As the climate change meetings kick off in Copenhagen today, many skeptics suggest little progress can be made in the next two weeks. This isn't for lack of solutions. In fact, for months, Bulletin authors have been proposing ways in which to build and support international strategies toward slowing climate change. Are the world's politicians and diplomats listening?
China might still be considered a developing country, but at Copenhagen, Beijing's posture needs to reflect that of the global economic power it has become.
Climate negotiations are at a standstill as developed and developing countries argue over who should limit their carbon emissions first. But there is a way to break the roadblock.
Instead of pouring resources into expensive geoengineering research, we should pursue low-tech reproductive health and women's empowerment programs that have widespread social benefits and can reduce CO2 emissions.
Even taken together, today's international governance organizations aren't capable of addressing the changing climate. The necessary step toward rectifying this problem: a new financial architecture that supports both adaptation and mitigation strategies.
Despite the well-known relationship between climate change and health, WHO has been only tangentially involved in major international climate efforts--a situation that must change.