn exacerbate global warming and further accelerate climate destruction.
The Great Permian/Triassic Extinction Event, which destroyed 90% of all life in the oceans and 70% of all life on land. The final nail in the coffin of life on Earth at that time occurred when the frozen methane in permafrost on land and beneath the oceans melted and released the last killing blow to the majority of all life on the planet due to a massive increase in the resultant accelerated greenhouse effect.
https://www.nationalgeographic.org/article/permian-extinction-when-life-nearly-came-end/
The ability for the oceans to absorb greenhouse gasses, and the similar effects of locations such as the Amazon Rain Forests, and oceanic algae were the most effective greenhouse gas absorbers on the planet. They would normally slow down the greenhouse effect to a time of thousands or millions of years.
But the fossil fuel industry greed for more and more fossil fuel resources has managed to create the worst acceleration of greenhouse gasses due to fossil fuel pollution in the history of the planet. A mere few hundred years of ever-increasing anthropogenic pollution, when previously it was thousands or millions of years due to natural events that were smoothed out by the natural heat and greenhouse gas sinks of the worldwide forests on land and oceanic flora and fauna.
But the human race has managed to destroy many of those heat and greenhouse gas sinks worldwide. The inevitable effect of that, has been the absorption of the resulting massive increase in greenhouse gasses into the oceans causes the acidization of the oceans and reduces the capability to absorb oxygen, which prevents ocean wildlife from thriving or even surviving. Hence, the greater deaths of all life in the Permian/Triassic oceans were as little to what the human race has been capable of doing in a mere few hundred years.
The anthropogenic created fossil fuel greed for even more fossil fuel resources has caused the Amazon Rain Forests to be a net producer of greenhouse gasses rather than an absorber, and the oceans are now so polluted by human activities, that they are already becoming acidised, and oxygen retention for oceanic species is already decreasing. The Earths natural heat and greenhouse gas sinks are now so severely compromised, that they have become all but further polluters themselves.
All of those effects have severely reduced the previously prolific flora and fauna worldwide. The Earth is already in the middle of the 6th Major Extinction Level Event in the Earths history. Once all life on Earth is severely reduced, then there are even worse effects to follow. Not just for animal life, but all life, and that includes humanity due to starvation, disease and drought.
Perhaps that should also be added to the list of crimes of ecocide through greed and corruption and the worldwide monopolies of fossil fuel pollution.
Make the polluter pay for repairing the damage and to save more lives. Rather than allow the fossil fuel polluters to pocket their vast profits in offshore tax havens. Making the polluter pay is the only logical way to proceed. But the money must not go into hidden government coffers to continue their own version of insanity and greed and corruption.
That money must go directly to efforts to repair the damage due to pollution and to save further destruction of all life. And that must be placed under the control of and directly responsible to the people of this planet.
Phil c it is a damn shame you have not benefited from the miraculous invention of the industrial revolution, although it has not been without huge criticism, political and environmental concerns. The fossil fuels industries have broken new ground in which we thought could never be possible, the world has over 7 billion inhabitants, each with differing degrees of energy usage and consumption. Most who wouldn’t have lived beyond forty years old without the invention of fossil fuels, so think yourself lucky you are in the century that does!!
Fossil Fuels are still a cheap source of energy, safety to transport, (due the the US fracked LNG being transport across the Atlantic ever week), it has massive economic benefits, it is completely stable, its in abundance, its of a high calorific value, its a useful by product, evident in fertilizers for those who prefer either a meat, dairy or vegan diet! Fact!, It creates hundreds of thousands of jobs globally, I take it you have never required surgery or been in terminal care, i assure you you haven’t looked round a room and understood all which comes from fossil fuels?
Or if your happy on you island of discontent, in your mud hut, cooking and heating on mature fuel then that is your prerogative! either that or you need to stop the use, of and abstain from all fossil fuels as its obviously a real issue for you, but you are obviously still using the resource!!
