Mayday! Mayday! Mayday! It’s Earth Day
We need Earth Day every day.
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EARTH & PSYCHIATRY
The Earth is in increased distress. Just take these representative headlines so far in 2021.
- “INDIA: Chamoli glacial outburst flood kills 26, leaves 200 missing.” Disaster Report. February 9, 2021.
- “COVID is our mass tutorial, our dress rehearsal for all the degradations as well as the tragedies that the climate emergency could bring.” The Wall Street Journal. March 19, 2021.
- “Australia’s worst floods in decades quicken concern about climate change.” The New York Times. March 22, 2021.
-“Monthly temperature records smashed in Europe beneath sprawling heat dome.” The Washington Post. April 1, 2021.
- “Florida crisis highlights a nationwide risk from toxic ponds.” The New York Times. April 6, 2021.
- “North Korea nuke fears as ‘heightened activity’ seen at nuclear site weeks after Kim Jong-un’s ballistic missile tests.” The Sun, UK Edition. April 8, 2021.
- “Greta Thunberg to boycott U.N. climate conference over vaccine inequality.” The Washington Post. April 9, 2021.
Will we answer these distress calls from the Earth? Psychiatric TimesTM is doing so. In our series on Psychiatry & Earth Day, we offer a unique collection of worldwide perspectives and lifelines. We have to head off advancing climate instability, pre and posttraumatic reactions, toxic and COVID-19 brain damage, disorders of despair, and more. Academic articles and presentations are not nearly enough. Advocate and agitate! We need Earth Day every day.
Dr Moffic is an award-winning psychiatrist who has specialized in the cultural and ethical aspects of psychiatry. A prolific writer and speaker, he received the one-time designation of being a Hero of Public Psychiatry from the Assembly of the American Psychiatric Association in 2002. He has recently been leading Tikkun Olam advocacy movements on climate instability, burnout, Islamophobia, and anti-Semitism for a better world. He serves on the Editorial Board ofPsychiatric TimesTM.
