The EPA, as part of the National Dialogue on Climate Action, will host a public lecture exploring health and climate change with Professor Hugh Montgomery MB.BS, BSc,FRCP, MD, FRGS, FRI, FFICM

It took 3.5 billion years of evolution before multicelled life appeared on our planet, another 525 million years before the first human walked the Earth. But our numbers have grown seven-fold - by over 6.5 billion - in only 90 years. Each of us is using more and more, exhausting finite resources and depleting those otherwise sustainable. We have more than halved the number of vertebrates on the planet since only 1970 with 8 species becoming extinct each hour - the greatest and fastest mass extinction the planet has ever seen.

The final blow to the fragile pyramid upon which humanity totters is climate change. For 350 million years, carbon dioxide was drawn down by our biomass and locked away as fossil fuels. We only started burning these about 250 years ago, with most of the growth in resultant emissions of greenhouse gases occurring in the last 50 years. Trapping long wave radiation, energy is being added to our atmosphere at a rate equivalent to 5 Hiroshima bombs every second. And as energy in our atmosphere makes 'weather', extreme weather events are becoming more serious and frequent.

What does this mean for the future of human health and survival?

The lecture will be chaired by Dr John Bowman

6:00pm – Refreshments and Registration
7:00pm – Lecture
7:45pm – Questions and Answers Session
8:15pm – Ends

Attendance is free, but advance booking is essential.

This lecture will be broadcast live to the web. For information on this and related climate science information please see: www.epa.ie/climate/communicatingclimatescience

Professor Hugh Montgomery MB.BS, BSc,FRCP, MD, FRGS, FRI, FFICM is Professor of Intensive Care Medicine at University College London and Director of the Centre for Human Health & Performance at University College London and has published over 450 scientific papers. He is one of the three co-chairs of the Lancet Countdown on Health & Climate Change, and practices as a consultant in intensive care at the Whittington Hospital in North London. Hugh has a strong interest in environmental impacts on health, and in climate change in particular. Hugh is one of the founders of the UCL MSc course in Climate Change and Health and a founding member of the UKs Climate Change & Health Council. He has been awarded the title of London Leader by the London Sustainable Development Commission for his work in climate change and health. Hugh has authored a number of scientific books, two children’s novels and is a keen competitor in 100km Ultra marathons.

Title picture image: Lisa Cullimore