WA doctors call for less gas and climate change action

A group of West Australian doctors want the government to do more to protect the community from the effects of climate change.

Doctors for the Environment (WA Branch) are calling on the Cook government to stop approving gas projects and reduce emissions.

It also wants legislators to include “ambitious” 2030 and interim targets in the new Climate Change Bill 2023 to be introduced to state parliament this week.

The doctors say heat-related hospitalisations have “exploded”, with over 7000 patients admitted due to extreme heat in the last decade.

“Over this period 300 Australians died directly from heatwaves,” spokesperson and general practitioner Tim Leahy said on Tuesday.

Climate change was a public health challenge that required urgent action, he said.

“The WA health system is already under significant pressure – we cannot afford a future where healthcare professionals are constantly forced to respond to climate change-induced heatwaves.”

The group pointed to The Lancet medical journal's recently released Annual Climate-Health report and said the community was now exposed to twice as many heatwave days compared to the period 1986-2005.

Heat-related deaths of people older than 65 increased by 85 per cent compared to 1990-2000.