He has, E-G. But, DoD exclude people being able to identify that, as what was done in the past can just be ignored when inconvenient. Hmm. Not so sure that is normal-see Bristol.
But hey ho, it takes a lot to get some mathematics to add up.
I have kept my comments to the inconvenient facts of the subject of health of the people in the UK.
However, I see there are the usual attempts to entirely avoid the inconvenient issue of Medical leaders who have called on the UK government to halt new oil and gas exploration to avoid further damage to the nation’s health.
Clearly, mathematics facts and relevance are not their strong points. Quite the opposite in fact.
So in order to retrieve the subject back into the Real World, which is the deaths and dangers to the health of everyone in the UK and worldwide due to fossil fuel pollution. And to explain that issue with some simple mathematics.
20 million deaths per year are due to fossil fuel pollution worldwide. (1 in 5 of all deaths for all reasons per year = 20 million deaths due to fossil fuel pollution per year) By extrapolation of resulting health issues compared to the number of deaths (always more than the deaths). The inevitable effects from fossil fuel pollution will have, and still creating severe health issues of at least 10 times the number of deaths, = 200 million health issues worldwide per year. To extrapolate the true likely number of severe health effects, due to fossil fuel pollution, however, there may well be 50 times the deaths, or 100 times the deaths = 1 or 2 billion deleterious health effects worldwide from fossil fuel pollution.
So you can see how it is far better to clarify the inconvenient facts in order to retrieve the true issues of the health of everyone in the UK, rather than those who prefer to bash the plastic about nothing at all.
Also getting back to another mentioned aspect of that illusive Real World. As regards the First Industrial Revolution. There are some unfortunate truths that are carefully avoided by those usual suspects.
The industrial revolution put many hundreds of thousands of people in the worst possible living conditions in the UK. The workers, who travelled from the countryside after the “partition act” which had turned the countryside into a rule by landowner lord/serfdom insult and who stole public land from the farmers and made them unpaid slaves. So people travelled to the towns and cities hoping for a better life. Only to find the terrible, cruel and insanitary working and living conditions. The terrible treatment by greedy profit motivated owners of factory and growing industry who exploited not only men and women, but children as well. No health or medical treatments were allowed because the people and children were given slave wages and still expected to pay for renting their insanitary jerry built housing conditions’ and to pay for fuel to heat and food and water to eat by those very same owners, leaving the workers in abject poverty, be that fuel or food or health poverty.
So, I would hardly recommend the example of the First Industrial Revolution as an example of progress for anyone but the owners and the new landowners for an example of the owners’ humanity to their all but slaves.
In fact, it is a matter of history in the UK in particular that all the achievements of sanitation, came from ordinary working and farming people. Workers rights and freedoms to be treated fairly and to have their children educated, not forced down mines or up chimneys, or forced to suffer pollution from the workplace for a decent living wage did not come from the owners or from government, or from the wealthy, but from the people themselves.
And that is still ongoing. Sanitary conditions such as decent drainage and street cleaning came about only because so many workers were dying of disease due to unsanitary living and working conditions. And that was only allowed by the wealthy because too many workers were dying or were unfit to work and that was decreasing the factory owner’s profits. However, that lack of available workforces, was due to lack of workers due to the spreading of diseases and to pollution and insanitary working and living conditions.
The danger to the rich and wealthy and government officials was those very diseases, that were due to the unsanitary condition they themselves imposed, and that those same resulting diseases and the health destroying stink of pollution were spreading to them as well. That was the reason for the Sanitary Act.
https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/acts/sanitary-act
The truth about fossil fuels and the inevitable pollution effects is much more inconvenient than you would like to admit, isn’t it.
So progress in any form, be that access to food, water, fuel, freedom and a fair wage for a fair day’s work did not come from the owners of the filthy polluting factories and mines, but from the people themselves.
Benefits from fossil fuels are severely curtailed by the resulting deaths and dangers to health of everyone and every living creature on the planet.
It’s obvious that it’s way past time to find a better way out of this blatant fossil fuel industry monopolistic greed obsessed profit at any cost insanity, isn’t it.
Fossil fuels cause deaths and health issues. Greed and profit motivated power and influence have prevented fossil fuels from being extracted and used safely and efficiently, and with the resulting severe health effects everywhere. The opposition to all the rational alternatives has only prolonged the fossil fuel industries end of licence well past its useful life.
That time is now.
No you haven’t. You have started to moralize about the demon fossil fuel responsible for so many deaths and how those responsible should be held to account.
[Edited by moderator]
Windfall taxation upon those who have benefitted? Careful!
[Edited by moderator] As for all that stuff about insanitary and dangerous working conditions, then greed has just foisted that upon the kids in the DRC. Oh well, helping to make the world’s richest man richer still. Why should he not attract a windfall tax also? After all, he is the prime candidate with Government policy providing a windfall by penalizing competitors.
Oh! Yes, I did!
It seems the pantomime season is running late this year? The painted pantomime dames seem to be turning into the wicked sisters?
Come on boys and girls, ladies and gentlemen! All shout together:
Did I keep to the subject?
“Oh! Yes You Did!”
Wow! That was deafening, wasn’t it! Thanks “everyone”!
There you have it from the audience. Everything I have said up to now was entirely descriptive and definitive of the issue at hand. And that is, since you fail yet again to mention any of the inconvenient facts at all, is “Medical leaders urge ministers to end new oil and gas exploration”.
Perhaps the facts are not so palatable to the wicked sisters?
Do you agree, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls?
Is the subject unpalatable to the “contributor”?
“Oh! Yes it is!”
Wow! That was even better ladies and gentle men, boys and girls! Thank you one and all!
I enjoyed that!
[Edited by moderator]
Where is your answer to the deaths of 20 million people worldwide per year due to fossil fuel pollution? Begin there. Then move on to what the fossil fuel industry should do to pay for reparation of two centuries of death dealing pollution?
A windfall tax levied on the fossil fuel corporations would just be the start, wouldn’t it. Or don’t you care for those in energy poverty and those who can either heat their houses or feed their children and themselves? That moralising cry seems to have evaporated as quickly as it was moralised about, didn’t it?
If you can’t come up with any logical, detailed and substantiated comment to answer even one of the perfectly honest and mathematically sound arguments I put before you. Then perhaps it would be better to admit it
[Edited by moderator]
[Comment removed by moderator]
Oh dear. What a lot of attempted but failed deflection.
To answer your one point of substance. A windfall tax on the energy companies would not have any more impact upon energy poverty than the £9 billion that is being supplied without a windfall tax, and is being directed at those who are in greatest need.
Please supply your impact assessment for a windfall tax upon the energy companies. I can get you started: higher energy prices as said energy companies refuse to invest in new drilling, causing less supply when currently high prices are being created by more demand than supply. And followed by unemployment. Yes, the panto. season reference is very apt.
Very typical of the antis. Moralise about a brave new world, and when it arrives go into deflection mode and add that someone else can pay for the costs they didn’t foresee.
Not “we” guv? Oh yes it is. You could always crowd fund and help out, together with sorry.
Oh Dear, Oh Dear! Defection away from the subject of the post again!
Isn’t that “moralising” and Brave New World? An interesting dystopian social science fiction novel by English author Aldous Huxley by the way, written in 1931 and published in 1932. That predated George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, written in 1948. George Orwell changed the date to read 1984, and was published in 1949. I suggest you read both of them and compare them both to recent events, and your own posts. Or perhaps, judging from your recent “contributions”, you already have?
The title Brave New World derives from Miranda’s speech in William Shakespeare’s The Tempest, Act V, Scene I:[8]
O wonder!
How many goodly creatures are there here!
How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world,
That has such people in’t.
— William Shakespeare, The Tempest, Act V, Scene I, ll. 203–206[9]
Unfortunately the required morals and ethics from such a “contribution” of your own clearly demonstrated only a short while ago, that any moral and ethical considerations are somewhat significantly absent in the fossil fuel industry, and as such the observances you said were nothing more than “academic” and therefore of no practical value in fossil fuel operations.
Perhaps the fossil fuel industry, who you claim to represent, would have something to say about that…..?
Whereas the Medical Profession, as demonstrated by the professionals in the subject heading above, do indeed have a code of moral and ethical behaviour referred to as the “Hippocratic Oath”.
The Hippocratic Oath: The Original and Revised Version
https://doctors.practo.com/the-hippocratic-oath-the-original-and-revised-version/
I suggest you read the Medical Profession Hippocratic Oath, and seek to apply that to the fossil fuel industry pollution effects of the deaths each year of 20 million people (1 in 5 of deaths worldwide per year from all causes as fact checked by the British Medical Journal) and damage to people’s health in the UK and worldwide of anything between 200 million to perhaps 1 or 2 billion people depending upon statistical estimates from 2020.
(BMJ) Fossil fuel air pollution blamed for 1 in 5 deaths worldwide
https://www.bmj.com/content/372/bmj.n406
Continued below:
Continued from above:
Which entirely explains the Medical Professionals letter to the government as detailed above and their concern for the health of all the people in the UK due to the health dangers from fossil fuel extraction, from its use and the resulting poisonous pollution from all aspects of the fossil fuel industry.
Perhaps you would also call that “moralising”? But that would be a gross insult to many millions of doctors, nurses, surgeons and medical Professionals, worldwide, wouldn’t it?
In my own professional career, I was always conscious of the Moral and Ethical Codes of Practice of my profession. [Edited by moderator]
The facts are here for you to explore. If you have any questions, then I am sure one of the professionals above would be only too please to help you.
Have a Nice Day….
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As the cloaking device has been brought into play-I blame those Romulans for letting it out of their control-putting it another way:
I note no impact assessment, or attempt, reference a windfall tax. Thought not. Consequences best not considered. However, there are those who have to consider consequences so it has been rejected. But, still interesting to see those exposed who are willing to ignore consequences. Usual suspects.
In respect of associations, unions etc writing letters. That represents the opinions of a few writing them, not the professions as a whole. Always has been, always will be. Most of these bodies have their officers elected via a very small proportion of their membership, sometimes around 5% in an organization like Unite. Next, it will be expected that all students take the view of the NUS. Very few, in my experience. Have these organizations consulted all their members before writing these letters? Nope. 600!
So, 600 within millions. Hardly a ringing endorsement. I suspect more than 600 would support free golf membership for themselves at their local courses to aid their physical fitness and thus perform their jobs more energetically.
Well, Well. If thinking isn’t your strong point, then I don’t know how much good the truth will be to you?
Let’s try it in easy steps, shall we? I will try to be gentle. Though you really don’t deserve it, judging from recent “contributions”.
The first impact assessment for you, is that you answer my questions first, the very same ones I have been asking you for a year now, and which you have totally ignored. Without that personal impact assessment first and foremost. I believe the expression is “in your dreams”.
Let’s just get the rubbish out of the usual rubbish way first. In the Real World, there are no Romulans or “cloaking devices”. I have tried gently break that inconvenient fact to you long ago. Perhaps it’s that problem with attention span? That out of the way? Good.
Back to the Real World.
Just in case you missed all of my questions for the last year or so, and the recent ones above. I will ask you again here:
Where is your answer to the deaths of 20 million people worldwide per year due to fossil fuel pollution? Begin there. Then move on to what the fossil fuel industry should do to pay for reparation of two centuries of death dealing pollution?
Then you can answer this one:
1. Answer the question, do you agree, that 1 in 5 of all deaths for all reasons per year as reported by the BMJ are from fossil fuel pollution. If you don’t agree, then please supply verified and substantiated statistics to prove otherwise, such as BMJ fact checked reports?
2. Answer the question, do you agree that therefore there are 20 million deaths due to fossil fuel pollution per year worldwide based upon 2020 reported death for all reasons statistics. If you don’t agree, then please supply verified and substantiated statistics to prove otherwise, such as BMJ fact checked reports?
3. Answer the question do you agree that by extrapolation of resulting health issues compared to the number of deaths (health issues resulting from identifiable causes such as fossil fuel pollution are always more than the death statistics). If you don’t agree, then please supply verified and substantiated statistics to prove otherwise, such as BMJ fact checked reports?
4. Answer the question, do you agree that the inevitable effects from fossil fuel pollution will create severe health issues of at least 10 times the number of deaths, By calculation, that would be = 200 million health issues worldwide per year due to fossil fuel pollution. If you don’t agree, then please supply verified and substantiated statistics to prove otherwise, such as BMJ fact checked reports?
5. Answer the question, do you agree with the further statistical assessment would indicate that the true likely number of severe health effects, due to fossil fuel pollution, may well be 50 times the number of deaths per year. Or even 100 times the deaths per year = 1 or 2 billion deleterious health effects worldwide from fossil fuel pollution. If you don’t agree, then please supply verified and substantiated statistics to prove otherwise, such as BMJ fact checked reports?
6. Answer the question, do you believe that those figures do not take into account the deaths and health issues to all living creatures from fossil fuel pollution. And that those figures may well exceed many more millions of deaths and health problems than to the human beings. If you don’t agree, then please supply verified and substantiated statistics to prove otherwise, such as BMJ fact checked reports?
Continued below:
Continued from above:
7. Answer the question if you agree that the number of deaths to all wildlife, being so much greater than to human beings, have contributed to the fact that Planet Earth is in the 6th major extinction level event in the Earths history? If you don’t agree, then please supply verified and substantiated statistics to prove otherwise, such as BMJ fact checked reports?
8. Answer the question, do you agree that fossil fuel pollution has contributed and has greatly exacerbated the unprecedented rapid rise in temperatures worldwide and has caused more than 1.2 degrees Celsius and will, by recent statistical predictions, increase worldwide temperatures to 2.4 degree Celsius or more. If you don’t agree, then please supply verified and substantiated statistics to prove otherwise, such as BMJ fact checked reports?
9. Answer the question, do you agree that the melting of the polar ice caps and the melting of the frozen methane below oceans and on land, is increasing the amount of methane in the atmosphere, and that is an acceleration of greenhouse gasses that is and will lead to more greenhouse effects? If you don’t agree, then please supply verified and substantiated statistics to prove otherwise, such as BMJ fact checked reports?
10. Answer the question, do you agree that the Medical Profession under their Hippocratic Oath. Are bound to object and seek to address the effects of fossil fuel pollution to everyone in the UK, and hence the letter of concern about further fossil fuel extraction in their letter to the government as detailed in the heading and text above? If you don’t agree, then please supply verified and substantiated statistics to prove otherwise, such as BMJ fact checked reports?
11. Answer the question, do you agree, that these issues must be transmitted to the government and to the fossil fuel corporations for their detailed and substantiated reply. If you don’t agree, then please supply verified and substantiated statistics to prove otherwise, such as BMJ fact checked reports?
12. Answer the question, do you agree that the fossil fuel corporations have vastly profited from the increase in the price of fossil fuels and that a windfall tax on the fossil fuel corporations is the best way of insuring that people will not have to choose between heating their homes and feeding themselves and their children? If you don’t agree, then please supply verified and substantiated statistics to prove otherwise, such as BMJ fact checked reports?
Answer those questions and if the answers are satisfactory, I may consider your request. However, I suspect there are far more discussions about that question behind locked doors right now.
I will await your imminent reply.